851 USING DASHBOARDS IN BUSINESS ANALYSIS Bradea Ioana , Sabău -Popa Diana Claudia, Boloș Marcel Ioan Department of Informatics and Cybernetics,… [613137]

851 USING DASHBOARDS IN BUSINESS ANALYSIS

Bradea Ioana , Sabău -Popa Diana Claudia, Boloș Marcel Ioan
Department of Informatics and Cybernetics, Faculty o f Economic Cybernetics, Statistics
and Informatics, The Academy of Economic Studies, Buc harest, Romania
Department of Finance and Accounting, Faculty of Eco nomics, University of Oradea,
Romania
[anonimizat]
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Abstract: Due to the development of information technology, ev ery enterprise has a lot of
data, which magnify the difficulties of selecting t he most relevant. Hence, appears the
mistake of measuring too many things. Owning too much i nformation, will lead to
vagueness, the opposite effect of a measuring system . This phenomenon does not
depend on the manager ’s ability to compute and communicate, but rather on the ability to
provide adequate information, to take good decisions and to compare results with the
planned objectives. These can be done through a use r interface – Dashboard, which is a
tool that allows the alignment of business processes and strategies implementation.
Dashboards are more than a collection of indicators and graphics, they are found in
different forms and interfaces. Dashboards answer to ma ny questions of the organization
and are addressed to different types of audiences. Be fore creating a Dashboard, we must
answer the following questions: who is our audience , what decisions should be taken after
the analysis, in what context will be used, how oft en should be measured the indicators?
Once an enterprise has identified a need for a dashb oard, managers must go through the
process of defining what they will include in their dashboard (key risk indicators and key
performance indicators). This paper shows how this met hodology has developed, the
main features and benefits of Dashboards, as well as the most used software for creating
them. As the main objective of the paper is to discus s how Dashboards can be used in
business analysis (BA), in introduction, there are pre sented some general ideas about BA
and benefits of using Dashboards. In the next secti on, there are presented several
definitions for Dashboards and the steps which must b e followed for implementing an
efficient one. In the case study is created a dashb oard for sales analysis of an enterprise,
using Tableau Public. The paper ends with some conclu sions and with the list of
references .

Keywords: dashboards – key performance indicators – management – business analysis
– Tableau Public.
JEL classification: C53, M10

1. Introduction

Acording to the International Institute of Business A nalysis (IIBA), business analysis
identifies the weaknesses of the enterprise and trie s to achieve those changes that
provide added value to stakeholders. Business analys is must be implemented across all
levels of the enterprise and help in defining the st rategy, the goals, the requirements for
projects and the improvement of technology and proces ses.
Every enterprise needs to magnify the business proces ses and to focus the activities on
a clear set of goals. This can be done by implement ing a Dasboard for each strategic
objective of the company, which selects, arranges an d shows the indicators in order to
achieve a synthesis of the enterprise activity on a single glance.

852 Developed in the 80's, Dashboard is a methodology f or analyzing and evaluating the
performances and risks of the enterprise, and is curr ently used by more than 40 percent
of the top 2,000 corporations in the world, in their Business Intelligence initiatives.
Dashboards enable the success of the enterprise, by o ffering the right information to the
right person at the right time. They may be consider ed an early warning system for
managers, showing the present position in relationshi p to their strategic objectives.
Dashboards can be created in Excel, Tableau Public, Reporting Services, SharePoint,
Microsoft SQL Server, Performance Point etc.. All the se tools can create dashboards,
allow decomposition of business objectives and crea te a strategy to incorporate the
necessary information. However most dashboards are cre ated in Excel, because the cost
of implementation is low and can be used to monitor the performance every week, day,
and sometimes every hour.

2. Dashboards
In the 80’s, managers tried to find a way to transfo rm the strategic objectives of the
enterprise in organizational behavior. Two researchers from Harvard, Kaplan and Norton,
who are considered the parents of Dashboards, created a system that transformed
strategies into actions, based on Balanced Scorecards method. After implementing it,
some enterprises achieved successes, while others con sidered it a generator of additional
expenses.
Over time, the model has developed and matured and i s now in the third generation,
suffering significant improvements. Currently, the mo del is used by companies around the
world (Hilton, Infosys, Ingersoll Rand, Kraft Food, Merck, Lockheed Martin, Marriott,
Motorola, Ricoh, Saatchi & Saatchi, Siemens, Cisco, S kandia, Statoil, UPS, US
Department of Commerce, US Army, FBI, Royal Air Forc e). In Romania, among the
companies that have implemented such a model are: Pe trom, Rompetrol, ING Romania,
UniCredit Tiriac Bank, Vodafone, City Pharma, Zentiv a, Accor Services, Kraft Food
Romania, Brau Union Romania, Danone, Anticoroziv, Ro mil Group, Ipsos Interactive
Services, Siemens România, Michelin România.
The methodology has been implemented also in the pu blic sector in Romania: The
Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Internal Affairs, mu nicipalities, county councils and
prefectures.
Modern dashboards display key performance indicators (K PIs) and key risk indicators
(KRIs), in related charts, maps and scorecards, in order to enable an enterprise focus on
the most important performance activities. The purpo se of the Dashboard is to display
information on a single screen in a clear manner, in order to be understood by everyone.
Dashboard is an application or a user interface that helps to measure the performance of
the enterprise, understand the organizational units a nd the business processes.
Due to web development, Dashboards began to be used to reflect financial indicators in
a manner understood by everyone. There are three types of dashboards:
operational,tactical and strategic.
The executive departments use the strategic and tac tical Dashboards, the midd-level
management uses all three types of Dashboards, whil e CEO uses strategic and
operational Dashboards.
When implementing a Dashboard should be considered: the objective, the audience, the
impact, the data needed to analyse the problem, if a re needed filters and in what format
will be used the Dashboard (PC, mobile, iPad, etc.).

853 3. Case study

The Dashboard created in this section was conducted with Tableau Public. Tableau
Public, created by a software company in Seattle, e nables interactive data visualization
and focuses on business intelligence. The product co nnects to relational databases,
cubes and cloud databases. Tableau Public allows th e creation of many types of graphs
that can be combined in dashboards and distributed on the internet. Currently used in all
areas, Tableau Public has imposed by the easy access not requiring programming skills.
Among the advantages of using Tableau Public we can mention:
· Speed – is the most important strength of Tableau Public. It is able to analyse
millions of rows and provide an answer in few second s, enabling decision making
in real time.
· Ease of use – based on the drag and drop option. Most of times, the graphics are
created by importing an Excel file.
· Engaging and interactive Dashboards – enables creation of smart charts and
graphs.
· Direct connection to databeses (Google Analytics, MySQL, Microsoft PowerPivot,
Oracle, SAP, Windows Azure Marketplace DataMarket, Ex cel, etc.)
· Easy sharing – can be easily distributed on internet and mobile de vices.
· Popular Tool of Business Intelligence

Next we built a Dashboard for an enterprise in Romania , which has as main activity the
production and sale of engine parts. Shareholders want to know how sales have evolved
in 2010, for this demanding a comprehensive report. T he first figure illustrates the
countries where they shipped the enterprise’s products by sales value and sales agent,
through whom the transaction was made. It can be see n that most customers are located
in Western Europe and preferred FedEx for products deliv ery.

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The other graphs show the products sold in each count ry, the products sold by each
salesperson and the customer preference for courier comp anies. After studying this
Dashboard, were made decisions about in which countri es should be more promoted the
enterprise products, the introduction of a remuneratio n system for employees according
to their sales performances and renegotiating contra cts with the courier companies
preferred by clients.

4. Conclusions
Dashboards might be implemented at all the levels of the enterprise, as a tool that
changes the business culture. One of the most impor tant benefit of using Dashboards is
the fact that managers can analyse a single screen w here are monitored the key risk
indicators, or the key performance indicators and can make decisions and undertake
actions to mitigate the risks and improve the performa nce of the enterprise.
Tableau Public is a useful tool for creating interac tive Dashboards, that analyse millions
of data in seconds. A Dashboard that monitors the ev olution of sales, enables the

856 manager to make decisions regarding: the market posit ion, the potential customers, the
performance of employees, who are the most efficient suppliers and collaborators etc..

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