What We Learned Building a Faculty Dashboard

Presentation Summary

Matthew Sheppard, Arizona State University

After assuming responsibility for ASU’s Dashboard Division, I was immediately tasked with building a Faculty Dashboard. As the project manager for this particular dashboard I was involved from the requirements gathering and scoping phases to the delivery and roll out of this tool. I tackled complicated issues relating to the university’s data and how to bring various sources together to generate the requested reports and measures. I managed expectations and interacted with the lead customers from the Provost’s Office, and in the current political environment was forced to present and highlight only certain types of data related to faculty members. Additionally, I tackled issues relating to security in an interdisciplinary atmosphere where the directive was to only allow departments to view data they had a direct interest in. We’ve completed work on this dashboard and as we put the finishing touches on the security and prepare to roll this dashboard out across our campus I can reflect back on the valuable experiences and lessons learned to bring a tool like this into the culture of a higher education institution. I’d like to share my insight with others that stand to benefit from our trials and tribulations.