Transforming Public Sector
Reporting with Power BI

Single
Source
of Truth

Faster
KPI
Reporting

Real-time performance insights

Overview

Public-sector organisations face increasing pressure to demonstrate impact, value for money, and efficiency. For this client, fragmented spreadsheets and siloed data sources made it difficult to track KPIs or share clear performance insights with stakeholders.

New Scaler partnered with the organisation to deliver a modern Power BI reporting suite, transforming raw data into real-time insights that empowered leadership to make confident, evidence-based decisions.

Challenge

The organisation’s existing reporting relied heavily on fragmented spreadsheets, which created several obstacles:

Data spread across systems – Information was siloed in multiple spreadsheets and finance tools, making it difficult to consolidate and compare programme results.
Inconsistent performance tracking – KPIs were not measured in a uniform way, leading to confusion and unreliable reporting.
Time-consuming reporting cycles – Quarterly reports required days of manual effort to prepare, leaving little time for analysis or strategic action.
Poor visibility for stakeholders – Without clear dashboards or visualisations, leadership and external stakeholders struggled to see outcomes or assess value for money.

These challenges slowed down decision-making and limited the organisation’s ability to demonstrate impact effectively.

Solution

New Scaler introduced a modern Power BI reporting solution that addressed these issues end-to-end:

Unified data consolidation – Data from spreadsheets, Microsoft 365, and finance systems was brought together into one central reporting suite, ensuring accuracy and consistency.
Best-practice data modelling – Cleansing, transformation, and structured dataflows established a strong foundation for reliable reporting.
Intuitive dashboard design – Staff and executives were engaged in the design process, ensuring dashboards aligned directly with KPIs and were easy to use.
Automated reporting processes – Scheduled data refreshes and KPI alerts replaced manual updates, reducing workload and ensuring information was always up to date.
Governance for sustainability – A KPI catalogue, data lineage, and retention policies were documented, giving the organisation a sustainable framework for future analytics.

This solution not only improved reporting speed and accuracy but also gave the organisation confidence in making data-led decisions.

End-to-End Journey

Data Discovery – Profiling current spreadsheets and finance data sources to define reporting schemas.
Data Engineering – Building staging → curated → semantic layers with Dataflows.
Dashboard Design – Engaging staff in wireframes and prototypes to align dashboards with KPIs.
Automation – Scheduling refreshes and alerts for overdue submissions or out-of-range KPIs.
Training & Handover – Shadow sessions with staff to create new reports and explore dashboards confidently.
Governance – Documenting data lineage, retention, and KPI catalogue to ensure sustainable reporting.

Results

The new reporting suite delivered measurable improvements:

Single Source of Truth – Leadership gained accurate, consolidated performance insights.
Faster Reporting – Quarterly reporting cycles reduced from days to minutes.
Improved Transparency – Stakeholders accessed clear visualisations of outcomes and value for money.
Empowered Staff – Training enabled teams to build reports and explore dashboards independently.
Future-Ready Analytics – The organisation has now extended its reporting capabilities into planning and forecasting.

Conclusion

By moving away from manual spreadsheets to an automated Power BI platform, the organisation transformed how it monitors and communicates performance.

Executives and staff now share a single, reliable view of programme outcomes, enabling faster and more transparent decision-making. With governance frameworks in place and analytics capabilities expanding into forecasting, the organisation is well-positioned to drive data-led strategies and deliver greater value to the public.

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