Dashboards — Tell the Full Story

Combine multiple charts into one interactive, shareable view. This is what executives use to make decisions.

~20 minutes

📌 Before You Start

What you need: Tableau Public open with your work from Module 5. You need your bar chart (Sheet 1) and your line chart (Sheet 2) already built. If you did not complete Module 5, go back and do it first — this module builds directly on it.

What you’ll do: Combine your two charts into one dashboard, add a title, add interactivity (clicking one chart filters the other), and publish it to a live public URL. That URL goes in your portfolio.

💡 The Concept

A dashboard is multiple visualizations combined into one view.

Instead of showing your manager 5 separate charts in 5 separate emails, you show one dashboard that tells the whole story at once. They can see the big picture AND drill into the details — all in one place.

What makes a great dashboard:

Answers 3–5 specific business questions on a single screen
Designed for a specific audience (not “everyone”)
Uses the minimum number of charts needed — not the maximum
Has clear, descriptive titles
Uses consistent colors and logical flow (most important = top left)
Has interactive filters so users can explore on their own

What separates junior from senior analysts: Juniors know how to make charts. Seniors know how to design dashboards that actually get used. This module is where you start crossing that line.

🔗 Why It Matters

Executives and managers make decisions from dashboards. They do not read data tables. They do not look at 10 separate charts. They look at one well-designed dashboard and act on it.

If you can build a clear, honest, useful dashboard — one that helps people make better decisions — you are valuable. Add the fact that it is live and interactive on the internet, and it is your portfolio proof.

🖐️ Practice

In Tableau, look at the tabs at the bottom of the screen. Click the New Dashboard button (it looks like a small grid icon, or right-click in the tab area). A blank dashboard canvas appears.

On the left panel, you see your Sheets listed (Sheet 1 = bar chart, Sheet 2 = line chart). Drag Sheet 1 (bar chart) onto the dashboard canvas. It fills the space automatically.

Drag Sheet 2 (line chart) below the bar chart on the canvas. Tableau will show a blue highlight guide to help you place it. Drop it in the lower half of the canvas.

Add a title. In the top menu: Dashboard → Show Title. Double-click the title area at the top. Type: Sales Performance Overview. Click outside to confirm.

Add interactivity. Click your bar chart on the dashboard to select it. A small toolbar appears at the top right of the chart. Click the funnel icon (Use as Filter). Now when someone clicks a category bar, it will filter the line chart below to show only that category’s profit trend. Try it.

Save it: File → Save to Tableau Public As…. Name it “Sales Dashboard — [Your Name].” After saving, Tableau opens the live URL in your browser.

Copy the URL from your browser. That is your live, interactive dashboard. Paste it into a document you keep for your portfolio. This is the beginning of your professional presence online.

💼 Portfolio note: You now have a live URL that employers can click and interact with. This is real. This is yours. Add it to your resume, your LinkedIn, and your GitHub profile once you set those up in Phase 4.

🛑 Phase 2 complete when you are done. Phase 3 starts fresh.

🧠 Brain Break

You built something shareable. That URL is the beginning of your portfolio. Take a real moment to feel good about that — not in a performative way, but genuinely. You did this.

Sit with that feeling Take a real breath Get up and stretch Tell someone what you built

✅ You Got This

The ONE thing to remember from this module:

One dashboard. Multiple insights. Shareable. Interactive. Yours. That URL is your first portfolio piece.

🏁 Phase 2 Complete

You completed Visualization. You can build charts and interactive dashboards in Tableau Public and publish them online. Phase 3 is Python for Data — pandas in Google Colab and Power BI. Browser-based. Zero installation for Python.

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