Field notes · March 2026
Choosing KPIs that belong on an executive report
Every finance team we meet in Kota Kinabalu already tracks dozens of metrics. The difficulty is not collection — it is curation. An executive report that lists everything communicates nothing. After forty-odd KPI audits, we use five questions to decide what earns a place on the leadership dashboard.
1. Does a director act on this number?
If the metric cannot trigger a decision — approve spend, reallocate staff, pause a promotion — it belongs in a departmental appendix, not the executive view. Occupancy rate passes this test for a hotel group; individual spa therapist utilisation usually does not.
2. Is the definition stable month to month?
Metrics that change calculation logic confuse trend lines. Same-store sales only works when store openings and closures are documented. We write definitions into a KPI dictionary so "revenue" means the same thing in March and September.
3. Can we source it reliably within your refresh window?
A beautiful chart built on a manual export that arrives five days late will miss every board deadline. We map source files, owners, and cut-off times before committing a metric to the dashboard.
4. Does it pair well with a variance explanation?
Executive reports need context. Headline numbers without commentary invite misinterpretation. We favour metrics where a ±5% move has an obvious operational story — supplier delay, weather, staffing gap — that fits in two sentences.
5. Would removing it leave a blind spot?
Finally, we stress-test the shortlist. If we remove a candidate, does leadership lose visibility into a material risk? Cash conversion cycle often survives this test; page views on the company website rarely does.
These questions produce a shorter, sharper dashboard. Clients sometimes push back — "we have always reported this" — and that is useful tension. The goal is not fewer numbers for their own sake, but a report directors open because every panel earns its space.