tgroenwals shared this post · Apr 29
Sebastian Hewing

“Help! I’m drowning in ad-hoc requests!”

Stakeholders ask for dashboards. You deliver.
Then they ask for another dashboard.
Then a slightly different cut.
Then export it to Excel.

You’re not building strategy. You’re running a reporting helpdesk.

Here’s a 9-question canvas that flips the script:

  1. Problem
    What’s the real business pain?
    If you can’t name it in plain English, don’t build anything yet.

  2. Users
    Who are you solving it for?
    No, “the business” is not a user.

  3. UVP
    Why should users come to your team instead of just guessing, using gut feel, or pulling GA numbers?

  4. Solution
    Your product isn’t a dashboard.
    It’s the combination of decisions, workflows, and systems that drive action.

  5. Distribution
    Adoption isn’t magic.
    Bake it into the user’s day-to-day. Motivate, enable, and trigger usage.

  6. Systems
    No one should need three meetings and 5 weeks to get data.
    Automate the boring stuff. Let your team breathe.

  7. Outcomes
    Measure what matters:
    Revenue, savings, satisfaction, efficiency.
    Dashboards are just breadcrumbs.

  8. Costs
    The most expensive thing isn’t your Snowflake bill.
    It’s your team burning time on low-impact work.

  9. People
    Hiring and team design is data strategy.
    Want outcomes? Hire for attitude, not just SQL speed.

Want to stop drowning in dashboard requests and start building leverage?

👉 I recently shared with 5,000 data experts how to build a 1-page data strategy that creates business value and not dashboards.

Read it here: https://lnkd.in/gdVRj3GK

♻️ And repost if you’ve ever felt more like a dashboard factory than a data leader

73
ali achachi Curious, have you tried enforcing this with a semantic layer + governed metrics (dbt/metrics layer) to cut ad-hoc requests at the source, or do stakeholders still bypass it? Apr 27 1 like
Clare Kitching Well said Sebastian, dashboards without a clear problem just create more demand not more value. Apr 27 1 like