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Performance analysis answers the questions. How are we doing with respect to
- previously (last week, last year)?
- plans and goals (budget, forecast, targets)?
- others (peers, competitors,external benchmarks)?
Often in terms of finance:
- revenue, income, debts, profit,…
- outputs (the products and services we deliver or sell)
- operations (staff, engineering, health & safety, complaints…)
Follow-on questions
- What were the main contributors / detractors?
- What are our biggest risks? - often grouped as Red –Amber-Green
- Are we near to breaching any limits? (These often have an action plan associated with them.)
- How do the different individual parts of the organisation compare?
A set of numbers, usually ratios, that summarise the health of the
organisation
Managers often set limits or desired range
Calculated at various cuts e.g. by each product and service
Examples:
- Health: waiting times, operation success rates
- Finance: liquidity ratios, earnings-per-share
Each part of the organisation has own set of KPIs
Sometimes more is good, sometimes more is bad
- Report produced at regular intervals e.g. weekly, often for an exec status meeting.
- Senior management are the audience
- Time element is always important
- Commentary often needed to add context to numbers.
- More sophisticated features (if available) for example
- drill from summary to details
- filter
- What-if analysis
Most useful visual elements
- Top N tables (with data bars)
- Line charts to show progress over time
- Cards with states (that change when there is a breach) for “badass” numbers.
- Alerts (automatic notifications of a breach)
- Bullet charts (this year vs last year vs budget)
- Reference lines for normal operating range
Considerations
- Different views of the data for different groups; pros and cons
- Timeliness - daily by 7:30 am or monthly?
- Does exec meeting want report as static PDF (or cut/paste into PPT)?
- Do execs want to see on their mobiles
- Adjustments need a properly controlled process