This article will focus on enabling smarter decision-making through the use of dashboards in monthly financial presentations.

Graphics are basically everywhere you turn, populating kitchen pantries and our wardrobes, too.  Red Crow Marketing Inc. reported that “digital marketing experts estimate that most Americans are exposed to around 4,000 to 10,000 advertisements each day.” Since we’re culturally more drawn to visuals, doesn’t it follow that applying visuals to your financial statements and presentations would be more effective? Consider the reality of having to review multiple pages of data-heavy spreadsheets. Is this the most effective way for you to extract your financial analytics at the end of every month?  Dashboards can be useful in this context.  Dashboards are charts, graphs, and scorecards that highlight data trends, successes, and challenges with key performance indicators (KPIs), whether you’re looking at a department, an entire organization, a product, a store, or a region.  Dashboards present important data from various financial and operational sources on one page, using tables and graphs to summarize a significant amount of information.  In this article, Solver Controller Gina Louie discusses her experiences in presenting month-end financials to the leadership team.

 

Why is it important to have month-end financial presentations?

Louie: It is essential to have month-end financial presentations because decision-makers and stakeholders of the company can get an accurate idea of how the organization is performing from a financial standpoint, including what areas of the company are succeeding or maybe require some additional attention.  Moreover, a financial presentation is essential to highlighting variances or trends when comparing actuals and budgeted and/or forecasted expectations.  Having monthly presentations enables managers and executive teams with enough time to contribute new data or make corrections if necessary before a calendar quarter or year is complete.

 

 

 

What are some perks to utilizing a dashboard in your month-end financials?   

Louie: Using a dashboards allows me to quickly point out to my audience of decision-makers the operational areas that deserve additional attention – all in a streamlined presentation.  It also enables me to pinpoint special trends that I have noticed in specific areas, such as account receivable, revenues, direct costs, or operating expenses. There are a lot of ways to slice and dice the financial data that I am bringing together, but having a dashboard makes it visually simpler and more concise when presenting a financial summary to the executive team.

 

If you would like to learn more about the benefits of dashboards in your month-end financial presentations, click here. 

 

 

By Solver, www.solverglobal.com