Key Performance Indicator Dialog Box

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The Key Performance Indicator (KPI) dialog box appears when you right-click a measure and click Create KPI or click Create KPI in the PowerPivot tab of the Excel ribbon. In the context menu, Create KPI is available only for measures you created. In the ribbon, the Create KPI control is enabled only when a measure is selected in the Field List.

A KPI is based on a specific measure and is designed to help evaluate the current value, status, and trend of a metric.

The Key Performance Indicator dialog box contains a common property (KPI Base Measure Value) and two sections, KPI Status and Descriptions.

KPI Base Measure

The KPI base measure (value) is a read-only field that inherits the name of the base measure for the KPI you create. To change the name of a KPI, right-click the KPI parent node, and then click Rename. The Edit Measure dialog box opens, where you can change the name of the KPI.

KPI Status Tab

Define target value

Select Measure, and then select a measure from the list, or select Absolute Value, and then enter any number.

Define status thresholds

Specify the thresholds for the status of the KPI either by dragging the status controls on the status bar or by entering the specific numbers. By default, the threshold reads from small to large, where the first control represents the lower range and the second control represents the upper range. To reverse this scale to read from large to small, enter the larger value for the first control. This will switch the scale and allow you to define a KPI where lower is better.

To change the order of the color icons, click the color icons. For example, you can reverse the colors so that red is high and green is low.

Select icon style

To change the icon type, click an icon set from the selection. The icons above the status bar change as you hover over the different icon sets. To define greater granularity in the thresholds, select one of the sets of five icons.

Descriptions Tab

Enter descriptions for each of the KPI objects (nodes). When you hover over the objects in the Field List, the descriptions appear as tooltips. The tooltips also appear in third-party applications that have implemented support for the descriptions.

ALT Shortcuts

UI section

Key command

KPI base measure

ALT+B

KPI Status

ALT+S

Measure

ALT+M

Absolute value

ALT+A

Define status thresholds

ALT+U

Select icon style

ALT+I

Trend

ALT+T

Descriptions

ALT+D

Trend

ALT+T

See Also

Reference

Measure Settings Dialog Box (Standard Aggregation)

Concepts

Create a Measure in a PivotTable or PivotChart

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