In the dynamic life of current times, information curation is worth gold.
And a dashboard is surely one of the management tools most valued by executives of companies, associations, and consultancies operating in Institutional and Government Relations (IGR or GovRel).
After all, a good dashboard is highly effective and powerful in conveying crucial information to decision-makers in the easiest and most interactive way.
Basically, dashboards intuitively and visually pleasantly present a series of indicators – even in real-time – that help measure the temperature of relevant topics, signaling risks and opportunities.
It is, therefore, a great medium for providing insights.
Here at Sigalei, we have evolved our operations to offer increasingly customized solutions that help clients in their IGR decision-making processes.
In this article, I give some tips on how to develop a dashboard.
Read our tips*:
1. Think carefully about the goals and needs of the IGR decision-makers who will see the dashboard
Before going out and building a dashboard, it's highly worthwhile to invest time in some basic questions that can save wasted time later on.
In this regard, ask yourself the following:
a) What is the goal of the IGR team in creating a dashboard?
b) What is the dashboard intended for? And what are the expectations of these decision-makers?
c) What indicators (KPIs) will be used? Will they be useful to meet the decision-makers' objectives?
These questions are essential. After all, a dashboard has – or should have – the ultimate goal of making life easier for the IGR team and, of course, the decision-makers in the organization, association members, or consultancy clients.
First of all, it's worth listing the group of people who will actively use the dashboard, as well as their roles. The ideal is to imagine the routine of these groups of people. Ask yourself how they will view the dashboard, how many times a day, at what times, and for what purposes. What goals are they trying to achieve? Do they want to know, for example, how many times the company or association was mentioned in a critical situation? Or whether the Bill of interest has advanced or not?
Do not move forward in the dashboard creation process until you have asked all the questions about the users and, subsequently, established one to three truly relevant goals for those users. An internal survey or quick interview with some of them can be very helpful to gain focus.
Once the goals are defined, it's worth thinking about which indicators, under measurement, will truly be capable of bringing valuable insights. It is also worth understanding how these KPIs are currently visualized in the company, association, or client (Excel? CRM?). Are there improvement points to be proposed in the visualization format?
Finally, what narrative resources can help give a snapshot of what is happening in a brief glance?
All these questions are essential so you can develop a dashboard that everyone is interested in using. The dashboard needs to be both easy to use and focused on already utilized tools. Otherwise, the effort will be in vain.
2. Make sure the data that will feed the dashboard
Once your audience and goals are mapped, an analysis of the data that will feed the dashboard's graphical indicators is worthwhile.
Credibility is the soul of a dashboard. Therefore, data must be clean, accurate, consistent, complete, and aligned with your company's strategic objectives.
In the Institutional and Government Relations monitoring process, as we've seen, there is a lot of noise – and the importance of this step is to filter out exactly what is relevant. An effort should be made so that this process is automated and technologically integrated with the data capture source. This ensures more speed in the process – and higher quality dashboards.
3. Choose appropriate charts for each indicator
Choosing the right chart makes all the difference for the success of a dashboard.
Tables? Gauges? Bar Charts? Or pie? Or Lines? Etc?
Each has pros and cons. It is paramount to test which one will be most appropriate to visually summarize what is happening.
Bar charts, for example, are great for temporal comparisons and for signaling trends – decline or growth. Pie charts, on the other hand, are good only to show proportions – for example, out of 100 news items, how many were positive or negative. Gauges help highlight the temperature of an indicator – and can have colors (red, critical).
4. Provide a correct and balanced scenario
An important point in selecting data and charts is that they reflect the correct and precise scenario. A dashboard that only brings positive results or fails to provide context makes no sense – metrics must allow comparisons of numbers for a proper analysis of the advance or retreat of a stakeholder's movement, for example.
It is important to be attentive to the interests of decision-makers. Ideally, an IGR dashboard should bring critical data providing a clear snapshot of what, for example, recently occurred in the National Congress regarding a bill, real-time data reflecting what is happening, and even insights signaling trends of risks and opportunities allowing anticipation of movements.
By having a complete overview, decision-makers will have the chance to evaluate whether the IGR strategy should move forward or if it deserves a review.
5. Invest in design
Design is everything. And dashboards will only have value to your audience with good design.
In essence, the best dashboards are visually the simplest, cleanest, and most minimal. They should tell a story. And this starts with the strategic positioning of the charts. It's evident that results and key indicators of IGR performance must be prominently displayed at the top of the dashboard, followed by supporting data.
It's also a function of design to allow a quick comparative reading of the data presented in the charts. Design should always take into account how people's logical visual flow works – and the way to scan indicators in a dashboard is usually in a "Z" pattern, that is, from left to right, diagonally, to resume from left to right.
Avoid cluttering the dashboard with too much data. Keep in mind that decision-makers have little time. They will only see utility in the dashboard if it's not difficult to use.
Another point of attention is the choice of colors. The ideal is to select a few colors – three, say – and keep the pattern. It's also worth using colors that cannot be confused. Red, yellow, and blue or green usually work well.
Finally, there are always predefined dashboard templates. It is a time saver to study which styles, layouts, and charts are most appropriate for your reality. They can easily be customized to the reality of your company, association, or client.
And customizing the dashboards, based on the colors, logo, and font of the company, association, or client, certainly helps to create engagement with the users of the tool.
6. Add interactivity and new technologies
Dashboards win many points with their audience if you give them control power.
Interactive dashboards offer decision-makers various possibilities that allow them to select data and information with a few clicks and examine them more deeply as they progress in using the tool.
There are a number of features that work well with interactivity: chart zooms, widgets, and the possibility of selecting timeframes and types of data and documents, among other resources.
Interactivity always has to play in favor of the IGR decision-making process: simplify analytical processes and, as much as possible, provide answers to questions immediately.
In this process, there are several more advanced technologies, including artificial intelligence and predictive analytics, which retrieve historical data to point out trends – and intelligent data alert systems to signal goals achieved or risk situations in regulatory issues. This already significantly improves the experience of decision-makers.
7. Program dashboards for mobile devices
Always bear in mind that the target audience for dashboards is formed by hyper-connected people, from the moment they wake up to the moment they go to sleep. They have access to information 24 hours a day, 7 days a week – on various platforms.
Smartphones and tablets, for example, are devices used at any time of day, anywhere, by decision-makers. Therefore, it is essential to design the dashboard for mobile devices – both from a technology and design standpoint.
Today, fortunately, any specialized vendor has this capability to program for all devices. Ask for these resources so the dashboard fully complies with the
8. Ask for feedback and redo
Once the implementation of the dashboard project is finished, asking for feedback is indispensable.
It is worth testing with those who will use it, to verify possible adjustments or improvement points that allow the evolution of the dashboard.
This can be done in various ways – from directly observing how users interact with the dashboard to asking them for comments on points they consider confusing.
*
The dashboard is a good thermometer of the Institutional and Government Relations work of a company, association, or consultancy.
These tips allow everyone to be on the same page – and the performance of the IGR team can be much more assertive with the engagement of decision-makers.
Here at Sigalei, our Services team has been building these solutions with some of our clients – and each of them has their own needs.
With these solutions, we are able to integrate all the potential of our monitoring platform and the analytical capacity of our experts.
We are certain that with our knowledge, we can help your organization improve processes and further enhance deliveries.
Send a message and I'll tell you how!
I await your message.
* Frederico Oliveira - Founder & CEO of Sigalei
