Quick Insight
One of the first questions people ask is, “How many metrics should I have on my dashboard?” One answer is to have as few metrics as possible that cover the most critical success factors. As a very rough guideline, I would recommend somewhere between 5 and 15 KPIs on your dashboard. The number depends on the size and complexity of your company.
One of the first questions people ask is, “How many metrics should I have on my dashboard?” I’ve seen some dashboards where the answer was “as many as we can squeeze on a page.”
I had a client that showed me his dashboard. It was an Excel workbook with dozens of graphs and multiple sheets. I asked him how often he looked at it and what he did with it. He admitted that he rarely looked at it because it was so overwhelming.
It’s different for every company. One answer is to have as few metrics as possible that cover the most critical success factors. As a very rough guideline, I would recommend somewhere between 5 and 15 KPIs on your dashboard.
The number depends on the size and complexity of your company. Too few, and you miss important information. Too many, and the importance of each metric is diluted. It’s a balance that each company must decide.
Here are a few major benefits of having only a few metrics:
- More focus
- Alignment
- Less overhead
When everything is a priority, nothing is a priority. A small set of metrics focuses the company on the very few things that are critical to your success.
- Rob Stephens
Founder of CFO Perspective and the Finance and Strategy Toolkit (FAST)
CFO Perspective Resources
Get all the CFO Perspective resources with a FAST (Finance and Strategy Toolkit) membership.