Why Your Admissions Dashboard Isn't Working

I've seen dozens of admissions dashboards. Most of them are beautiful. Most of them are also ignored.

The problem isn't the data. It's not even the design. The problem is that most dashboards don't answer the questions people are actually asking.

What teams really want to know

When I ask admissions managers what they want to know, I hear things like:

• Why are leads from this campaign not converting?
• Which counsellor needs help with their follow-ups?
• Where are we losing students in the funnel?

But when I look at their dashboards, I see:

• Total leads this month
• Applications submitted
• Conversion rate

These are summary metrics. They're not wrong. But they don't help you do anything.

The fix

Good dashboards start with questions, not data. Before you build anything, write down the top 5 questions your team asks every week. Then design your dashboard to answer those questions – clearly, quickly, and honestly.

That's it. That's the whole principle.