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Jon Guerra

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Dashboards of the Month - Managing to Zero and Green

As the world shifts to remote work, managers are having to learn new ways to keep their teams motivated and on task. Without the ability to pop over to someone’s desk or have a passing conversation ...
As the world shifts to remote work, managers are having to learn new ways to keep their teams motivated and on task. Without the ability to pop over to someone’s desk or have a passing conversation in the hallway, it seems to be a bit more challenging to know what your technicians are working on. This is where dashboards can have a really profound impact. Business intelligence dashboards act as a single source of truth and paint an accurate picture of what’s going on at any given moment. This month, we’re showing you two BrightGauge dashboards that are daily must-haves for working with your remote team. Managing to Zero dashboard *View this sample Managing to Zero dashboard here The point of this dashboard is to manage all metrics to zero within a specific time frame. So, the goal can be to have each metric on the dashboard hit 0 by the end of the day or week. In BrightGauge, you can filter this dashboard for each specific technician and share with them, that way everyone is on the same page and knows what they need to work towards. Here’s a breakdown of the key performance indicators (KPIs) displayed in the Managing to Zero dashboard: High Priority - A count of any currently open high priority tickets. Managing this number to zero ensures that all high priority items are handled in a timely fashion. Unassigned - A count of all currently open tickets that have no technician assigned. Keep an eye on this metric so that all of your customer’s issues and requests are not overlooked. Offline Servers - With your customers relying heavily on their technology during this time, making sure you maintain and manage the amount of servers that are going offline is more essential than ever. New - A count of all tickets that are still in a "New" status. Often this is an indicator that there has not been progress made on these tickets. Highlighting this item for your team should help keep them on track. Breaching Response SLA - This gauge will show any tickets that are within 60 minutes of breaching their response SLA. Managing this metric allows you to stay true to the expectations you have committed to with your customer base. Stale - A count of all tickets that have not been updated in at least 7 days. Make sure you keep this number to zero, so that none of your customer's requests fall through the cracks. Scheduled Today - A focus on tickets that are currently open and scheduled for today. Staying on top of these tickets should also aid in keeping your techs on task. Breaching Resolution SLA - This gauge will show any tickets that are within 60 minutes of breaching their resolution SLA. Managing this metric allows you to stay true to the expectations you have committed to with your customer base. Machines on EOL OS - Ensuring that your customers are on a reliable OS is extremely essential during the new work-from-home environment we are in. Reliable technology will allow them to operate efficiently and in turn increase your value as a partner. Managing to Green dashboard *View this sample Manage to Green dashboard here Another essential, this dashboard gives a view of the current state of affairs. The goal is to have your KPIs consistently within a ‘green threshold’, which indicates that you are on the right track. Metrics that turn to red show areas where you may be falling behind, allowing you to respond quickly and course correct. With BrightGauge, you have the ability to set thresholds based on numbers that you’ve deemed indicative of a problem. When that benchmark is crossed, your gauge will change colors, making it very easy to identify a problem and act on it immediately. In this sample dashboard, we’ve chosen KPIs with arbitrary goals and thresholds set to them just to highlight the idea behind the Manage to Green dashboard. When creating this dashboard for your use, make sure to choose goals and thresholds that match your internal standards. Here are our examples: Average Time to Response (mins) - Keeping your response time low and within an acceptable threshold allows you to provide an exceptional service to your customer base. Make sure this metric fits within internal expectations. CSAT Score - A quick glance at your customer's sentiment towards you. Customer retention is key during these times. Average Time to Resolution (hrs) - Keeping your resolution time low and within an acceptable threshold allows you to provide an exceptional service to your customer base. Make sure this metric fits within internal expectations. % Met Response SLA - A percentage of tickets that have met their response SLA compared to all of the tickets that have been worked that week. Use this gauge to make sure your team is meeting the commitments you have made to your customers. Kill Rate % - This is a quick glance into your team's efficiency. Calculated by taking tickets closed divided by tickets opened, this metric should always stay at 100% or higher. 100% means you have closed as many tickets as have been opened this week. Anything below 100% indicates that there may be some lingering tickets. % Met Resolution SLA - A percentage of tickets that have met their response SLA compared to all of the tickets that have been worked that week. Use this gauge to make sure your team is meeting the commitments you have made to your customers. Billable Utilization % - This calculates the amount of billable time your team has submitted versus their total time submitted. % Tech Time Fulfilled Yesterday - A view of the time submitted yesterday versus their daily capacity set within your PSA. If this number ever falls below 100%, some of your technicians are not putting all of the time allotted in their daily capacity. % Gross Margin - A key metric in determining the overall profitability of your business offerings. The Manage to Zero and Manage to Green dashboards are easy to implement and share and can make a big difference in your team’s productivity and efficiency each week. Having these two rules (‘no red’ and ‘get to 0’) is a quick solution to getting everyone on the same page. To recreate these dashboards for your own teams, check out the links below: Link Manage to Zero dashboard Link to Manage to Zero Recreation Key Link to Manage to Green dashboard Link to Manage to Green Recreation Key Please feel free to reach out to success@brightgauge.com with any questions you have!
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Dashboard of the Month - Client Success Overview

We say this over and over - when it comes to building long-term client relationships, transparency is key. You need to show your client the value that you’re bringing to their business so that they understand what their investment is worth and are never left to question why they are paying you. A great way to do this is by sending consistent reports to key stakeholders. Another option made possible by BrightGauge is to share a real-time dashboard with your client. That’s exactly what Peter Kardel, co-founder of Clever Ducks, puts into practice. Clever Ducks is an MSP out of San Luis Obispo, California, focused on serving clients who see tech as a strategic weapon, or something central to their success. Their clients want to cut costs with IT, not on IT. As part of their client retention strategy, Peter and team share a Client Success Overview dashboard that allows them to manage relationships in a proactive way. For example, when it comes to a planning and QBR process, a lifecycle of client’s hardware and software all up and down the stack is established. That way, Clever Ducks can proactively replace gear once it reaches the end of its lifecycle rather than waiting for that equipment to fail. “Something like this makes our operations much less reactive and it’s a much better outcome for the client because, as we all know, downtime is expensive,” says Peter. Peter has found that setting color-coded thresholds on the Client Success Overview dashboard makes the data more compelling and more likely for a client to take notice. “People just know that green is go, yellow means you may want to hit the brakes, and red is bad,” says Peter. “After a while, a client looks at a dashboard, sees red, and wants to take immediate action. It’s an amazing way to support their success and help them prioritize.” In general, the Client Success Overview is a good way to ensure that everyone is on the same page. *View this sample Client Success Overview Dashboard here Included is the client’s ticket trend, which is a nice visual way to tell a story of what’s going on without hiding anything. It provides an opportunity to look at trends and understand what changes need to be made to influence the direction of that trend. With this dashboard, Peter and team avoid bogging clients down with nitty gritty details. Instead, they get right to the point of showing clients that their business is safe and can show where there are opportunities to take advantage of in order to be successful. An interesting KPI they include in the overview is how the clients are rating Clever Ducks. The dashboard is often being seen by C-suites, so these CSAT scores show how team members are (or are not) happy with Clever Ducks’ service. It’s a nice boost for that C-suite person to know that their people are confident in their technology. These days, your workforce won’t tolerate IT that’s confused or unreliable, so having confidence in leadership is becoming ever more important. Finally, a Client Success Overview dashboard makes meeting with clients way more efficient. Instead of bringing a stale report that was printed out before the account manager meets with a client, Peter and team can literally open the dashboard in front of the client during the meeting and look at real-time information, allowing them to get down to business and problem-solving right away. For instances when team meetings are not occurring face-to-face, clients still have access to their important data, day or night. Check out the links below to replicate this type of dashboard for your own clients. Link to Client Success Overview Dashboard Link to Dashboard Recreation Key Please feel free to reach out to success@brightgauge.com with any questions you have!

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December Dashboard - Leadership KPI

Undoubtedly, one of the most important areas of business any owner or manager wants to keep an eye on is financial performance. Simply put, you need to know the status of your cash flow, revenue, expenses, and more at any given moment. Any executive or leadership team will look to view and analyze these kinds of metrics on a regular basis, to drive business decisions and forecast performance. So, when building a financial overview or leadership KPI dashboard, what are the key metrics you are choosing to display? There are some key performance indicators that will resonate across the board, but others may be specific to your organization. To help shed some light, and maybe some inspiration, we spoke to BrightGauge customer Dan Lattuada of Pinnacle Technology Partners to learn what their Leadership KPI Dashboard looks like. The following is a recreation of the dashboard they use: View this dashboard here. For Dan and PTP, it's important to see how the company is doing financially on a trailing 12-month basis to ensure that they are heading in the desired direction. To accomplish this, their BrightGauge dashboard is designed to look at specific areas of their business, such as sales, product, and managed services. For example, when it comes to sales, they want to make sure their commissions are in line with company performance. The most critical metric on their dashboard is their recurring revenue, which is the bread and butter of the PTP business. "We look at recurring revenue as our main KPI because, in any given month, we want to see that trending upwards," says Dan. "We're in the habit of optimizing the services our clients are consuming, but we want to make sure we are doing it in a way that makes sense for our overall business." Within BrightGauge, Dan builds his gauges with multiple layers to return that recurring information. He cautions that in order to do that, you need to organize yourself within Quickbooks (or other financial tool) first. When possible, gauges have thresholds set to them, which Dan sets based on a combination of where they think their business should be and past performance. So just how often is Dan using this leadership dashboard? Along with his accounting manager, he's looking at it on a daily basis. Given that this dashboard is meant to inform upper management on company performance, they share their metrics with the leadership team on a quarterly cadence. Interested in setting up a Leadership KPI dashboard like this for your business? Check out our Dashboard Key to recreate it yourself or feel free to reach out to success@brightgauge.com and we’ll be happy to help. Thank you to Dan and PTP for sharing your insights! Link to Public Dashboard Link to Dashboard Recreation Key
Videos   |   Read

VIDEO: How to Add Layers and Calculated Metrics

When we added Calculated Metrics, we wanted to bring the ability to easily calculate formulas to our Gauge Builder. Using this tool, you can create powerful MSP Metrics like Support Kill Rate, Tickets Per Endpoint, and Service Gross Margin. This video shows you how to easily add layers and create calculated metrics. If you have questions about doing this within your BrightGauge, reach out to our support team. For more tutorial videos, check us out on YouTube.
Videos   |   Read

Adding Datasources to Your BrightGauge Account

If you're using BrightGauge to manage your data and to integrate with the various tools you use to run your business, then you know how easy it is to access your data as soon as you open an account. Got a new datasource that we integrate with? Adding it to your BrightGauge account takes just a few moments before you're up and running and gaining data insights. In this how-to video, we show you the steps to take to configure a new datasource to your BrightGauge. Anytime you've got a question, we're here to help. Just reach out to our support team!

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How to Set Up Rotating Dashboards

You may want to display multiple dashboards on TVs around your office, giving everybody visibility into the important KPIs you are tracking every day. With BrightGauge, you can easily create dashboard playlists to see your dashboards as a rotating carousel throughout the day. Set your playlists up in just a couple minutes by following the steps in the video above. For more help, see our support doc or submit a support ticket.
Customer Success, Videos   |   Read

VIDEO: How to Send Client Reports

When you have the ability to automate client reports, it becomes a true game-changer and a huge win for productivity. We've had customers tell us it takes 8-10 hours per week to put together client reports, but with BrightGauge you can create, schedule, and send reports in just a few clicks. That means, you get 8-10 hours of time back to spend on other revenue-generating tasks. Yay! In the above tutorial video, we'll take you through an in-depth guide of the steps you need to take to create and send client reports in BrightGauge. Part of the process is to set up your client mappings, which you can review in this video. Once you set up your report templates, they'll automatically go out on the date and time you choose. A real set-it-and-forget-it situation that will make a positive impact on your client relationships. If you've got questions at any time, please feel free to reach out to our support team.
Videos   |   Read

VIDEO: How to Set Up Snapshot Gauges

Have you gotten use out of Snapshot gauges* yet? We like to think of it as our data warehousing lite solution. Essentially, Snapshots capture a specific data point on a cadence you set (daily, weekly, or monthly) and plot that point onto a chart. Over time, it helps you identify historical trends that could have a big impact on your business decisions. We see Snapshots being used for things like Tickets per Endpoint or End of Day Ticket Count, for example. This quick video shows you how to set up Snapshots in just a few clicks. If you've got questions at any time, please feel free to reach out to our support team! *Please note: this feature is available to Enterprise Plan users only.
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VIDEO: How to Set Up BrightGauge Goals

You've made it a point this year to start setting and tracking goals for you and your team members. That's awesome! Goal-setting is a really effective way to get everyone on your team on the same page and working towards success together. With BrightGauge Goals, it's really simple to set up trackable goals in the same tool you're already using to get your data insights. You can even power your goals from existing gauges. For example, you may assign one of your techs a goal to keep their response time at or below 30 minutes this quarter. You can set up this goal to automatically pull in data from your Average Response Time gauge week-over-week. The video above gives a comprehensive overview of our goal-setting process. A few important things to note: Make sure your gauge-powered goals are filtered for the current week, otherwise the data that is captured each week won't be accurate. Your team members will be emailed each week reminding them to check in to their goal and mark whether they were on- or off-track and add context around why they might be missing their target this week. This keeps everyone accountable to their actions and responsibilities. Each week, every team member will receive a goal summary email, detailing the whole team's progress. This kind of visibility is a powerful way to drive everyone together and build trust amongst one another. After watching this video, you should be able to get your goal list started. But, if you've got questions at any time, please feel free to reach out to our support team and we'll be happy to lend a hand! Want to see how other BrightGauge customers are using goals? Watch our customer showcase webinar, where BrightGauge user Justin Kelley shares how he has set up goal lists for his entire team.
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Feature Update: Client Mapping

We've been working hard behind the scenes to improve upon some of our features. Just released: an update to our Client Mappings process. If you're new to BrightGauge, the Client Mappings process is really simple and makes it a whole lot easier to use BrightGauge properly. Specifically when it comes to sending client reports, having gone through Client Mappings means you'll be able to create and send reports to the clients and recipients you want in just a few clicks. For current users, you'll appreciate that clients are better organized per datasource, that you'll be able to filter searches within datasource buckets, and that you'll be able to easily add client names when needed. This tutorial video takes you through the process of setting up your Client Mappings. It takes just a few minutes but saves you a whole lot of time down the road. Read more about Client Mappings or reach out to our support team if you've got any questions!
Videos   |   Read

VIDEO: How to Share Dashboards With Clients and Team Members

When you've got a dashboard you want to share, it's easy to do so without worrying that your data might get manipulated. With BrightGauge's unlimited, free viewer licenses, you can share read-only dashboards with as many people as you'd like. You may want to share data dashboards with your clients to keep them in-the-loop on important metrics they care about. Or, perhaps you want each individual tech on your team to see their performance metrics - like Kill Rate % and CSAT scores - in real-time. The tutorial videos below show you how to share dashboards with your clients and team members in just a few steps. Your recipient will be notified by email when you assign them a dashboard. Sharing dashboards with clients: Sharing dashboards with team members: Read more about tech dashboards and client dashboards or reach out to our support team with any questions!

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How to Generate Powerful Autotask Reports

You know what clients love? Partners who are trustworthy and transparent about what they’re doing. Know what’s even better? When that foundation is set naturally, without clients having to ask. It’s likely a priority of yours to foster a really strong sense of trust between you and your clients, which is great. Trust breeds long-term relationships and repeat business, putting you on a path towards success. And a really simple, yet powerful way to build that trust is to get in the habit of consistently sending out client reports. It’s not as tedious or time-consuming as you may think, and the payoff is substantial. Determining what to report on Let’s say you’re using Autotask Professional Services Automation to track your support tickets, SLA data, engineers’ hours, and more. That’s some pretty important data! How do you show your clients what you do with that data to keep them running efficiently? This is where Autotask reports come in. Consistent reports give you the opportunity to visually display your value to your client and reinforce the reasons why they are paying you. Autotask reports also show that you’re proactive and committed to helping them run their business - a.k.a., you’re a partner, not just a service provider. However, while we are clearly in support of showing off your data management skills, we should caution against dumping too much Autotask data (or any data) on your clients. The key is to choose the right data. There are a few questions to ask yourself whenever you’re choosing the Autotask data to report on: How does this fit into my client’s SLA? Referring to the SLA you and your client agreed upon is an excellent way to refresh yourself on what matters to them. For example, if the SLA specifies a satisfactory support ticket response time, you’re going to want to include your Autotask Average Time to First Response on each report you send. Does this impact my client’s bottom line? Only include the Autotask data that’ll have the most impact to each specific client. They may not need to know nitty-gritty details like Hours Today by Engineer, but would probably appreciate an update on Projects Opened vs. Closed. Am I spending significant time on this? If it’s not something that matters a whole lot to you, it’s not likely to matter a whole lot to your client. Remember, this is an opportunity to report on your value, so show off Autotask data that you spend a worthwhile amount of time on. Once you’ve got your data ironed out, you can start pulling your Autotask reports together. A little help goes a long way You’re really busy. You don’t have 8-10 hours a week to spend on compiling reports. And no one says you have to. Using a business intelligence tool like BrightGauge can help you get your Autotask reports out with very little work on your end. First of all, BrightGauge takes all your Autotask data (plus data from your RMM, BDR, security, finance tool, etc) and puts it up on one seamless dashboard, so you can keep an eye on the metrics that matter to you in real-time. Then, when it comes to building reports, the whole process is automated and can be set up in just a few clicks. When you connect BrightGauge + Autotask, your account will come pre-loaded with 8 report templates to get you started, including Daily Member Scorecard, Weekly Project Work Summary, Service Calls, Sales Daily Wrap Up, and more. You can open one of these templates, personalize it with a client logo, choose your client recipient(s), and then schedule the report to automatically be sent out at the frequency you choose (like every Monday at 8 a.m.). If you’d rather build a report from scratch, it’s just a matter of dragging and dropping the data you’re already tracking into the report template, and then personalizing it and scheduling it out. It’s honestly that simple. And the reports look clean, professional, and digestible. Once you get your Autotask reports scheduled, you can rest easy knowing they’re automatically being delivered to your client’s inbox every week/month/quarter and that your client’s can rely on you and trust you to receive this information. High-five! By the way, in addition to 8 report templates, you’ll get almost 200 default KPIs and 9 pre-built dashboards to get you started. Some KPIs include: Amount on Invoices 90 Days Past Due Average Time to First Response Average Time to Resolution Breached SLA Summary Per Resource Customer Satisfaction This Month Leaderboard Opened vs Closed Tickets Project Phases - Current Month Tickets Assigned by Tech Tickets Completed This Week Leaderboard Tickets by Issue Type Watch this video to learn more about setting up and sending out reports. If you’d like to add Autotask to your stack of BrightGauge datasources, please contact us today.
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Dashboard of the Month: RMM Overview - Endpoints

Dashboards and reports play a vital role in streamlining data and extracting valuable insights. In the dynamic realm of endpoint management, it is imperative for Managed Service Providers (MSPs) to have real-time access to consolidated data from their array of tools, enabling swift action on behalf of their clients. Utilizing metrics not only aids in pinpointing areas for enhancement but also empowers them to enact precise strategies for advancement. In this month's featured Dashboard, we delve into RMM Overview metrics tailored to streamline endpoint monitoring and management. Our inspiration stems from a recent user showcase webinar featuring Nate Ginn, the Centralized Systems Manager at ESI Technology Advisors, who shared insights on leveraging ConnectWise RMM and ConnectWise PSA data for enhanced client management. Tune in to Optimizing Remote Monitoring and Client Management with Data to discover more on how Nate drives performance enhancements through data utilization. Nate and the ESI team rely on the RMM Overview dashboard to gain a snapshot into critical indicators like patch status, warranty updates, and disk space utilization, guaranteeing optimal functionality of their endpoints. This visual aid, shared among their team, helps them stay ahead of RMM tickets for prompt issue resolution as well. RMM Overview - Endpoints - view here. Here are some featured metrics: Ticket & Configuration Information - These segments organize RMM tickets based on their status, time spent, and attached configurations. It also offers a historical perspective on ticket volume, and provides insight into the endpoints and software under your management. Patching & Disk Space Utilization - These metrics provide valuable insights on missing patches, OS patch compliance rates, and disk space utilization percentages. These data points are crucial for addressing performance concerns and identifying potential security vulnerabilities. Thank you, Nate, for collaborating with us and sharing your valuable insights! Recreate in your BrightGauge RMM Overview - Endpoints Dashboard (public view link) RMM Overview - Endpoints Buildout Key Make sure to visit our library of more report and dashboard templates and please feel free to reach out to success@brightgauge.com with any questions!
Customer Success   |   Read

Report of the Month: Service Desk 30-Day Summary

Managed Service Providers (MSPs) play a vital role in ensuring the smooth functioning of their clients' IT infrastructure. One effective way for MSPs to showcase their worth and maintain transparency is by crafting monthly client reports. These reports can spotlight important metrics around ticket volume, response and resolution times, and customer satisfaction ratings, illustrating their dedication to meeting service level agreements (SLAs). For June's Report of the Month, we are excited to present a Service Desk Summary Report inspired by a recent User Showcase Webinar on Client Reporting Excellence featuring Scott Kingston, the Service Delivery Manager at Spark in New Zealand. This 30-day summary offers a comprehensive view of the services delivered in the past month. Utilizing dynamic filtering capabilities in BrightGauge, this report can also display data from the previous month, tailored to your reporting preferences. Scott and his dedicated team at Spark NZ diligently distribute their Caretaker Plus Service Desk Report on a monthly basis, providing both interactive drill-down features and a downloadable PDF version for convenience. These reports offer a detailed backdrop for their regular meetings and consistently showcase the tangible advantages and improvements facilitated by Spark's exceptional services. This not only validates their pricing structure but also strengthens their reputation as a reliable and valued partner. Service Desk 30-Day Summary Report - view here. Here are some featured metrics: Ticketing Information - This section offers a concise overview of active tickets, the 30-day history of both open and resolved tickets, and key performance indicators such as resolution rates and customer satisfaction scores (CSAT). Ticket Trends - This section categorizes tickets to easily identify trends. For instance, metrics include tickets by type, subtype, item, source, and ticket opener. Additionally, it provides insights to highlight potential problematic tickets, such as those with extensive time entries and an aging ticket summary. Open Projects & Managed Servers - Concluding the report with a brief summary of ongoing projects and the effectiveness of managed servers opens up avenues for further improvements and additional tasks to be explored. Thank you, Scott, for collaborating with us and sharing your Caretaker Plus Service Report template! Recreate in your BrightGauge Service Desk 30-Day Summary Report (public view link) Service Desk 30-Day Summary Report Buildout Key Make sure to visit our library of more report and dashboard templates and please feel free to reach out to success@brightgauge.com with any questions!

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