What Are KPI Dashboards?

Key takeaways

Key performance indicator (KPI) dashboards help you visually track multiple key performance indicators in one place. 

• Common types of KPI dashboards include operational, strategic, tactical, and analytical. 

• Marketing specialists, business intelligence analysts, and executives use KPI dashboards to track analytics.

• You can use KPI dashboards to support data-driven decision-making, conduct an overall health check of your organization, and track organizational goals. 

Explore more about KPI dashboards, the different types, what you can use them for, some pros and cons, and how to start tracking your KPIs with a KPI dashboard. If you want to continue developing your skills in business analytics, try the Business Analytics Specialization from the University of Pennsylvania. In just two months, you can gain skills in data-driven decision making, supply and demand modeling, and predictive analytics. 

What are KPI dashboards?

KPI (key performance indicator) dashboards help you visually track multiple key performance indicators in one place. You can quickly see if your business is meeting its goals through a combination of graphs, charts, and other visual data representations. Having a KPI dashboard on the same program you use to track your KPIs allows you to see real-time adjustments to what you’re tracking when you add new targets and input new data sources. This way, anyone in the business, from high-level stakeholders to employees, can understand how the business performs in every area.

Types of KPI dashboards

You can choose from various types of KPI dashboards depending on your needs. How you want to organize a KPI dashboard depends on the KPIs you and your team need to track. KPI dashboards primarily come in four types:

• Operational dashboards

• Strategic dashboards

• Tactical dashboards

• Analytical dashboards

Explore each dashboard type and some example dashboards that fall under each category. 

Operational dashboards

Operational dashboards cover information about your business's day-to-day operations. Managers and employees use these dashboards to inform their decision-making about daily operations. Some examples of operational dashboards include:

• Sales dashboards: Allow sales representatives and managers to track daily sales in real-time to see if they are meeting their goals

• Inventory dashboards: Allow you to track the daily inventory levels to know when to restock

• Marketing dashboards: Allow the marketing team to track daily metrics like view count, follower count, or bounce rate

Strategic dashboards

Strategic dashboards allow you to track KPIs about the overall health of your business. They track macro trends and missions. Some examples of strategic dashboards include:

• Executive dashboards: Allow senior-level management and executives to see KPIs related to overall business health, such as profit and earnings

• Financial dashboards: Allow accountants and finance managers to see financial data like purchases, debt to equity, and revenue to evaluate financial health

Tactical dashboards

Tactical dashboards help you gain insight into specific goals or departments instead of following the day-to-day activities or macro KPIs. They track specific KPIs related to goals and projects. Some types of tactical dashboards you could implement include:

• Employee dashboards: Allow the HR department and managers to assess employee productivity

• Milestone dashboards: Allow for specific goal tracking, objectives, and targets across an organization

• Department dashboards: Allow for each department to track their projects, team, and how the individual department is meeting their KPIs

Analytical dashboards

Analytical dashboards focus on tracking overall data trends within an organization. They search for the root issues within trends that cause bottlenecks in efficiency, production, sales, and so on. Analytical dashboards allow you to predict future trends using historical data. 

What are the 5 main KPIs?

While the main KPIs your institution tracks may differ, five common KPIs to begin tracking include [1]:

• Financial

• Full-time equivalents

• Customer satisfaction

• Margins

• Product volumes

Read more: How to Improve Operational Efficiency and Reduce Costs

What is a KPI dashboard used for?

You use a KPI dashboard to have real-time visual information about how your business performs in every respect, from marketing campaigns to company growth. Dashboards are a key business intelligence tool that allows organizations to bring all their data streams into one place that anyone can see, interpret, and understand. In short, they support and encourage everyone to make data-driven decisions. 

Who uses KPI dashboards?

All stakeholders and members of an organization can use KPI dashboards to support their work and decision-making at all levels. Some roles, such as executives, marketers, human resources, and sales teams, may use dashboards more frequently. Below are some jobs that use dashboards to support their roles.

All salary information represents the median total pay from Glassdoor as of May 2026. These figures include base salary and additional pay, which may represent profit-sharing, commissions, bonuses, or other compensation.

Marketing specialist

Median total pay (Glassdoor): $75,000 [2]

Job outlook from 2024 to 2034: 6 percent [3]

Marketing specialists work in various media to find and retain customers, build brand awareness, and manage social media accounts. These teams might use a KPI dashboard to view social media analytics and track the performance of new marketing campaigns. 

Business intelligence analyst

Median total pay (Glassdoor): $117,000 [4]

Job outlook from 2024 to 2034: 34 percent [5]

A collects, analyzes, and shares data with relevant stakeholders within a business. They use data to help you find more efficient processes within your business. Some KPI dashboards integrate business intelligence capabilities.

Executives

Median total pay (Glassdoor): $218,000 [6]

Job outlook from 2024 to 2034: 4 percent [7]

Executives manage a company by creating policies and procedures and then directing their implementation to department heads and managers. They oversee many financial and organizational procedures in the business and use executive dashboards to assess their company's financial health. 

KPI dashboard advantages and challenges

KPI dashboards give teams many advantages when visualizing data, KPIs, and goals. However, dashboards can come with some learning curves and setup challenges. Examine some of the advantages and challenges KPI dashboards provide.

Advantages

KPI dashboards help streamline data visualization and goal setting. Some advantages to using them include:

• Organizational overview: KPI dashboards give your organization a view of its health as a business

• Data-driven decision-making: All stakeholders in your organization can visualize trends and use that information to make informed decisions

• Goal-tracking: KPI dashboards allow you to track metrics that give you specific details about whether departments, teams, and the business are reaching their goals

Challenges

Even with the many benefits of KPI dashboards, their upkeep and implementation come with some challenges. Some of these include:

• Compatibility: Some KPI dashboards may have compatibility issues with the data streams you usually pull from, dampening their efficiency if you manually input data.

• KPI tracking: KPI dashboards will only work if you select the proper KPIs to track. If the criteria you select are too broad or too specific, the information the dashboard displays will not be helpful in decision-making.

• Cost and size: Depending on the size of your business, the cost of a comprehensive KPI dashboard might not be within your budget. It’s important that you weigh various options so you can get the most return on investment.

How to get started with KPI dashboards

In building your organization’s first KPI dashboards, you must stay focused on the KPIs you want to track and how they align with the goals of your business. Follow these steps to start implementing a KPI dashboard:

1. Define attainable goals.

2. Identify KPIs that align with your goals.

3. Assess your data sources and how you’ll connect them.

4. Create a KPI dashboard that fits your needs and budget.

5. Integrate your data into your dashboard. 

6. Monitor your dashboard and make updates as needed. 

Explore our free resources for data professionals

Consider career paths, assess your skills, and connect with resume guidance while browsing our Career Resources Hub. Or if you want to learn more about data analysis, check out these free resources:

• Watch on YouTube: The Future of Data Visualization: AI & Automation Trends 

• Study terms: Data Analysis Terminology | Coursera 

• Hear from an expert: 7 Questions with a Data Analytics Professor 

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