What Is A KPI Report, & How Do I Create One?

Key performance indicators (KPIs) play a role in nearly every organization. Every company wants to meet its objectives, but that is easier said than done.

You have to select the KPIs that fit your industry (i.e., municipal KPIs aren’t going to work in the financial sector). Then you have to report on them accurately. That step is tough, and it matters.

Below we cover what a KPI report is, why it matters to your company’s success, and the elements to include in one. We’ve also included five KPI libraries you can use to guide your organization’s performance management efforts.

Why Are KPIs Important?

To understand why KPIs are important, and to create a successful report, you need a clear definition of what a KPI is. Every organization has objectives, or high-level company goals. Key performance indicators (KPIs), also called “strategic measures,” are both actions and tools of measurement used to monitor progress toward these objectives.

In its simplest form, a KPI is a measurement device that helps you understand how your organization is doing in regard to its goals. Effective KPIs are actionable, essential, and easy to communicate throughout the organization. KPIs are important because they act as a proxy between your organization and the goals you want to achieve.

What’s the difference between KPIs, metrics, and goals?

Strategic planning discussions use terms that can confuse people unless everyone shares the same definitions. KPIs, metrics, and goals are related terms that are easy to mix up. Here’s how they differ:

‍Goals (also sometimes called objectives) are key elements of your strategy that describe the behavior you want to see in your organization. They are high-level and typically conveyed as an action statement. For example: Our goal is to improve fundraising.

KPIs, metrics, and measures are synonyms. They all refer to indicators of progress that you track as part of executing your strategic plan. They are more measurable and clearly defined than goals. An example KPI for the goal listed above would be the total dollar amount of donations.

Some organizations do use the terms KPIs, metrics, and measures distinctly. In that case, KPIs might be the top 10 measures for the organization; measures are the tangible numbers you can get from tracking information; and metrics are the intangible, less concrete indicators of performance. In strategy planning, though, they all mean the same thing.

Performance Reporting: KPI Reports & Dashboards

Tracking is a key element of strategy reporting. You need to consistently collect the data associated with your identified KPIs in order to understand progress, and then report on that progress regularly to stakeholders. Two useful tools for evaluating measure statuses are KPI reports and KPI dashboards.

A dashboard is a type of report, so sometimes you might see these terms used interchangeably. But the two tools differ slightly, as explained below.

KPI Dashboards

A KPI dashboard offers a highly visual, bird’s-eye view of performance levels. It usually provides a collection of various metrics in one location and presents data in various chart formats. Since the primary function of a KPI dashboard is to give an at-a-glance summary of performance (with no deep-dive analysis), stakeholders often check them frequently, even daily, to see how they are progressing toward their goals.

Different stakeholders have different goals and organizational areas of focus. Use dashboards to provide them with the context and specific information they need about your KPIs. Examples of some common KPI dashboards are:

‍Overall KPI Dashboard

An overall KPI dashboard shows the status of the highest priority measures. The strategy team and executive leaders are the audience for this dashboard. The format makes it easy for them to quickly understand KPI status and progress in order to make informed decisions.

This is an overall KPI dashboard. You can build specific KPI dashboards for each department, as we’ll show you below.

‍Executive Dashboard

Executive dashboards are focused on high-level performance. Your organization’s senior leaders need to see a clear snapshot of the status of strategic (versus operational) KPIs. The dashboard should condense broad sets of relevant information so executives can make analytical decisions that relate to strategic goals.

Financial Dashboard

A financial dashboard includes KPIs related to revenue, profit margins, expenses, operational costs, etc. Any measure or project tied to your organization’s financial health would appear here, including charts that show progress on strategic financial goals and priorities. The audience for this dashboard would be the finance team and executive board.

Department Performance Dashboard

See how individual departments, ranging from sales to account management, are performing with customer-related metrics using a department performance dashboard. This dashboard has a narrower focus than the previous examples. It showcases a specific department’s key performance metrics, projects, and goals, but can be tied to the organization’s overall strategic goals and KPIs. The audience for this dashboard is department leaders and the executive team.

Human Capital Dashboard

KPIs around recruitment, retention, and employee performance and productivity can be displayed in an HR dashboard. These dashboards are unique because they often show metrics at varying levels, ranging from organization-wide data with the ability to drill down into team and individual information. The HR leadership team would be the audience for this dashboard.

Local Government Dashboard

KPI dashboards can also be tailored by industry. Local government dashboards are often used for benchmarking. Once a municipality has created its KPIs, it’s helpful to compare progress and performance to other, similarly sized governments. This helps organizations set realistic, achievable strategies and goals. The audience for this type of dashboard would be the city council, as well as community members.

Healthcare Dashboard

Healthcare is another industry that relies on dashboards to report to various stakeholders that the organization is meeting certain standards and providing high-quality service to the public. Healthcare reporting dashboards focus on the operational performance of the facility and its staff. The audience is the healthcare department’s executive team.

Keep in mind that every organization will need to customize its dashboards, depending on the goals and the audience you’re providing information to. You need software like ClearPoint that’s flexible enough to let you build as many dashboards as you want without duplicating information.

KPI Reports

A KPI report provides a more detailed look at performance levels. It includes more data points, usually in grid style, for analysis purposes. KPI reports are a great way to display data over time so you can identify trends. They are also a good mechanism for housing qualitative analysis around performance. For example, if your organization missed a quarterly KPI target because of an outside event, that commentary could be included in a KPI report.

The report below, for example, shows measures in the far left column, followed by reporting frequency, measure owner, monthly status updates, and RAG status. Summary views like these work best for financial personnel or others who are number-oriented.

Another example of a KPI report is the “Red Alert” report. It highlights all “red” or critical measures, including who owns them, the context behind them, and when someone last updated them. It helps with team accountability: you can see who’s responsible for these metrics and whether they’re providing updates and helping the metric along.

What should be included in a KPI report?

Let’s walk through the essential elements based on the below report template, for a KPI focused on increasing website visits and contacts.

Objectives: As previously stated, objectives are high-level company goals. The reason you’re tracking a KPI in the first place is to ensure that this particular goal is met. State it in your KPI report so you remember why you’re tracking a particular KPI and what you’re trying to improve in your strategy. The objective listed here is to gain “new visits and contacts.” Keep the objective brief and straightforward, without excess detail or reasoning.

‍Status Icon: A colored indicator next to your objective (a yellow square, in our example) shows the current KPI status at a glance. This icon can be updated from reporting period to reporting period, using easily understood red, yellow, and green visual indicators.

‍Measure Source and Formula: You can think of a “measure” and a “KPI” as one and the same. In our example, the report includes the measure itself and where you can find the data source that’s used to monitor and measure this KPI: The measure is the number of new visits and total new contacts, with the CRM system providing the data. There is no formula that needs to be applied to the data source involved in this example, but if there was, it would appear in this section as well. Remember, this step needs to be actionable, essential, and easy to communicate across the organization.

‍Measure Intent: This section should explain the why factor. When a KPI that lines up with a particular objective has been decided upon, the team assigned and the KPI owner should be able to describe in detail why they made that choice and what tracking this KPI will reveal. In this case, the measure will help stakeholders understand the effectiveness of marketing efforts to attract and convert site visitors.

‍Measure Data: This is the actual data you’re using to track your KPI (CRM data, in this case). To make your life easy, build calculations to automatically show percentages. This section shows measure data in a list view. Graphic presentations come next.

‍Graph: With every KPI, you have to determine how you’re going to share the information that you collect. For example, you may care most about target, actual, year-to-date performance, or a benchmark. Decide what is most valuable and create a meaningful chart with that information. Make sure you’re consistent and use the same chart each month, quarter, or year, so the team can track performance over time. Our example includes two visuals: an area chart displaying visits by quarter and a bar graph showing tiered contacts by month. In ClearPoint, you can add as many charts as you’d like, but only create what you need to best communicate your results.

‍Analysis: This section explains the qualitative reasoning behind the current status of the KPI. The KPI owner provides context that can’t be ascertained from the other sections of the report. Using language like “another record-breaking month” and “focus on converting a higher percentage” serves as further explanation of the KPIs’ status and progress.

‍Owner: To be successful, every KPI needs an “owner” who is tasked with tracking it. This establishes accountability. The owner can delegate reporting pieces to others as needed, but is ultimately responsible for this KPI. Clearly state the owner in this section.

Using KPI reports and dashboards together helps your organization define and track the numbers you want to hit. A dashboard shows quickly how your company is performing, and a report lets you analyze the detailed data. Both keep you on track over the long term.

Keep in mind the other elements that go along with KPI reporting: assigning an owner to be responsible for each KPI, continuously analyzing your overall objectives, and presenting the data on a regular basis. Without all these elements in place, you shouldn’t count on reaching your goals anytime soon.

How To Create A KPI Report

To create your first KPI report, follow these steps:

‍1. First, determine your audience.

Your audience could be executive leadership, department heads, single department members, or some other group. That choice determines the type and level of information they need. Also note how often your audience will view the report, whether annually or every month. Settle this before moving on, because it shapes the next two decisions.

‍2. Determine the different KPIs the audience needs to view.

Be thoughtful about what you’re showing on the report. People tend to report on data just because they have it, but the problem with showing too much data is that insights can easily get buried. Keeping your audience in mind, choose KPIs that are relevant for the audience and are most impactful in reaching your goals. Save the rest for another report or another audience.

‍3. Determine the different fields this audience would find helpful.

When you track a KPI, you’re probably tracking several different things about it (various data points, qualitative analysis, visualizations, etc.). We call these “fields” in the strategy reporting world (you may have heard of this as metadata in other contexts). In most cases, you don’t need to show all the fields in every report. Instead, think about which fields will be most helpful and relevant to your audience. For example, you might have a “description” field that explains the meaning of “total dollar amount of donations.” External audiences might need the description information to understand the KPI, but internal audiences likely would not. Also decide whether they need individual data points or just summary calculations. Whatever you decide, keep it simple.

‍4. Use ClearPoint to create and format the report.

Reporting takes time. If you want strategy reports your organization can rely on to execute its strategy, it’s worth investing in KPI monitoring and reporting software that can help you do that in a minimal amount of time.

ClearPoint already houses all your important strategic data, making it fast and easy to assemble meaningful KPI reports of all kinds. In fact, our reporting feature dramatically cuts down the time you spend building reports. In just a few minutes, you can create exactly the type of report you need with exactly the information you want, whether it’s a high-level dashboard or a detailed KPI report. Our users also benefit from:

• Consistent formatting with every report generation cycle
• Customization options to create on-brand, attractive reports (worlds better than Excel!)
• Multiple exporting options, including PDFs, HTML links, and Briefing Books
• Easy user interface
• Automated data uploads, reminders, and report generation and delivery

With ClearPoint, you can always answer “How are we doing?” quickly. That leads to the next topic: what to do when you’re missing KPI targets.

What To Do If Your KPI Turns Red

It's happened to the best of us. Your KPI monitoring indicates that things are going well, but all of a sudden, your KPI reporting metrics turn against you. As a manager, you have to take the heat. Here is a process to turn those numbers around.

‍1. First, don’t panic.

If there’s one thing that “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” taught us, it’s “Don’t panic.” (That, and “Bring a towel.”) Once you’re calm, you can begin to look at the root causes of the issue at hand.

‍2. Second, communicate, communicate, communicate.

Yes, it’s bad news. Yes, it’s scary when your key performance indicators turn against you. Worse than bad news is bad news when it’s too late to do anything about it. Every big problem starts with a small problem. So let your boss know that something is rotten in Denmark. Never try to sweep it under the rug. We all know how that story ends. Great leaders have to overcome great adversity. This is your challenge.

‍3. Third, break it down.

Look at the problem dispassionately, like those expensive consultants your boss hired a few years back. Check whether it’s a sales problem. If so, check whether it’s everywhere or in just one place, and whether it’s tied to a specific product or service. Look into the numbers. If it’s costs, find which costs, when, and how much. Anticipate the questions your boss might ask. Find the answers.

‍4. Fourth, build a plan.

Once you’ve done some analysis and have figured out what the problem is, start thinking about what you can do and what you should do. Start making plans to FIX the issue. Don’t focus on blame or on a flaw in the reporting process. Focus on solutions. Bosses love people who solve their problems. Be one of these people. Say, “we’re getting beaten on sales in Wisconsin. But here’s how we can fix it…”

‍5. Fifth, execute the plan.

A plan is great. A man, a plan, a canal, Panama! But a plan is only as good as the team that executes it. Once you have a good enough plan, start executing it. Build the team, task the team, manage the team. That’s what management is all about. Problem solving. Doing more with less. Finding creative ways to do things.

‍6. Finally, learn from it.

Stuff happens. Even to nice people. And that’s just the way it is. But learn from the “stuff.” Look beyond the short-term fix to the fundamental issue. If you’ve identified a problem, figure out a way to solve that problem and all the problems it could create. Always be learning, and always be growing as a manager.

When you monitor your KPIs in a tool like ClearPoint, you'll know as soon as your KPI turns red so you can create a plan of action to get it back on track right away.

KPI Libraries

For examples to get started, here are KPI libraries you can download from our resource center:

1. Financial KPIs

Financial measures are important in every organization, even nonprofits and municipalities. Staying on top of your finances by monitoring the right key performance indicators is critical.

Consider these examples of financial metrics:

2. Customer KPIs

Your customers are the lifeblood of your company, so it’s smart to monitor metrics that will help you understand if (a) your customers are purchasing from you regularly, and (b) your marketing or product development efforts are impacting sales.

Consider these examples of customer metrics:

3. Human Capital KPIs

Top organizations all over the world are constantly trying to retain the best talent, and their ability to do so is a major indicator of company success.

Consider these examples of HR metrics:

4. Local Government KPIs

It isn’t possible to determine whether you’re achieving your local government strategic plan without the use of KPIs. But municipalities often struggle to pinpoint the most important metrics to track and examine.

Consider these examples of municipal KPIs:

5. Healthcare KPIs

Many healthcare companies in the U.S. and around the globe have experienced major changes in their business model in the last 10 years. To meet new and changing standards, many health-related organizations are using KPIs to evaluate progress toward their goals.

Consider these examples of healthcare KPIs:

Start Building Insightful Reports Today

Building KPI reports and dashboards takes less time than you might think. To be successful with organizational strategy, you have to take the necessary steps and get S.M.A.R.T with your KPI tracking. The extra effort will pay off once you’ve successfully achieved your company goals. In the meantime, if you’d like to talk with someone on the ClearPoint team about how you can improve your KPI monitoring and management, please reach out. We’d love to hear from you!