unDUBBED

D36 Dashboards don't drive decisions, people do!

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Summary

Are your dashboards actually driving decisions? Or are they beautifully built artefacts that nobody uses? In this episode of unDUBBED, Sarah and Fiona sit down with two of the most respected voices in data communication to tackle one of the industry's most uncomfortable questions: do dashboards actually work?

Amanda Makulec is a data visualisation leader with 15 years of experience and a founding board member and former executive director of the Data Visualisation Society. Andy Cotgreave spent 20 years in data and analytics, 15 of them at Tableau, before co-founding How to Speak Data. Together they co-host Chart Chat - so yes, they have opinions.

The conversation digs into the discovery and prototyping work that must happen before anyone opens a tool, the difference between story finding and storytelling, and why reducing friction often beats adding features. They also get into AI's messy, exhilarating, and frankly terrifying impact on data work.

Whether you build dashboards, manage a team that does, or quietly suspect nobody reads your reports - this one's for you. Amanda and Andy are also co-authors of the Big Book of Dashboards and Dashboards That Deliver.

 

Takeaways
  • 71% of people surveyed said most dashboards fail - but did you ever define what success looked like in the first place?
  • The most common mistake is diving into building before understanding what users actually need - discovery and prototyping must come before development.
  • Dashboards don't drive decisions, people do - the real value of data happens in the conversations it sparks, not the charts themselves.
  • Reducing friction is one of the highest-leverage moves you can make - data needs to meet people where they already work.
  • Story finding and storytelling are completely different design paradigms - conflating them is one of the most costly mistakes in data communication.
  • Pretty data that turns out to be wrong destroys trust faster than almost anything - and AI makes this risk higher, not lower.
  • Your data team is probably using AI extensively without telling you - and leadership's early bans are almost certainly why.
  • The word "dashboard" is just semantic drift from stagecoaches - what matters is whether people can act on the information, whatever you call it.
  • Data communication is broader than data visualisation - sometimes one statistic at the right moment beats an entire interactive dashboard.
  • In an AI-obsessed world, the things that remain irreplaceable are human context, earned trust, and genuine connection with the people who use your data.

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    Keywords

    amanda makulec, andy cotgreave, dashboards that deliver, big book of dashboards, why dashboards fail, dashboard design, data communication, data visualisation, story finding vs storytelling, AI and data analytics, future of dashboards, dashboard strategy, user centred design, discovery before development, reducing data friction, data trust, data decision making, how to speak data, chart chat, data visualisation society, datafam, unDUBBED, dub dub data, dashboard best practices, data storytelling

     

    Chapters

    00:00 Introduction to Dashboards and Their Value

    08:35 The Failure of Dashboards: Insights and Statistics

    19:23 Redefining Dashboards: Integration and User Experience

    21:54 Teaching Data Visualization Workshops

    24:02 The Future of Dashboards

    33:38 Data Communication vs. Data Visualization

    44:26 AI and the Role of Data Teams

    45:10 The Rapid Evolution of AI Technology

    47:04 Balancing Productivity and Ethical Concerns in AI

    47:51 The Importance of Human Connection in Data Analysis

    50:04 Building Trust and Communication in Data Work

    53:12 Quick Fire Round: Insights and Opinions

    56:11 Key Takeaways and Final Thoughts

     

    Links

    Amanda Makulec website - https://www.amandamakulec.com/

    Amanda Makulec LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/abmakulec/

    Andy Cotgreave LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/acotgreave/

    How to Speak Data - https://howtospeakdata.com/

    How to Speak Data Newsletter - https://acotgreave.substack.com/

    Andy's YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqhn4yE-8QS3U1b7Jn1WItQ

     

    Dashboards That Deliver - https://www.dashboardsthatdeliver.com/

    Viz Responsibly (Amanda's Substack) - https://vizresponsibly.substack.com/

    Chart Chat Newsletter - https://chartchatlive.substack.com/

    Data Visualisation Society - https://www.datavisualizationsociety.org/

    Amanda's Nightingale article - https://nightingaledvs.com/has-data-storytelling-reached-its-peak/

    Iraq's Bloody Toll by Simon Scarr - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ybwh4lejYO4

     

    Empire of AI by Karen Hao - https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/460331/empire-of-ai-by-hao-karen/9781802064650

    Weapons of Math Destruction by Cathy O'Neil - https://www.amazon.com/Weapons-Math-Destruction-Increases-Inequality/dp/0553418815

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    unDUBBEDBy Fiona Crocker & Sarah Burnett | co-founders, dub dub data