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Sometimes we fly too close to the dashboard
A quiet morning on the porch and what it taught me about watching metrics.
Last Sunday I sat on the porch with a coffee and, for once, no laptop. Mild for the end of January, birds busy in the hedge, a neighbour's wind chime doing its thing. I closed my eyes for what I thought was a minute. It was closer to twenty.
I spend most of my working week inside dashboards: activation rates, day-7 retention, how many new members post in their first week. I like numbers and I'll defend them in any meeting. But that morning I noticed how rarely I give my attention to anything that isn't being measured.
The thing the chart can't see
A client asked me recently why their retention dipped in January. We pulled every cohort chart we had. The real answer came from a moderator who mentioned, almost in passing, that the member who used to welcome every newcomer had gone quiet over the holidays. No metric tracked her. She was the onboarding flow.
That's what I mean by flying too close. Stare at the numbers long enough and you start managing the chart instead of the community.
What I'm trying instead
- One morning a week with no dashboards at all. I read member posts in full instead.
- Every metrics review opens with a single member story before any chart goes up.
- When a number moves, the first question is "who?" before "why?"
The numbers will still be there on Monday. The person quietly holding your community together might not be, if nobody notices them.
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Comments (18)
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Sharing this with the Music Lovers mods. Half of us check the member count like it's a heart monitor.
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Victoria, would you ever turn this into a talk? Our monthly organisers' call would love it.
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Back after our open mic planning call. Ten minutes on numbers, forty on who needs a lift home after the gig. Felt like the right ratio.
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We see the same in the patient support groups. The most useful signal is rarely on a chart. It's the regular who quietly stops posting after a hard appointment, and whether someone notices.
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And from the physician side: twenty minutes sitting outside with your eyes closed is good for more than perspective. Keep the porch habit.
