The information displayed on the Manager Dashboard is driven by whether you are assigned as a Manager to that client.  The team stats and alerts show data on users assigned to the client where you are the manager.  This in effect creating the scenario of a team.  It is crucial that you have updated a users Client Access from the Practice Admin section for the dashboard to function correctly.

Manager Dashboard Example

If you are not assigned a client manager role for a client on a ‘paid’ plan you will be told this when entering the page with the following notification.  Click on the read more link to get more information about the ‘paid’ plan or close to have a look around.  Be aware that not all functionality is live within the example dashboard and the data shown is purely dummy data.

The Manager dashboard gives the seniors and middle management visibility over their portfolio of clients and how team members are performing in relation to completion of alerts and the quality of client records they are responsible for.

Upcoming Client Deadlines

Nearly everything you do in accountancy is deadline orientated.  The purpose of this panel is to focus your attention on those clients with a quarter end approaching.  How many days are left until quarter end?  What condition are the books and records in?  How many alerts need clearing?  When was the bank last fully reconciled and how many unreconciled bank account transactions are there?  All good questions you should be asking of your team before they commence any work.  This way you don’t need to ask those questions and can just divert your attention to those clients and team members that may require assistance.

You will only see clients on this list where you have been assigned as the manager thus creating a view of your clients only.

The star after the client name indicates whether this is an internal or external bookkeeping client.  You may alter your approach and actions based on who is responsible so it is important to know who completes the bookkeeping.

Now you are armed with all this information you can start to think about how to tackle your workload.  What needs prioritising, who should I be contacting and what do I need them to do.

The table can be sorted by multiple columns by holding shift while clicking the columns should you wish to look at quarter end, by heart rate by number of alerts as an example.  Any selections made will be stored.  Above you can see in this example we are sorting by client name whereas quarter end would be much more useful.

Scenario

We have one quarter end coming up in eleven days.  Our heart rate is looking pretty healthy and there are a few alerts that need attention.  Once that bank account has been reconciled we may find that the alerts will be completed and our heart rate will increase further.  As we do the bookkeeping for that client I would get the bank reconciled first and it will then be in a great position to start the VAT return shortly after quarter end.  Approaching the client for any missing paperwork regularly will avoid a bottleneck at quarter end.

Please note that the Bank Rec and Un Rec columns are driven by the alert settings for each client.  If you have not configured those settings or turned off those alerts data will display as N/A.  If an alert has not triggered because the results are not outside the parameters set for that client N/A will be displayed.  It does not mean that the bank is fully reconciled and up to date just that it is within the agreed parameters.

Team Stats – Alerts

The daily alerts panel shows you the number of alerts that have triggered and who they are assigned to in your team.  As an alert is completed the progress bar will fill depending on the type of action that has been used by the assignee.

Green = alert complete

Orange = excluded

Red = dismissed

In an ideal situation we want to see as much green as possible.  This shows that corrective action has been taken.  Orange would imply that we are deciding to exclude suppliers, customers or account codes from our checks.  Are you happy with that?  What could be missed by doing that?  Red means the alert has been dismissed.  This is a quick and easy way to clear your alerts but means you have not corrected the problem and have told Hindsight to ignore it going forward.  It has not been corrected nor flagged up again in the future.  To many of these would lead us to think the assignee is not following correct procedures and may require some more support.

What you don’t want to see is too much grey.  That means nothing has been done and that will definitely need picking up with the relevant team member.

Team Stats – Heart Rate

The average heart rate panel shows you the average heart rate being achieved by team members where you are assigned as a manager.  This is to direct your attention to those team members that may be struggling and need assistance.  Perhaps it is an indication that they have been assigned to the difficult clients or external bookkeeping jobs.  Under the team members name we have highlighted the last time they logged in to Hindsight as this could offer a big clue as to why the Heart Rates are not as expected.  As the manager it is your responsibility now you have this information to understand where the problems rest and implement a solution.

The colour of the progress bar and the score will change depending on the level of the average achieved and are in line with the Heart Rate score colour scheme.

Alerts

The alerts panel will display any critical alerts where you are assigned as the manager.  The users that are assigned to the critical alerts will be displayed by way of their initials.  If multiple people are assigned we will show the first 5 users.  Any critical alerts that are assigned to more than 5 users will show the first five and then an indicator showing how many more assignees there are.  We would suggest that if you have more than 5 people assigned to an alert that this is reviewed.  If you make too many people responsible, no one is responsible.

Critical alerts are those that have been assigned a priority of critical in the client alert settings.  They require immediate remedy.  Clicking on the alert will take you to the relevant alert in the alert page.

Heart Rate

The heart rate panel will display the clients with the lowest heart rate.  The ones that need the most support.  These may or may not be clients that have a quarter end approaching but you don’t want to leave to their own devices to the detriment of the service you can provide them.  Clicking on the notification will take you to the heart rate report for that client for closer inspection.

We are only displaying four organisations but this panel does contain a scrollbar should there be multiple records to display.

Performance

The performance metrics are your own personal way to understand how effective your team is.  Below you will note that my metrics are out of 2.  This tells me that there are 2 users in total in my practice that are assigned a client user role of ‘manager’.  My ranking is displaying how my metrics stack up against that other team.  I cannot see their metrics and they cannot see mine.  It is to be used as a guide to understand areas where you are doing the right things and areas where there is room for improvement.

Using this information coupled with the Team Stats panel I need to consider what I can do to improve these metrics.  It may be as simple as reviewing the alert settings or taking a closer look at certain team members performance.

Now we have a full understanding of what is going on across our client base I can take corrective action where required.  Chase up anyone that looks likely to cause a blockage at quarter end and get on with the rest of my day.