Skip to main content

​
Immediate Value

After this tutorial, you’ll design an executive dashboard, build custom analytics dimensions, compare individual and team performance, and create calculated fields for advanced metrics, and deliver the dashboard to leadership on a schedule.

​
Prerequisites

  • Tutorial 14: Analytics and Reporting
  • Tutorial 12: Advanced Pipeline Management
  • The Creator role in Affinity Analytics (see Tutorial 14)
  • Recommended: enough historical data for meaningful trend analysis (typically 3+ months)

​
Quick-Start Roadmap

  1. Design an executive dashboard
  2. Build custom analytics dimensions
  3. Compare individual and team performance
  4. Create calculated fields for advanced metrics
  5. Deliver the dashboard to partners and LPs

​
Why Executive Dashboards Matter

A well-designed executive dashboard gives partners and LPs a single view of pipeline status, recent closings, team activity, and conversion — without requiring them to navigate Affinity directly.
Affinity guide: Portfolio Growth Best Practices with Bessemer Ventures and Affinity Analytics: Reporting Tips & Tricks.

​
Task 1: Design an Executive Dashboard

​
Context

Build the dashboard around the small set of questions leadership asks repeatedly. Decide on the questions before you build anything.

​
Action

Step 1: Decide your 3–5 key questions. Common examples:
  • What’s our total pipeline value, and how has it changed?
  • How many deals closed this quarter?
  • Which team members are most active?
  • What’s our conversion rate from sourcing to close?
  • Are we on track for this fund’s deployment targets?

​
Step 2: Build the dashboard

  1. Open the list the dashboard should live in, click the + at the end of the view tabs, and choose Dashboard View.
  2. Name it (e.g., “Executive Dashboard”).
  3. Click Edit Dashboard and add a tile for each question: | Question | Tile Type | Data | | --- | --- | --- | | Total pipeline value | Single value | Sum of Amount where Status ≠ Closed | | Deals closed this quarter | Single value | Count where Status = Closed Won, this quarter | | Pipeline by stage | Bar chart | Count grouped by Status | | Deal flow trend | Line chart | New deals per month, last 12 months | | Team activity | Table | Emails + meetings per person, this month |
  4. Place the highest-priority tiles at the top.
  5. Share it: teammates with access to the list can open the dashboard’s URL. For leadership who don’t log in to Affinity, schedule it by email — see Task 5.

​
Expected Outcome

A focused dashboard answering leadership’s recurring questions without requiring them to navigate Affinity directly.

​
Task 2: Custom Analytics Dimensions

​
Context

Standard dimensions (Status, Owner, Industry) cover basic reporting. Custom dimensions let you group by fund, vintage year, deal source, sector thesis, region, or any custom field.

​
Action

  1. Open the dashboard, click Edit Dashboard, then use the ⋯ menu on a tile → Edit.
  2. On the All Fields tab, choose the field you want to group by as a dimension. Any field on the list works, including your custom fields. Examples:
    • Fund — pipeline per fund
    • Deal Source — which channels are producing deals
    • Sector — activity across investment themes
    • Region — geographic distribution
  3. Combine dimensions for cross-cuts (e.g., Fund × Stage).
  4. To group by something that isn’t a field yet — such as bucketing check sizes — create a custom dimension from Custom Fields → + Add.

​
Expected Outcome

You can group reports by custom fields, not just default dimensions.

​
📚 Help Center

​
Task 3: Individual vs. Team Performance

​
Context

Compare individual activity and outcomes against team averages for coaching, allocation, and accountability.

​
Action

  1. Create a performance report with: Activity metrics (per person):
  • Emails sent this month
  • Meetings held this month
  • Notes created this month
  • Deals sourced this quarter Outcome metrics (per person):
  • Deals moved to next stage
  • Deals closed
  • Pipeline value managed
  • Average days-to-close
  1. Start from the Team Activity template for the activity metrics, then add tiles for the outcome metrics.
  2. Set targets with goals, so each person’s numbers sit against a benchmark.
  3. Use the dashboard filters to compare periods (this quarter vs. last).

​
Expected Outcome

A performance dashboard showing individual metrics alongside team benchmarks.

​
📚 Help Center

​
Task 4: Calculated Fields in Analytics

​
Context

Calculated metrics in Analytics go beyond list-scoped formulas. They aggregate across records — ratios, running totals, weighted sums.

​
Action

  1. Click Edit Dashboard, then use the ⋯ menu on a tile → Edit.
  2. Next to Custom Fields, click + Add → Table Calculation, write the calculation, choose a format, and save.
  3. Common calculations: Win Rate:
  • Closed Won / (Closed Won + Closed Lost) × 100 Average Deal Size:
  • Sum of Amount / Count of Closed Deals Velocity (deals per month):
  • Count of new deals / Number of months Probability-Adjusted Pipeline:
  • Sum of (Amount × Probability) for open deals

​
Expected Outcome

Your reports include calculated metrics that go beyond raw counts and sums.

​
📚 Help Center

​
Task 5: Deliver the Dashboard to Partners and LPs

​
Context

The point of an executive dashboard is that leadership doesn’t have to go looking for it. Schedule it to arrive in their inbox.

​
Action

  1. On the dashboard view, click the ⋯ menu → Schedule delivery.
  2. Choose the Recurrence — for example, every Monday morning before the partner meeting — and a Time. Times are in Pacific Time, so adjust for your time zone.
  3. Add the recipients’ email addresses. They don’t need an Affinity login.
  4. Choose PDF or PNG for a visual report, or CSV for the numbers behind each tile.
  5. Click Save.
Only Creators can send dashboards to other people. Viewers can schedule deliveries to themselves.
Need a one-off chart for an IC deck? With Affinity MCP, you can build one from a pipeline list in plain language — see On-demand pipeline dashboards and reports.

​
Expected Outcome

Leadership gets a current copy of the dashboard on a schedule, without logging in.

​
📚 Help Center

​
Common Questions

Affinity Analytics refreshes its underlying data every 20–40 minutes — no manual refresh required. Scheduled deliveries send whatever the dashboard shows at the time they go out.
Yes. A detailed dashboard for internal team reviews and a simplified one for board or LP presentations is a common pattern.
If your firm uses Restricted Opportunities (Enterprise), restricted deals still count as rows — so totals stay accurate — but their name and field values are masked for anyone not on that deal’s allow list. Analytics follows the same allow list as the rest of Affinity. Ask an allow-list member or your Enterprise Admin if you need access.

​
See It In Action

​
Where to Go Next