The Big Book of Dashboards

Chapter 36 A Journey into the Unknown

Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know. And if one looks throughout the history of our country and other free countries, it is the latter category that tend[s] to be the difficult ones.

—Donald Rumsfeld, February 2002

We hope the dashboards and real-world advice in this book leave you feeling inspired. We also hope you use the content here to make amazing dashboards that reveal great insights to you and your colleagues.

Now, in this final chapter, we bring you a shocking message: All dashboards are incomplete.

What? How can that be?

Consider all the scenarios in this book. Each one has been designed to answer a specific set of questions. Not only a specific set of questions, but a specific set of questions that were decided when the dashboard was conceived. These are the known unknowns. You know the questions you need to ask (e.g., How many patients were admitted to the hospital yesterday?) but you don't know the answer.

In itself, this isn't the end of the world. By using your dashboard, you can see your data and get answers to those anticipated questions. Most businesses have a core set of questions that need to be monitored. However, a dashboard presents ...