Need Confirmation or Correction - Do I understand this correctly.

Dave Charboneau

Background:

• I created a primary sheet holding unique project information in each row.
• I then created Summary fields for this sheet data (e.g. Total # of Projects, Submitted Projects, Projects Waiting for Approval, Projects In Process, etc.).
• I then created Reports for each of those summary fields off the main sheet.
• I then created a Dashboard with widgets for each field and connected them to the corresponding dashboard widget & linked the corresponding report to that widget.

Comment: Pretty straight forward.

Problem: However, if I'd like to duplicate the same by Dept:

• I'd had to duplicate all this work.
• Then if I'd like to do the same for each Team within a Dept I again would have to duplicate this work.
• Finally, if the organization structure changes OR I make an enhancement to a Dashboard I'd then have to go and replicate those changes for each Department and Team I created.

Question: Is this correct or am I missing something?

Comment: It would be great to create a single dashboard with supporting summary fields and reports and then just filter / set context (e.g. All, select Dept, select Team) to see the values. This approach/design isn't very scalable or easily maintained.

Matt Johnson

Hi @Dave Charboneau

If you put all that stuff into a Folder, then you can "Save as New" on the Folder itself to quickly duplicate the whole thing. Anything connected within the folder will stay intact with itself and not refer to the originals in the other folder. You will have to rename everything and redo the filters as you've described above.

The tool that automates all that is Control Center. The big plus to Control Center is that once you've created 50 or 100 versions of this Template Folder and then need to update a report or add a new widget to the dashboards, you can do it all at once with the Global Update feature. When you're ready to make that upgrade, find an implementation partner. Configuring Control Center on your can be overwhelming.

I hope that helps.

Matt

Dave Charboneau

Thanks Matt ... feel much better with confirmation that I'm approaching the solution I've built correctly in this tool ... a little frustrated that the solution is so burdensome to change over time and the lack of "filter" widgets for the dashboard that could be used to really improve the solution. Will take a look at Control Center and the Pivot Reporting add-in ... Dave