Create Project Management Dashboard in Excel
Excel is one the most used tools in the business environment internationally. Basically it’s a tool developed by Microsoft mainly based around spreadsheets. The good thing is it comes with powerful built in algorithms that you can use to analyze your data. If you want to you can visualize that data and view it in charts, diagrams etc. this will help you to communicate it better with your team so you guys could analyze and help make important business decisions. You can use Excel to create dashboards, reports, key performance indicators etc. it’s very a flexible tool and that’s why business managers and executives come to rely on it so heavily.
One of the most used programs you can create using Excel is the dashboard. Dashboards can range from easy to complex it all depends on the user’s skills. They are used to give you an overview of your business. After it’s created it will allow you to track the different processes of your business. You have all sorts of dashboards you can create using Excel serving different functionalities.
These include dashboards for sales, key performance indicators, customer service, employee performance etc. You can even create a dashboard for project management dashboard. This one will help give you an overview of your different projects by checking and analyzing your different business processes.
Creating a project management dashboard can be quite difficult. Overall Excel in itself is difficult. It can take a lot of time and effort to learn it. On the positive side once you’ve reached a certain level of mastery everything will get easier. It all boils down to dedicating yourself at the start which is the most difficult area of learning process to get through.
As stated before creating a project management dashboard can be difficult. That’s why it’s easier to just download a template off of the internet. It will surely make your life easier and is quite easy to find .You can just search for (project management dashboard Excel template) and you will see a lot of templates you can download and choose from.
It takes a certain level of knowledge to be able to use the templates in Excel. That’s why it’s important to at least learn the basics of creating a simple dashboard in Excel. If you interested in learning to creating a project management dashboard in Excel you can see a tutorial below.
If you are a beginner this tutorial will help you out in getting a taste of what Excel is like. If you have some experience under your belt, this tutorial can also help you as well because creating a project management dashboard can be a new skill you can add to your toolkit.
Project Management Dashboard Excel Tutorial and Templates
Step 1
Go on report which can easily be seen on the ribbon. Next you are going to choose “new report”. You are going to then name the report to your preferences.
You will then see a blank report. Insert a table into your report so you can easily add and view the different areas of your project such as percentage complete, project finish date etc. To this go on “Design” and choose the Table button.
Step 2
Your table will now be set up; next you must use the Field List dialogue on the right hand section. This will help you to choose the different information you want to see on your table. You can use it to track items such as work, date, cost etc.
It will make it easy for you to get the data you are searching for. If necessary you can choose a filter, sorting etc. it all depends on the data that you would like to see in your table.
Step 3
To put a chart on your report, this can easily be done the exact same way as adding a table. To do this, click the Design ribbon and after that you can choose chart. There are going to be a lot of charts you can choose from examples of these would be bar chart, line etc. after the chart is set up; you can now use the field list.
You can change up the chart to your liking by adding in colors. You can also use formatting to change up certain aspects of it. If you want you can add images by going on images which can be seen in the ‘insert’ area on the design ribbon.
In summary this is a very simple method you can use to create a project management dashboard. If you want to use a more advance dashboard as stated before you can easily download one on the internet. Over all this a very useful tutorial which if you are beginner can help you out a lot in getting the hang of Excel.
This can also be a great learning curve for you as well that you can build upon going forward.