My Top 3 tips to reduce the visual burden on your dashboard
In this article, I would like to share with you the three main tips I use to reduce the visual burden on users, and which I use most often when coaching dashboard designers.
Identifying the core issue
In so many instances, dashboards progressively grow complex. This complexity may arise from:
- Overly broad scope, leading to a single dashboard for too many different needs
- User-initiated evolution requests are executed without prior validation
- Frequent changes in approach due to developer turnover
- Influence from internal politics or company pressure
- Blindly migrating existing dashboard from old tools
The 4 Key Consequences
- Products: The outcome is overly complex dashboards, whether in terms of data utilization, performance, or layout. This complexity interferes with usability, decision-making, and consequently, the adoption of the dashboard.
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Costs: Dashboards require extensive development time. Redesigns become frequent, leading to escalating costs. What was initially estimated at $30K may now exceed $90K.
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Users: Users start to lose faith in the company's data strategy. They invest time in the design process only to see delayed or disappointing dashboard results.
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Data Teams: Data analysts, BI engineers, and Data engineers begin to lose sight of their roles' significance within the company.
My Top 3 tips in this situation:
- Treat your dashboards as real products => They're much more than a spreadsheet report
- Embrace a minimalist approach and stick to best practices in Data Visualization
- Involve stakeholders and end users as early as possible in the dashboard design process
And remember:
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