tableaut /ta.bloat/
noun
def: When your Tableau Server has too many dashboards, making users too overwhelmed to make confident decisions.
"If we don't consolidate these dashboards now, our case of Tableaut is just going to get worse."
Similar: inDATAgestion, OverGraphed, PieEyed
Tableau makes it super easy to create content - that's the good news. The bad news is that if you don't revisit created content often, you end up creating slight variations of each (mostly for different audiences). This results in a condition I call, "Tableaut."
Currently, there is no known 'cure' for Tableaut, however the symptoms can be managed with a few key efforts
- Automate a weekly 'archive stale content' script that moves workbooks and data sources off the server and alerts the owners
- Leverage the Logs and Postgres to determine what content is being used and by whom. Then organize a strategic consolidation / cleanup effort
- Create Landing Pages where users can get to what they need from one spot instead of having to bookmark multiple links (here's a good example of one we did: https://www.copulsepoll.org/results)
- Run a post mortem on the most used workbooks, especially where you see users are downloading data. (If they are downloading data, then the dashboard is not giving them the answer they need.)
What are some other ways you handle Tableaut?