Hi Everyone,

I hope you a wonderful Labor day weekend.

Did you hear?  Google’s Self Driving Car has been cruising through Blacksburg, Virginia.  Speculation suggests the Virginia Tech Smart Road may facilitate testing of this futuristic machine.  Congressman Bob Goodlatte took a closer look at the vehicle and Google gauged his reactions and that of the Blacksburg populace to that driver-less car.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed and hoping to see this innovation I have been following years.

And what better way to introduce the importance of a dashboard then the car that requires input over steering?

The dashboard or console of your business works much like this amazing car; it totally relies on where you want to go.  The goal you select gives you the latitude and longitude of your destination. Like the car, you will need to run the analysis of the path to that goal.  Let’s use Pronets as example.  We decide our goal is to reduce ticket time on our repairs.  Now we figure out how to get there, and design the map to guide us.  We want to make sure all of our staff is well trained and develop standardized questions to ask and quickly ascertain the client’s problem.  Google’s Self Driving Car uses lasers and cameras in addition to the GPS map builder to judge its surroundings and react properly to its immediate stimuli.  Your dashboard needs to be able to do that for your goals.  In this instance, I would want to see current ticket time closures.  I would want to analyze how many of my staff has certifications.  I would want to judge how many times my standardized questions successfully drilled down to the correct problem.  All of these graphs should be readily available to me in a dashboard.  I can then make better informed decisions, like selecting certifications that everyone MUST have or adding additional questions to help properly identify a user’s issue.

Business Intelligence helps guide a business to its goals.  The dashboard is your means to get there.  This week think about what your true business goal.  Remember this activates the guidance process!

Want to see how a driverless car works according to Google: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ye8zJDHH9D0

Want to see how business intelligence works:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaGqOPxHFkc&;list=PLWeRrYyP6wqe1XWOTpq_4bsqT0o7Ndu60