Many of the industries in which we work have been asking for an easy-to-consume interface that allows a CRM User to understand the value of a CRM Contact within a few moments. This post will focus on utilizing Dynamics CRM 2011’s new Sub-Grid and Chart features to implement a dashboard on the CRM Contact record.

This dashboard was built using point and click (no code!) and works for CRM 2011 Online and On-Premise using Charts, Views, and Sub-Grids.  Instead of displaying a traditional list of boring data, a chart is displayed. 
 
How to build Dashboards on the CRM Contact record

Create a Chart within the Entities you want to display.  The dashboard we’re building displays data from Invoices, Cases, Allocations, and RMS Wine Clubs; therefore we need to create a Chart within each of those Entities. Charts require a bit of testing and allow you to X/Y axis many fields.

Within CRM, navigate to Settings-> Solutions-> [Pick your solution]-> Entities-> Invoice-> Chart-> click the New button to create a new Chart. Then select the options below, then click Save & Close.

You'll need to repeat the steps above for each CRM Entity you want to display on the contact record dashboard. Also, you will need to create new CRM Views if you wish to use a filtered view of data that doesn't already exist.  By default, the "All" views that exist for all Entities will automatically filter data on the Contact that's open.

Create a new Tab/Section on the Contact record and make it 4 Columns wide – this is where we’ll be adding 4 Sub-Grids. Within CRM, navigate to Settings-> Solutions-> [Pick your solution]-> Entities-> Contact-> Forms-> [Pick the Main form]. Once the Main form opens, click the Insert link at the top of the page-> Add a 1 Column Tab [optional]-> Add a 4 Column Section.

Your form should now look similar to the following:

Select the section and then within the insert area in the toolbar, select Sub-Grid.  Populate this form similar to the following screenshot:

Be sure to set the formatting.  12 rows seems to be a good height:

Click Ok when done.

Repeat these steps for any other entities you want to show in your Dashboard.

Save your changes and then Publish All customizations in CRM.

Your CRM Contact record should now look like the following:

This type of data delivery makes for easy consumption by end users, and since Dynamics CRM makes it so easy, it should be one of the first things implemented in any CRM 2011 implementation.