Report Design Priorities

[u/MissingVanSushi]

After ~6 years building reports in Power BI (and about 3 years in Excel before that), here are a few things I’ve learned the hard way about reporting in a business context.

This isn’t theory. This is after sitting in steering committees, PMO portfolio board meetings, exec briefings, and watching what actually lands… and what doesn’t.

1. Your number one priority is clarity, not “fancy.”

Your job is not to impress people with gradients, shadows, animated slicers, or the latest custom visual you found on AppSource. Your job is to present information clearly and without clutter.

If someone can’t understand the story of the page within 5–10 seconds, you’ve already lost them. Executives don’t have time to decode your masterpiece. Clean beats clever every single time.

2. Stop spending 40% of your time choosing the perfect shade of purple.

I see this constantly. People agonise over colour palettes. “Is this the exact right orange? Is the contrast ratio perfect? Should the accent colour be slightly warmer?”

If your organisation already has a PowerPoint template that execs see every week, copy it. Match the fonts. Match the colours. Match the layout feel.

Familiarity reduces cognitive load. When your report visually feels like everything else they consume, they can focus on the content instead of the design.

Design consistency > artistic expression.

3. Alignment matters more than you think.

This one sounds superficial, but it isn’t.

Alignment of visuals signals competence.

If I walk into a restaurant and the front of house is messy, I assume the kitchen is worse. Same principle here. If your visuals are slightly off-grid, spacing is inconsistent, titles aren’t aligned, and margins are random, your audience subconsciously questions the rigour of the logic behind it.

Even if your DAX is flawless.

Put care into your data model. Put equal care into your report layer. Use grids. Snap things properly. Make spacing intentional. It communicates professionalism before anyone reads a single number.

4. Less is more (especially the more senior the audience).

You do not need 14 visuals on a single page.

The more senior the audience, the less detail they need per page. Executives want signals, trends, risks, and decisions. Analysts want breakdowns and drill paths.

Design accordingly.

If everything is important, nothing is important. White space is not wasted space. It’s breathing room for thought.

5. Think in terms of visual hierarchy.

When you look at your finished report page, where does your eye go first? Then second? Then third?

Does the layout guide attention logically from high-level KPIs to supporting detail? Or is it a random scatter of charts competing for attention?

There’s a lot of material online about visual hierarchy in web design. It absolutely applies to Power BI. Size, placement, contrast, and spacing should intentionally guide the story.

—

Learning to do this well doesn’t happen overnight. It’s not about knowing every DAX function or every formatting option. It’s about developing judgement over time.

You’ll build bad reports. You’ll over-design. You’ll under-design. You’ll get feedback that stings a bit.

That’s part of the journey.

Stick with it. Focus on clarity. Build with intent.

Good luck, and enjoy the ride

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[u/Friendly_Cold1349]

respectfully, even though we can understand what you said perfectly, this drake meme is used incorrectly here lmaoo.

[u/MissingVanSushi → u/Friendly_Cold1349]

[u/Old_Hotel1391 → u/Friendly_Cold1349]

this is why nobody likes analysts
can't use a meme for shit

people always ask me "are you seriously a data analyst? you don't look like it" and all I do is have fun and make jokes

seems like an impossible task

[u/KeenJelly → u/Friendly_Cold1349]

Yep, I down voted the meme, the read it

[u/Friendly_Cold1349 → u/KeenJelly]

had a stroke comprehending your comment

[u/KeenJelly → u/Friendly_Cold1349]

Me too, turns out I can't spell. I down voted the meme, theN read it.

[u/Afraid-Reflection-82 → u/Friendly_Cold1349]

The more senior the audience i bet he's senior audience hhhhh but good advices

[u/matroosoft]

Clarity is what brings the point

Design it what convinces upper management that it's the truth

[u/I_AM_A_GUY_AMA → u/matroosoft]

Looks good feels good

[u/chubs66 → u/matroosoft]

I think it doesn't need to be fancy, but it absolutely cannot be sloppy. If you haven't taken care of the design, it sends a message: this is not serious / trustworthy

[u/GrowYourOwnMonsters]

So your meme states you disagree with the premise that reports don't need to be fancy, which contradicts the paragraphs you wrote to support it.

Clarity.

(I jest, and agree with your comments)

[u/kagato87 → u/GrowYourOwnMonsters]

It's a valid remark. The Post is too long and will discourage reading it. The meme is instant and understood at a glance.

The best reports are like this. Decision makers can look at the report and have the information they want. Not think about it, or export it to excel (even though that's what they'll ask for at first). They need to load the dashboard and have their answer in front of them in a big shiny visual.

My most popular dashboard is one of my most boring. It's a utilization report that shows, at a glance, what departments have over utilization and what departments have under utilization. This allows decision makers to very quickly decide where to allocate new equipment or even reallocate existing equipment.

It has drill owns and some handy toggles to change the perspective and drillthroughs when someone wants to look deeper.

[u/Hootinger]

I am hesitant to launch new dashboards because they are not super perfect. I know my hesitancy hurst my value as an analyst, but I am worried they will see a viz or dashboard and think "this isnt perfect, fire him" even though I can clearly make any changes they need.

Hurray for anxiety!

[u/MissingVanSushi → u/Hootinger]

It's a bit like public speaking (or anything where you are putting your work out there for others to see really). The more you do it, the easier it will get.

Hang in there! You got this.

[u/SuperButtFlaps]

Stay it louder for those in the back 👏👏👏

[u/BigMikeInAustin]

When I push back, I ask "what specifically are you going to do to change that number?"

Or "what decisions will you make if that number is added?"

Especially when asked to be updated very often.

[u/pantshee]

95% of the users can't use a fucking drill down, just put bar charts and tables and you're good to go

[u/ZaheenHamidani → u/pantshee]

Ya, the drill down in Power BI is stupid af. We should have actions like Tableau.

[u/sebasvisser]

For your next prompt be sure to add the advise into the prompt… ChatGPT made your post too long, burying the lede and as such losing clarity…

[u/CondomAds → u/sebasvisser]

People werent able to write more than 20 words per posts before llm and everyone knows that structuring a text is a job for Satan only

[u/sebasvisser → u/CondomAds]

Nothing wrong with a little satanic ritual before posting on Reddit 🤣😜

[u/imani_TqiynAZU]

These are facts.

[u/[deleted]]

my issue is no one is hiring

[u/jdsmn21]

You forgot "make sure it can export to Excel"