How to Build a Simple Weekly Dashboard

Track cash flow, sales velocity, and key ratios in a weekly dashboard that takes 15 minutes to update and flags problems early.

1. Pick your core cash metrics. Track cash position, weekly burn rate, and runway in weeks. Cash position is your checking plus savings minus outstanding checks. Weekly burn rate is total weekly expenses minus revenue. Runway is cash position divided by average weekly burn rate.
2. Monitor sales velocity weekly. Calculate weekly revenue and compare to your weekly target (annual goal divided by 52). Track weekly sales as a 4-week rolling average to smooth seasonal bumps. Flag any week that drops more than 20% below your 4-week average.
3. Watch your gross margin ratio. Calculate weekly gross margin as (revenue minus cost of goods sold) divided by revenue. Track this as a percentage and flag any week below your target margin. Most service businesses target 60-80% gross margin; product businesses typically see 40-60%.
4. Track receivables and payables aging. List total receivables over 30 days and over 60 days. Calculate days sales outstanding: total receivables divided by average daily sales. Most businesses target DSO under 30 days for healthy cash flow.
5. Set up automatic data pulls. Export weekly data from your accounting system on the same day each week. Most systems export to CSV. Use a simple spreadsheet with formulas that calculate ratios automatically when you paste in new numbers.
6. Create alert thresholds. Flag cash runway under 12 weeks, gross margin below target, or receivables over 45 days. Use conditional formatting in your spreadsheet to highlight cells that breach thresholds. Review flagged items first each week.