Connect ™ User Guide

Focus: Scorecard Structure Imports

Table of Contents

Get ConnectedCreating Your Scorecard Structure Spreadsheet

• Headers • Scor ecard Name • Key Performance Area • Objective s • KPI • Calendar • Aggregation Type • Data Type • Scoring Type • Is Yes Good • Higher Better

• Weighting • Threshold

Connect• Log in • Home Screen • Edit Import Screen • Basic Information • Source Data • Destination

Organization• Mapping • Run Your Import • See Your Success

If you’re reading this User Guide, you’re probably looking to “Get Connected.” And, if you’re reading this User Guide, you probably have never before used an application like Connect. In fact, you might not even be sure what Connect can do for you.

Connect is somewhat similar to an ETL tool. Now, if you’re not much of a “techie” you are likely shaking your head and wondering “what is an ETL tool.” Well, the answer is pretty straightforward. An ETL tool is simply an application that will allow you to move - or more precisely, Extract, Transform, and Load - your data from one place to another. Getting from one place to another is something we can all understand.

So, Connect is a tool you will be using to automatically get your information from one place - your spreadsheet – to another place - Spider Strategies’ Scoreboard application.

OK, but where to start? For starters, there are two types of information that Connect will allow you to import into Scoreboard. The first type is Structure. It is this type of import that will allow you to get your Scorecard Structure imported into Scoreboard. We’ll call these imports “Build a Scorecard.”

Take a look at the sample Structure below. Using Connect allows Structure Imports like this to be imported into Scoreboard fairly quickly. Without Connect, creating this Scoreboard Structure would have been a data entry chore.

The other type of import that Connect will allow you to perform is what we call Update Metric Values.

Imagine the data entry chore to enter the following metric values into Scoreboard:

But, with Connect, this information can go from spreadsheet to Scoreboard without being a data entry chore.

Now, keep in mind that the process of using Connect to move your information from your spreadsheet into Scoreboard is not magical, as some have said, nor is it incredibly complex, as others have said. It is simple and straightforward. However, the import process requires a bit of work before you are even ready to log in to Connect. So, don’t log in just yet!

The best place to begin is really the beginning…and that is with a spreadsheet.

Building a Scorecard Structure Creating Your Scorecard Structure Spreadsheet

The first thing we’re going to do is create a spreadsheet that will allow you to use Connect to automatically populate Scoreboard with your Structure. Remember, that’s our goal…moving your information from one location – your spreadsheet - to another - Scoreboard.

So, go ahead and open up a blank spreadsheet, and let’s get started.

You’ll want to insert a series of headers in the first row of your spreadsheet to guide you in filling in your structure.

Here are the headers you will likely need:

Scorecard, Key Performance Area, Objective, KPI, Calendar, Aggregation Type, Data Type, Scoring Type, Is Yes Good, Is Higher Better, Weighting, Thresholds

And here is what your spreadsheet will look like with the headers inserted.

“Wait!” you’re thinking. “I don’t know what all of the headers even mean.”

Don’t worry about it, yet. Everything will be clear as we move through the spreadsheet step by step – or actually “column by column.”

First, what is your scorecard name? Simple. Enter it in the Column entitled Scorecard.

In our example, let’s call our scorecard Franklin Labs Corporate Scorecard.

In our template Colum B is where you will enter your Key Performance Areas. (You could easily have your columns in a different order, but this is the order that makes the most sense. You’ll see though that you can add columns later on as necessary. Don’t worry. I’ll point this out to you when we get there.)

An easy way to establish your Key Performance Areas is to consider them as the “lenses” through which you view your overall scorecard.

In our example, let’s say that we have the following Key Performance Areas:

Financial, Customer, Internal, and Learning and Growth

In other words, what I’m saying is that I view my Franklin Labs Corporate Scorecard through those four “lenses” or Key Performance Areas.

So, go ahead and enter them in Column B. Here’s what your spreadsheet will look like now. Notice that I left space between each of my Key Performance Areas.

Now, let’s move on to Column C. This is where you will enter your Objectives.

Each of those Key Performance Areas that you entered in Column B will have at least one Objective attached to it. Remember, our Key Performance Areas were:

Financial, Customer, Internal, and Learning and Growth

Now what are your Objectives for those Key Performance Areas?

In our example, we’ll say that:

for our Financial Key Performance Area, our Objectives are to:• Decrease Costs• Increase Productivity

for our Customer Key Performance Area, our Objectives are to:• Increase Market Share• Increase Quarterly Customer Satisfaction Rating

for our Internal Key Performance Area, our Objectives are to:• Excel at Providing Customer Solutions• Deliver Efficiently and Effectively

for our Learning and Growth Key Performance Area, our Objectives are to:• Continuously Develop Leaders• Share and Implement Best Practices

I’ve gone ahead and entered these Objectives into my spreadsheet, so that it now looks like this, again leaving some space between each of the Objectives:

I bet you can see your scorecard structure beginning to take place!

Now, referring back to our spreadsheet template, you’ll see that Column D is where you’ll enter your KPIs.

Take a moment to consider KPIs. These are the things that you will be measuring over time. There are no “typical” KPIs, but here’s a few to consider as examples:

• Percent share of market• Customer satisfaction rating• Accidents• Revenue• Employee turnover

What these items all have in common is that they can all be measured over time. So, as you begin to enter your KPIs, be sure that these are the things that you intend to measure over time.

Now, I’ll start to enter my KPIs in my spreadsheet. In the Financial Key Performance Area, for my Objective to Decrease Costs, I’ll enter the following KPIs:

• Monthly Material Costs to Gross Revenue Ratio• Operating Margin• Gross Revenue

Here’s what my spreadsheet looks like with those KPIs entered.

Continuing down my spreadsheet, I’ve identified and then entered KPIs for my Increase Profitability Objective and then entered KPIs for each of my other Objectives.

Here’s what my spreadsheet looks like now.

You can now see that each of my Key Performance Areas has Objectives, and each of my Objectives has KPIs.

Now, if you’re still with me so far, let’s move on to Column E, Calendar.

Remember, your KPIs are those items that you will be measuring over time. Calendar refers to the frequency with which each of your individual KPIs is going to be measured.

Let’s say you’re measuring “number of accidents.” Ask yourself “do we track the number of accidents daily, monthly, weekly, quarterly, or annually.” Whatever the case, this is the information – or Calendar name - that you will enter in the Calendar column for each of your KPIs.

I’m going to add an extra step here to make sure that your Structure Import will work without a hitch. Take a step back from your spreadsheet structure, and go ahead and log in to Scoreboard for just a moment.

Once you are logged in, click on the Administration tab in the upper left of your screen.

That will bring you to the Administration Screen.

Next, click on Calendars.

You will now see a list of the calendars that are currently available to you.

You’ll want to make sure that any calendar that you are entering onto your spreadsheet is listed as one of the calendars available in Scoreboard. If not, click on and follow the prompts to create the calendar you want in Scoreboard BEFORE you enter it onto your spreadsheet. You’ll be given the option to choose from a standard calendar or to create a custom calendar.

** If you use a calendar on your spreadsheet that has NOT been created in Scoreboard, your import will NOT work. So, it is wise to double-check now that your calendar exists in Scoreboard if you are not 100% certain. **

* Please note that the calendar name in the calendar column must match EXACTLY the name of the calendar in Scoreboard. *

Back to your spreadsheet…

Go ahead and enter your calendar selection in the calendar column. Your spreadsheet will now look something like this:

Looking to the template again, the next column calls for Aggregation Type.

Aggregation Type refers to how your data will roll up on an annual basis. Your choices here are simple: sum or average.

• If your KPI is measuring a percentage, you are going to enter average for Aggregation Type. That’s because if you were to look at this information over a year period, you won’t want to add the numbers up. You’d want to see an average of them.

• If your KPI is measuring a number or currency, you are going to enter sum for Aggregation Type. That’s because if you were to look at this type of information over a year period, you’d want to add all the numbers up rather then see an average.

Here’s what your spreadsheet will look with this information added:

Let’s keep going…

In Column G, we are going to add Data Type.

Your Data Type choices are currency, number, or %. To enter the correct choice here, just ask yourself “what is my KPI measuring?” Is it a dollar amount (e.g., “annual revenue”), then enter currency. Is it a number (e.g., “number of accidents”), then enter number. Is it a percent (e.g., “percent revenue growth”), then enter %.

Once you’ve entered Data Type, your spreadsheet will look something like this:

In Column H, you will be adding Scoring Type.

This column requires a bit more explanation than the other columns we have encountered.

Scoreboard and Connect supports a number of different types of scoring options. Depending on your KPI and what you are looking for, you can select from nearly a dozen scoring type options.

Yes/No: something is done or it isn't:

This type of scoring is ideal for KPIs that either are or aren’t done. For example, did you or didn’t you finish your project on time. It can also work for KPIs where the desired outcome is negative: Did any employees quit this month?

2 Color: between worst and goal is red and between goal and best is green

This type of scoring is ideal for situations where you want to give a more continuous range of scores. For example, when tracking revenue, gradations are important because it is crucial to see just how close you are getting to your revenue goal.

2 Color Goal Only: red if you are under goal, green if you are above

This type of scoring is not used as often as the 2 Color option above, likely because it does not offer the ability to see a continuous range of scores.

3 Color: stoplight coloring where you specify where the absolute worst and best value is

This scoring option allows you to specify where the best and worst value is, like in the 2 Color option, but it allows for even more gradations because of the yellow band. Note that the Red Flag value is the point at which yellow changes to red.

Goal/Red Flag: stoplight where you have red below a least acceptable value, yellow between that value and goal with green at goal and above

This is the scoring type most often recommended to Scoreboard users. This type of scoring only requires that you specify Goal and Red Flag. Scoreboard then creates the best and the worst automatically in such a way that all three fields are the same size.

4 Color (Red-Orange-Yellow-Green): like stoplight except you include a wider range from worst to best

This scoring option is similar to the 3 Color type, but with the addition of the orange field to show when you want an additional warning that orange will soon turn to red.

4 Color (Red-Yellow-Green-Blue): like stoplight except blue is where things are TOO good and no more effort should be expended

This scoring option is similar to the previous 4 Color type, but instead of orange nearing red, you’ve denoted the point at which things are, perhaps, too good and you might want to focus less effort there.

2 Color Stabilize (Red-Green-Red): for KPIs like inventory where too much is bad and too little is also bad

This type of scoring is useful for when you want to have exactly a certain value. For example, a warehouse might need to have exactly a certain amount of items on its shelves. Too much and too little would both cause problems. In this type of scenario, the best score is dead center while one end of the speedometer is Low Worst and the other end is High Worst.

3 Color Stabilize (Red-Yellow-Green-Yellow-Red): for KPIs where there is some flexibility about what is too much and too little

This is similar to the previous type of scoring, but allows for more gradations.

Unscored:

This type of scoring is useful for when you have data you want to report on, but don’t have a target. For example, perhaps you don’t want to set targets for revenue or expenses (both unscored), but you do score your profits. Then, using the Unscored option for revenue and expenses won’t effect the roll up of the nodes higher in the tree.

Here’s my spreadsheet after I entered Scoring Type:

Now, let’s look back to our spreadsheet template. The next column asks “Is Yes Good.”

This information is only filled in for KPIs with a Yes/No scoring type. Enter either Yes or No.

This information is critical because for KPIs such as “Employee retention has increased,” the desired outcome is likely Yes. But for KPIs such as “Accident rates have increased,” the desired outcome is likely No.

The next column, Column J, is asking if a higher value is better.

This information is only filled in for KPIs with a Goal Only scoring type.

This information is critical because if you have a Goal Only KPI such as “Monthly Material Cost to Gross Revenue Ration,” the desired outcome is lower. In that case, you would enter No. If you had a KPI such as “Amount of New Functionality Deployed,” the desired outcome would be higher. In that case, you would enter Yes.

Enter either Yes or No.

Your spreadsheet will now look something like this:

Let’s go back to our template. The next column is asking for Weighting.

If you do not enter anything in this column, then Scoreboard will give equal weighting to all the items. So, if you have three KPIs, then each will be weighted the same. However, if you want one of your items to be weighted more heavily then the others, this column is where you can enter that information.

Let’s take a look at the following:

You’ll see that there is no information in the weighting column. In this case, all of the KPIs in the structure will be weighted equally. In other words, if there are three KPIs under a particular Objective, then all three measures are weighted the same; if there are four KPIs, then all four are weighted the same.

Now, let’s say that I want Operating Margin to be weighted twice as much as the other KPIs associated with that Objective. All I need to do is enter 2 in the correct cell. Look at the following example:

In this case, Operating Margin will be weighted twice as much as the other two KPIs associated with that Objective.

Additionally, you can edit the weight of a Key Performance Area or an Objective in much the same way. Remember, back at the beginning when I said that you might find it necessary to add columns. Well, here’s one place you might find it necessary.

So, if you are going to edit the weight of a Key Performance Area or an Objective, you must:

• add additional columns with a “weight” header that will contain those values• ensure that there is a specific row associated with those items (Key Performance

Area or Objective) to distinguish them from your KPIs.

In such a case, your spreadsheet will look something like this.

Cell C3 would contain the edited weight for the Key Performance Area. Cell E4 would contain the edited weight for the Objective Decrease Costs. And Cells G5, G6, and G7 would contain the edited weight for the KPIs.

The final column from our template is Threshold. A threshold is the point where your speedometer switches from one color to another color, and the number of Thresholds is related to the type of scoring you choose for each KPI.

Now, Connect will allow you to enter as many default thresholds as required by your scoring type. Note that if you haven’t established your default thresholds at this point, you can import your structure without that information and enter them directly into Connect at a later date. You can also enter period-specific thresholds as part of your Update Metric Values Import (more on that later).

Use the following as a guide for threshold creation. Scoring Type Number of Threshold

Unscored NO thresholds

Yes/No NO thresholds

2 Color Goal Only ONE threshold:• goal

2 Color THREE thresholds:• worst• goal• best

Goal/Red Flag TWO thresholds:• goal• red flag

3 Color FOUR thresholds:• best• goal• red flag• worst

4 Color Orange FIVE thresholds:• best• goal• warning• red flag• worst

4 Color Blue FIVE thresholds:• best• goal• warning• red flag• worst

2 Color Stabilize FIVE thresholds:• low worst• low target• best• high target• high worst

3 Color Stabilize SEVEN thresholds:• low worst• low red flag• low target• best• high target• high red flag• high worst

Remember to add enough Threshold columns to your spreadsheet. So, if one of your KPIs has a 3 color stabilize scoring type, then you’ll need seven Threshold columns in your spreadsheet. Also, note that Connect reads Threshold from left to right. When higher values are better, your Thresholds will be in numeric order (e.g., 1, 2, 3, 4, 5). When lower values are better, your Thresholds will be in reverse order (e.g., 5, 4, 3, 2, 1).

Congratulations! Your Structure Spreadsheet is complete and you are ready to import it using Connect.

Go ahead, and log in to Connect.

Once you have logged in, you will see the Connect Home Screen:

Under Imports, click on .

You will then see the Edit Import Screen:

From this screen, all you need to do is follow the prompts. (The hard part - creating your spreadsheet - is already done.)

First, click Basic Information.

Fill in the information on the Basic Information screen. You will be prompted to give your Structure Import a name. The Data Source – Excel or CSV Upload - is correct as it appears. Make sure that you select Build a Scorecard for Import Type. Then, for File select and select your Structure Spreadsheet.

Click OK in the top right of the screen when you are done.

You will now see the following. Click on Source Data.

You will then see the following:

What you’ll see here is your spreadsheet with labels already on top of their corresponding columns. On the left-side of your screen you’ll see the spreadsheet that you have uploaded. The only thing to do on this screen is click OK in the upper right of your screen.

Next step, click Destination Organization. In this step, you will identify the destination node for your Structure Import.

You will now see something similar to the following:

If your Destination Organization is already visible on the upper-left portion of your screen, simply click on it.

You will then see all the elements of your Destination Organization on the lower portion of your screen as in the following image:

If you don’t see your desired Destination Organization on the upper-left portion of your screen, right-click on the top level node. You will then be prompted to Create New Organization.

Give your new organization a name, and it will appear in the upper-left portion of your screen.

Then, select this new organization as your Destination Organization, and it will appear in the lower portion of your screen.

Click OK in the top-right corner of the screen.

The next step is Mapping.

You will see something similar to the following:

In this step, your Source Data is being mapped to the Destination Organization you have selected. The only thing you need to do here is click OK in the upper-right portion of the screen.

You will then be brought back to the Edit Import Home Screen.

Click on the upper-right portion of the screen.

You will then be brought back to the Connect Home Screen where you can see your

import. Click on .

You will see the following dialog box:

Click OK.

You will then see that your Import was a success.

If you want to see your import, go ahead and log in to Scoreboard.

In the upper-left portion of your screen, select Scorecards.

Click on your Organization Node in the left portion of your screen and then you will see the Structure that you imported in the right side of your screen.

Congratulations!