What actually takes time
The critical path rarely runs through development. What takes time: obtaining read access to the tools, reconciling sources that contradict each other, and above all arbitrating definitions. Agreeing on what “margin” means takes longer than displaying the curve.
Rebuilding history also stretches the timeline when it is requested: recalculating 2 years of indicators assumes clean past data, which is rarely the case. We often advise starting from today and letting the history build itself from there.
The data prerequisites
Three prerequisites shorten everything. The list of expected indicators, even an imperfect one. Read access to the source tools: accounting, CRM, invoicing, bank. And one person who settles definitions without calling a meeting for every arbitration.
When those three conditions are met, a first cockpit is in production in 3 to 4 weeks, main sources connected. When they are not, the same project drifts for months, for reasons that have nothing to do with technology.
The milestone-by-milestone path
We deliver in short milestones. First milestone: one screen with the vital indicators, connected to the two or three main sources, refreshed every night. It is used in the leadership meeting from the day it goes live, that is the test of a successful milestone.
The following milestones add thresholds and alerts, then views per team: sales, production, finance. Each milestone delivers a screen that is actually used; nothing waits for a big-bang launch. The scope of each milestone is decided with you, based on what the leadership team asks for after using the previous screen.
Starting with manual exports is acceptable to validate the indicators; automating the collection comes as a second milestone. Validate first, automate second: the reverse means automating figures nobody looks at.
Adoption: the real hidden delay
The real hidden delay is habit. A cockpit consulted once a month out of curiosity has changed nothing. The useful timeline is measured by the moment the leadership meeting opens on the screen and nobody prepares slides of figures any more.
That habit settles in about a quarter, on two conditions: a named owner per indicator, and a meeting ritual that starts from the cockpit. We install the ritual along with the tool; one without the other does not hold.
What happens after go-live
A cockpit is never finished: the indicators follow the strategy, and the strategy moves. New thresholds, a new line of business, a new view for a manager: these changes are part of the tool's normal life.
That is what the plans are for: Care, from €250 excl. VAT per month, covers monitoring, hosting and fixes; Growth, from €1,500 excl. VAT per month, adds continuous evolutions, prioritised with you every month.
Our advice: book a quarterly review to remove dead indicators and bring in the missing ones. A living screen keeps being read; a frozen one dies within 6 months. That review lasts an hour and is prepared with the indicator owners: they are the ones who know what has stopped being useful.