Ah, dashboards. The modern executive’s window into their company’s soul. Or at least, it should be. But after reviewing hundreds of dashboards from clients in SaaS, e-commerce, retail, and manufacturing in the first half of 2025 alone, we’ve realized something uncomfortable: most dashboards are… broken.
Let’s fix that. Here’s a list of the most common mistakes we’ve observed—and what to do about them.
1. One Dashboard to Rule Them All
Mistake: A single dashboard used for everything: daily operations, weekly reporting, board presentations, strategic analysis.
Why it fails: Different decisions require different views. Cramming everything into one dashboard overwhelms users, muddies purpose, and slows decisions.
Fix: Separate your dashboards by cadence and audience:
Daily Dashboards: Health checks with 2-3 key metrics, ideal for morning coffee.
Weekly Dashboards: Campaign and team performance (e.g., a SaaS company using a dashboard to track churn and new MRR each Monday).
Monthly Dashboards: Strategic views, budget vs. actuals, NPS breakdowns by region.
Board Dashboards: Clean, high-level metrics with contextual storytelling.
Example: One of our manufacturing clients cut weekly ops meeting time by 60% after splitting dashboards by daily operations (machine downtime, throughput) vs. monthly KPI reviews.
2. Metrics for Metrics' Sake
Mistake: Tracking dozens of legacy KPIs no one uses.
Why it fails: The business evolves. Dashboards don’t. And suddenly, you’re optimizing for outdated goals.
Fix: Build a metric pyramid that mirrors your business model. Regularly audit relevance.
Example: A mid-sized e-commerce client removed 15 outdated KPIs from their weekly report and focused instead on three composite metrics: LTV, repeat purchase rate, and fulfillment SLA. Result? Clearer discussions. Better decisions. Faster action.
3. No Actionability
Mistake: A dashboard that shows numbers—but gives no clues about what to do next.
Why it fails: Data without context is noise. And no one likes guessing games.
Fix:
Compare against plans or historical benchmarks.
Flag deviations (e.g., sales vs. plan -15% = red flag).
Use clear signals: up = green, stable = gray, down = red.
Example: In a global SaaS client, we added “plan vs. actual” bars with color-coded deltas. Result: their sales managers started using the dashboard daily—for the first time.
4. No Visual Hierarchy
Mistake: All numbers look the same. Nothing stands out. Users don’t know where to look.
Why it fails: Your eyes shouldn’t work harder than your brain.
Fix:
Create visual contrast between headline metrics and deep dives.
Use white space, color, typography, and groupings to guide attention.
Example: For a large retail chain, we introduced visual zoning: top-line revenue front and center, store-level breakdowns on the right, trend insights below. Engagement jumped by 30%.
5. No Color Coding by Domain
Mistake: Every metric looks identical. Sales, finance, marketing—same blue numbers.
Why it fails: No ownership. No domain clarity.
Fix: Apply color-coding or icon systems to cluster metrics by department.
Example: A manufacturing client color-coded their dashboards: green for production, orange for maintenance, blue for logistics. Department heads now instantly know which metrics belong to them.
6. No Signals → No Insight → No Action
Mistake: Users spot a drop in metrics… and do nothing. No documentation. No hypotheses. No follow-up.
Why it fails: Signals die unless they’re captured and converted.
Fix: Build a signal-insight-action loop:
Signal: Sales dropped by 12% in EMEA.
Insight: Attribution points to product supply delays.
Action: Increase inventory buffer for that region.
Example: A logistics company we work with tracks 37 recurring signals each week. They documented 212 actionable insights in Q2—resulting in savings of $480,000.
7. Decisions Disconnected from Dashboards
Mistake: Strategic decisions are made, but dashboards remain unchanged.
Why it fails: No feedback loop = data irrelevance.
Fix: After every major decision:
Annotate the dashboard.
Track post-decision metrics.
Adjust views and thresholds accordingly.
Example: A mid-sized construction firm started annotating dashboards after strategy meetings. Within three months, dashboard adoption increased by 45%, and decision-making cycles shortened by 22%.
What You Can Do Today
1. Book a Dashboard Audit
Let us show you examples of dashboards that actually work. Free, honest, fast.
2. Ask: “What Decision Does This Dashboard Support?”
If the answer is vague, you need a redesign.
3. Track Your Decisions
We’ll help you build a signal → insight → action pipeline.
4. Start Small, Start Right
Focus on one dashboard. One role. One purpose.