What a live indicator changes, and what it does not
The advantage of a live indicator is narrow and real: it shortens the distance between something going wrong and somebody noticing. It does not make people work differently by being visible, and dashboards installed on the assumption that it will are usually ignored within a month.
The indicators that benefit from being live are the ones where a same-week reaction changes the outcome — allocation gaps, timesheets not entered, hours booked outside an assignment. Everything else is better as a weekly figure, because a number that moves hourly invites reactions to noise rather than to trends.
- Live only where a same-week reaction changes the outcome
- Weekly figures for anything trend-shaped
- A stated threshold for every live indicator
- Noise dampened so small movements do not trigger action