A one-page dashboard from your own data, published and refreshed

The situation

Take a spreadsheet you actually have, a fee register, a sales sheet, an attendance sheet, and turn it into a dashboard a manager would open on Monday: cleaned in Power Query with a readable steps list, modelled across three related tables with a calendar, measured with DAX, laid out to answer five written questions, published, and refreshed on a schedule you then verify actually ran.

What you'll be able to show

• Clean in Power Query so the Applied Steps list is the cleaning report
• Model three related tables and prove the relationships with a click
• Write measures including a month-over-month comparison
• Publish, schedule a refresh, and check it happened

What you need

• Power BI Desktop (free) and the free Power BI Service personal workspace
• Your own spreadsheet with at least 50 rows, plus two related tables you build (or invent plausibly)
• A cloud-stored copy of the file for the scheduled refresh

Tasks

1. 1Clean in Power Query

   Load a deliberately messy version of your sheet. Promote headers, fix every data type, standardise a category column with three spellings, remove blank rows, and unpivot any months-across-the-top layout. Read the Applied Steps list.
   A correct result: A clean table and an Applied Steps list that reads as a cleaning report.

2. 2The model

   Build three related tables (students, enrolments, payments: or products, orders, customers). Create relationships in Model view, add a Calendar table. Put a chart from one table and a chart from another on a page, click a value in one, and confirm the other filters.
   A correct result: A model diagram, and a screenshot of cross-filtering working.

3. 3Five measures

   A total, a distinct count, an average, a percentage using DIVIDE, and one CALCULATE with a filter, each formatted. Then a Calendar-based measure comparing to the previous month, placed on one visual with its current-month twin.
   A correct result: Six measures, and a visual showing this month against last.

4. 4The page, from questions

   Write five questions on paper first. Build one page: four cards for headline numbers, a time trend, a sorted comparison, slicers for date and one category. Check every visual answers one of the five; delete anything that does not.
   A correct result: The five questions, and a page where each visual maps to one of them.

5. 5Publish and refresh

   Publish to the Service. Set up a scheduled refresh from the cloud-stored file. The next day, check the refresh history and confirm it ran.
   A correct result: The published report link and the refresh history showing a successful run.

6. 6The note that goes with it

   Write two paragraphs: what question the dashboard answers, and one thing it revealed that surprised you.
   A correct result: Two paragraphs a manager would read.

What to hand in

The .pbix file, the Applied Steps screenshot, the model diagram, the cross-filter screenshot, the published link, the refresh history, and the two-paragraph note.

How it is marked