The Perfect Board-Level KPI Dashboard for Engineering SMEs
- Jones Financial Accounts
- Dec 18
- 5 min read
Introduction - Perfect Board-Level KPI Dashboard
Most boards don’t need more numbers. They need clearer numbers.
In construction and engineering, the biggest risks rarely show up as one dramatic figure.
They creep in quietly:
revenue looks strong, but margin is leaking job by job
cash feels tight, but you can’t see whether it’s WIP, debtors, retentions, or supplier terms causing the squeeze
the team is flat out, yet EBITDA isn’t moving
That’s why the best boards don’t rely on spreadsheets alone. They use visual reporting that makes performance obvious at a glance, even for directors who aren’t accountants.
At JFA, we build management packs and dashboards for construction and engineering
SMEs so your board can answer five questions quickly:
Are we growing the right revenue?
Are we keeping gross profit where it should be?
Is EBITDA healthy after overheads?
Is working capital improving or getting worse?
Is WIP helping cash, or silently damaging it?
If your visuals don’t make those answers instantly clear, your pack is costing you money.
If you want background reading on dashboards and management info, these are worth a look:
The Rule of Thumb: “One Page to See It, One Page to Explain It”
A board pack works best when:
Page 1 is a visual “cockpit” (green/amber/red, trends, variance to target)
Page 2 explains why (plain-English commentary + actions)
That gives visibility without drowning people in finance jargon.
A common myth is: “Visuals are for big companies with Power BI.”Wrong. Visuals are for any business where one decision can swing cash by £50k+ in a month. That includes most construction and engineering firms.
1) Revenue: Best Visuals for Directors
What the board actually needs to know
Is revenue up, flat, or down and why?
Is growth coming from good work (profitable, collectible, repeatable) or “busy fool” revenue?
Which departments / revenue streams are driving it?
The best visuals
A. Line chart (12 months) + target line Shows trend, seasonality, and momentum.
B. Stacked bar chart by revenue stream
Example splits:
projects vs small works vs maintenance
install vs service vs call-outs
residential vs commercial vs frameworks
C. Waterfall chart for “movement in revenue”Perfect when the board asks: “What changed since last month?”
Common mistake
Only showing “total sales”. In construction, mix matters. A £200k month of low-margin reactive work can be worse than a £140k month of controlled margin work.
Practical step: Use a simple split in your chart of accounts and job system so revenue reports by stream are automatic. Then track each stream against a target gross margin.
2) Gross Profit: Best Visuals for Margin Control
What the board needs to know
Is margin holding at the right %?
Which jobs are leaking?
Are we under-pricing, over-spending, or both?
The best visuals
A. “Margin % trend” line chart (12 months) One of the most powerful charts in the entire pack.
B. Gross profit bridge (quoted vs actual) A mini waterfall that shows:
margin lost to labour overruns
margin lost to materials increases
margin gained from variations / claims
C. Job margin league table (Top 10 / Bottom 10) Boards don’t need every job. They need the outliers.
Common mistake
Boards stare at the P&L margin and assume it reflects reality, while WIP or late costs are hiding the truth.
Practical step: Tie margin reporting to job codes and cost categories so you can see labour, materials, subcontract, plant separately.
If you want a simple tool to support this, point teams to:
Job / Project Profitability Tracker on https://www.jonesfa.co.uk/resources Jonesfa
3) EBITDA: Best Visuals for “Real Profit After Overheads”
What the board needs to know
Are overheads scaling properly, or ballooning?
Is EBITDA improving with growth?
Are we building a business that can sustain bigger projects?
The best visuals
A. EBITDA trend (12 months) + EBITDA %
Show both:
£ EBITDA (absolute)
EBITDA % (efficiency)
B. Overheads “run-rate” chart A bar chart showing overheads by month vs target.This stops overhead creep hiding inside “we’re busy”.
C. Overhead-to-revenue ratio (simple gauge / bullet chart) Directors understand: “Are we running too heavy?”
Common mistake
Treating EBITDA as “accountant talk”. For boards, EBITDA is simply:
“Profit before financing and tax, are we generating enough from operations to fund growth?”
Practical step: Use an absorption costing view so pricing reflects the true overhead load. The Absorption Costing Calculator is on https://www.jonesfa.co.uk/resources Jonesfa
4) Working Capital: Best Visuals to Explain Cash Pressure
What the board needs to know
Is cash tight because of debtors, WIP, stock, retentions, or supplier terms?
Are we improving or drifting?
The best visuals
A. Cash conversion cycle dashboard
Show three numbers clearly:
Debtor days (DSO)
Creditor days (DPO)
WIP / unbilled days (or stock days if relevant)
B. Aged debtors heatmap (0–30 / 31–60 / 61–90 / 90+) This is far more “board-readable” than a long list.
C. Working capital waterfall Start with last month, then show:
/ - debtors movement
/ - creditors movement
/ - WIP movement
= cash movement
Common mistake
Boards blame “slow payers” without proof. The visual should show exactly where cash is stuck and how much.
Practical steps
Use the Credit Control Procedures Checklist and Late Payment Letter Templates from https://www.jonesfa.co.uk/resources Jonesfa
Add a rolling cash forecast so the board sees problems before payroll week (the 13-Week Cashflow Forecast Template is there too). Jonesfa
5) Work in Progress: Best Visuals for WIP That Boards Understand
WIP is where construction finance goes wrong most often, not due to effort, but because the reporting is unclear.
What the board needs to know
Are we ahead on valuations or behind?
Are we carrying “paper profit” that isn’t collectible?
Which jobs are at risk?
The best visuals
A. WIP “traffic light” by project
For each live job:
% complete
costs to date
value completed
invoiced to date
margin forecast
risk flag
B. WIP bridge: Value vs Invoiced
A simple bar/bridge:
Value completed (earned)
minus invoiced
equals unbilled WIP (cash still stuck)
C. Cost-to-complete trend One line: forecast cost-to-complete moving over time. If it keeps rising, that’s margin leakage in real time.
Common mistake
WIP presented as a single number with no explanation. Boards need to see which jobs create the number.
Practical step: Make WIP a standard page in the pack, reviewed monthly, and connect it to commercial actions: variations, applications, certificates, and billing cadence.
Key Takeaways
Boards don’t need more spreadsheets, they need visuals that show trend, variance, and risk fast.
Track revenue and margin by stream, not just totals.
Working capital visuals prevent cash panic by showing exactly where cash is stuck.
WIP must be shown by project, with value vs invoiced and cost-to-complete movement.
If you want a board pack that makes decisions easier (and stops firefighting), JFA can help you design the visuals, the KPIs, and the monthly rhythm, and we’ll keep it in plain English so the whole board can use it.
Free tools to support this are available at https://www.jonesfa.co.uk/resources. Jonesfa
Wrapping up today's insights, tomorrow we simplify another accounting challenge.
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