Dashboard at the Speed of Nothing
Summit Retail's PMO dashboard has 11 reports and is shared with 220 project managers. The largest report lists all 5,000 active projects, 18 columns, and a filter on a calculated custom field 'Health Score.' The dashboard takes 90 seconds to open, and some regional managers see a blank report even though they can open the same project list report separately. The instance has 40,000 tasks and 12 portfolios. The PMO wants to keep the dashboard but reduce load; they also want regional managers to see only their region, using a group structure called Regional Managers. The current report uses a prompt for region, but many users leave it blank.
1. Diagnose the likely causes of the slow dashboard and the blank reports.
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The slow dashboard is likely a combination of volume and design. Eleven reports load on one dashboard, and the largest report scans 5,000 projects with 18 columns and filters on a calculated field. Calculated fields are evaluated at read time, so filtering on 'Health Score' can force Workfront to evaluate the formula across a large result set before returning rows. The prompt for region is often left blank, which means the report returns all regions and multiplies the work for every viewer.
The blank report is probably an access or filter issue, not a data issue. Reports generally run with the viewer's access, so a regional manager may not have sharing rights to the projects in the report even though they can open a different project list. Alternatively, the prompt default or a filter may be excluding all rows for that user. Compare a blank user's report settings, sharing, and prompt values with a working user's before changing the report design.
2. Recommend a redesign that keeps the dashboard useful while reducing load and enforcing regional visibility.
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Split the dashboard into role-specific dashboards and reduce each to the reports that role actually uses. For the large project report, remove unnecessary columns, filter to active or current projects, and replace the calculated-field filter with a stored field or a status category that can be indexed. Give the region prompt a default and make it required or locked where appropriate, so users do not accidentally run an all-region query.
For regional visibility, use group-based filtering rather than 12 report copies. If each region has a group, filter on the project's group and include subgroups, or use a wildcard such as the user's home group where the data model supports it. Share the regional dashboard with the Regional Managers group and verify that project sharing matches. If some managers still need cross-region visibility, give them a separate dashboard with an explicit prompt default rather than weakening the regional report.
3. A regional manager says the blank report is a Workfront bug because the same projects appear in another report. How do you investigate and resolve it without over-sharing data?
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Treat the two reports as different access paths. Check whether the blank report uses a prompt with no default, a filter on a field the manager cannot see, or a report run-as setting that restricts results. Check project sharing: the working report may be shared through a portfolio or company that grants access, while the dashboard report relies on project-level sharing that the manager lacks.
Resolve it by fixing the report's filter and sharing, not by broadening access to all projects. If the report should run consistently for the regional team, consider running it with the access of a report owner who has the necessary rights, but only if the filter is tight enough to prevent cross-region exposure. Otherwise, share the relevant projects or groups with the Regional Managers group. Test with the actual manager account and confirm that the row count matches the expected region.