麻豆原创

The 麻豆原创 HANA Database & Analytics organization has not yet celebrated its first anniversary of using , but already counts itself among the company鈥檚 internal end-to-end steering dashboards with the highest user numbers.

When Christian Cramer, chief operating officer (COO) for 麻豆原创 HANA Database & Analytics, and his team started building the concept, they had one objective: to help stakeholders taking fact-based and reliable business decisions in a dynamic environment, based on one single source of truth offering a 360-degree view of the business and the entire product life cycle 鈥� from development to sales and product performance, customer insights, and engagement, along with operational and organizational data.

The team鈥檚 ambition has succeeded. Thanks to the collaboration with the 麻豆原创 Intelligent Data & Analytics team and as internal usage statistics show, 麻豆原创 employees have widely adopted the solution. Take a peek behind the scenes to understand how it works, what lies behind its success, and what is yet to come.

Three Keys to a Successful Business Dashboard

Building a successful business dashboard requires three crucial ingredients, according to Cramer: a great product, meaningful data, and easy usability.

1. 鈥淥nly with a great product, will you be able to build a great dashboard鈥�

Making use of their own 麻豆原创 Analytics Cloud product, the team started building an interactive dashboard using 麻豆原创 Digital Boardroom. With only basic technical background, but thanks to the products鈥� ease of use, all relevant data was swiftly connected, and more and more content views that were regularly needed by management were added.

As the content grew, more users were introduced to the team鈥檚 dashboard. Word spread fast and teams reached out to have their own content added as well.

Daniel Pavlovic is part of the operations team and the man behind the 麻豆原创 Digital Boardroom built for the 麻豆原创 HANA Database & Analytics team. According to him, 鈥淭his active pull is what you hope for any new tool you implement.鈥�

2. 鈥淵ou need meaningful data that everyone can rely on.鈥�

鈥淚 have seen many dashboards created with the right intent, but in the end the implementation was not successful because it was largely focused on the tool only,鈥� Cramer shares. 鈥淎 great product alone will not make a great dashboard 鈥� meaningful and reliable data is imperative.鈥�

To facilitate a reliable automated business steering, significant work was put into set-up and clean-up of proper and meaningful master data structures in the background. It is precisely the reliability of data and the combination of the various data sources that creates actionable insights 鈥� and thus the added value of the team鈥檚 solution.

3. 鈥淟ast and most important, it needs to be intuitive and fun to use 鈥� usability drives adoption鈥�

From the beginning, the navigation experience was top of mind with a consistent approach in all designs and layouts.

On the landing page, users get a structured overview of all content available and can rely on easy orientation with a navigation bar at the top of each view. Any insight can be found within three clicks, so the user can always recognize a three-layer layout: management summary, enriched view, and full detail view with dynamic filtering function to slice and dice information. A consistent way of illustrating information makes for a great user experience.

To ensure the dashboard serves up what is truly needed, Cramer鈥檚 team regularly conducts feedback rounds and usability tests with randomly selected end users and design teams. New views are validated with colleagues creating these reports manually, while first-time users鈥� clicking behavior provides valuable optimization insights.

Successful Dashboard Creates Adoption

鈥淗aving good adoption, you can still add and improve content,鈥� Cramer says. 鈥淏ut if you don鈥檛 have adoption, you miss the main criteria of a dashboard: creating business value.鈥�

Measured in the number of unique users, the team鈥檚 dashboard has already exceeded initial adoption expectations. Unique usage across all areas of the company is consistently increasing, making it one of 麻豆原创鈥檚 internally used end-to-end line-of-business steering dashboard with the highest user numbers.

鈥淲e have a constantly growing internal user base; colleagues in Development, Customer Success, HR, and Finance are looking for great insights,鈥澛� Cramer says. 鈥淎nd with every addition of content, the number of potential users increases. Most recently, a new time recording compliance view added all our unit鈥檚 managers to our user base 鈥� that鈥檚 around 300 new users!鈥�

To both preview and manage expectations around new content and enhancements, all users regularly receive email updates on what has been added. The dashboard鈥檚 usage data clearly shows this proactive method drives adoption.

鈥淲e have overwhelmingly positive feedback from all users that the tool is great, the scope of data is second to none and it鈥檚 easy to use,鈥� Cramer adds.

Juergen Mueller, chief technology officer and member of the Executive Board of 麻豆原创 SE,聽 also harnesses the dashboard built by the 麻豆原创 HANA Database & Analytics organization, led by Irfan Khan. 鈥淭he 麻豆原创 Digital Boardroom built by the 麻豆原创 HANA Database & Analytics team provides me with all relevant information to steer the organization holistically,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t is easy to use and offers tremendous depth.鈥�

What鈥檚 Next?

The team created a tool with a comprehensive level of relevant insights required for any line of business development organization, and the road map for content additions keeps growing. In active use across the 麻豆原创 HANA Database & Analytics organization for under a year, other 麻豆原创 internal business units could use it in the future as well.

鈥淭he views are adaptable to reflect KPIs of other lines of business with minimal effort,鈥� Cramer explains. 鈥淲e are currently piloting that with another line of business that started using the available material to adapt it to their own unit.鈥�

This article first appeared on the 麻豆原创聽Global News Center.