Rooftops and Invitations: Welcome to My Dashboard!
By on September 25, 2019
It’s finally here! We’ve been waiting so long, so long to share this project with you and we’re ready to scream it from the rooftops. My Dashboard is finally here!
The Qualtrax team would like to invite you to check out the release of this long-awaited feature. As you prepare to dive in and explore the new interface, remember to breathe – it’s an exciting step in the evolution of our product and this blog will walk you through some of the key points to ensure you get the most out of your user experience.
As we mentioned in the release notes for 2019 R3, this first look at the new Dashboard is a beta version, a work-in-progress of sorts. Our intent is to solicit your feedback and learn what you like, what could be better, and how we can steer our development efforts to best serve our users – you. As such, we will be living in your letters. The feedback you provide will directly influence the future of this feature and help ensure that the final product makes your job a little less stressful.
This version of My Dashboard serves primarily as a visual indicator. Think of it as your own personal Eye of Sauron – the ability to see everything on your active task list from a 50,000 foot vantage point. It will enable you to get the big picture quickly and determine where your attention is most needed. Keep in mind that this feature is not available with Basic or Testing and Training licenses, so only Concurrent and Dedicated license holders will have access and visibility.
A General Overview
To see My Dashboard in your navigation menu, your system must have the “new look and feel” user interface turned on. Access My Dashboard by clicking “Dashboards” on the main Qualtrax navigation menu. You will immediately notice the focal point of the display are two donut graphs. These graphs compile all of your open tasks and group them by type: trainings, documents, workflows, tests; and by status: new, approaching, late, expedited. Breaking the data down in this way allows you to see where the majority of your workload is and how many of those tasks require immediate attention.
While the graphs will give you a visual overview, we are also aiming to provide this information in a format that is easier to dig into. We have done this by including two rows of four boxes – one above the donut graphs and one below. The four boxes at the top of My Dashboard indicate the total count for document tasks, workflow tasks, test tasks, and training tasks, respectively. The row of boxes below the graphs give you a total count for tasks by status: expedited, late, approaching and new.
Finally, you will also see open document tasks and open workflow tasks by status and type with two bar graphs at the bottom of your dashboard. On the document side, this allows you to see how many documents you currently have to edit, review and approve. For example, if you have five documents that you are editing, the bar graph will show five documents in queue. If you release a document for approval, that item will fall off your graph, so it will now only show four. If you are the editor and approver, you would see that document move from the “edit” bar on your graph to the “approve” bar.
On the workflow side, you will have a list of all active workflows in your system that currently require you to take action. As you complete your action and advance the workflow, the number reflected in your bar graph will change accordingly.
In each case, if you do not have any active tasks for a given graph or data point, you will see the message “No Data to Display.” This isn’t a defect in the system – you’ve just been uber-productive! Don’t wait! Do the brilliant dance and get on with your day!
You also have the ability to export My Dashboard as a PDF or print a copy if you need to share the information with your team or leadership group.
Presently, clicking on any of the visual features or widgets in My Dashboard will take you back to your traditional inbox. For example, if you click on the widget showing that you have three expedited tasks, you will be rerouted to the full task list shown in your Inbox.
For Beta or for Worse
That last point is the reason behind our decision to release My Dashboard as a beta version. This is also where your feedback is crucial to the continuing development of the My Dashboard interface and in determining future dashboards and/or functionality.
As we determine the next steps to build out this feature, we want to know how you would like to see My Dashboard function. What actions are you expecting when you click a certain widget? What information would be most helpful for you to see on your dashboard? If you could design another dashboard, what type of data would it represent?
We recognize that some of these answers may seem like no-brainers, but we have learned that our user group is so diverse in the way they perform their jobs that there is no such thing as a no-brainer! Having learned this lesson in past updates, we are asking you to give us your honest feedback – even on the no-brainer stuff. Prove us right (or wrong!) in our assumptions and help us make this feature as powerful as it can be.
To provide feedback, please click the link in the context menu of My Dashboard (the orange text that says FEEDBACK at the top left of your screen) to fill out a form that sends us your feedback directly. We will definitely take every suggestion to heart and consider it in plotting our course for future development as we expand this product to provide the most benefit possible for the greatest number of users!
Thank you for choosing Qualtrax for your quality and compliance needs! We look forward to hearing from you and we hope you enjoy the added visibility that My Dashboard is designed to provide.
Bonus points: for those fans of Emo Rock, we’ve scattered a few Dashboard Confessional song titles throughout this blog – can you find them?
Category: Product
