Until now whatever testing was conducted, it was done by the implementation team to make sure that they deliver the best project, but it is the business users who have the final say about the project. Their usage will decide the success of the project.

User Acceptance Testing is the kind of testing where the dashboard is released to a select set of users who will spend a good amount of time in testing the dashboard from all aspects. They will look at if the dashboard fulfills the requirements given in early stage of the project, if it produces the correct data, if it gives the analysis which they are looking for etc.

Another aspect of the UAT is to make end users comfortable so that they can easily understand the sheets which are developed. Once the testing is finished, user may and may not ask for changes. If they find a bug and ask for changes then bugs should be corrected by the developers. UAT phase is the key to the adoption of the dashboards.

It is important to conduct the UAT testing because during development though the developers may be familiar with entire process but could become victim of tunnel vision. They may miss out some crucial steps in the development.

It may also happen that they misunderstood the requirement or one of the requirement itself is missing. In such cases UAT testing helps to find such shortcomings in the development.

There are many things which you should consider before starting the UAT. They are listed as follows:

• Identify right time for UAT: You must understand one thing that you are going to give the access of the dashboards to the end users. Your dashboard is going to create a first impression on them. If the dashboard is not fully developed or tested internally by the consultant and development team, it may will not excite the user. Thus it is important that a consultant know when the dashboards are fully ready for the UAT stage. Consultant should not hurry to start the UAT.
• Identify the users: In an organization you may find many users with different roles and they may have access to their own data. A consultant should identify the key users who understands the given requirements and who has correct access to the data. If a user has access to restricted data they may not be able to complete the entire validation and when it goes into production the results for the data which was not accessible to user could be wrong. The user should be the one who had given the requirements or someone who understands the requirements given and who is well verse with business operations.
• Train the users: The users may or may not know how to use the software, thus it becomes important to given them training on how to use the software. They should be trained on frequently needed features such as how to filter the data, how to navigate between sheets and so on. This will increase their confidence on the system and increase their excitement and interest to use the software.

Once the UAT phase starts a consultant should spend time with users to help them. Consultant should take users through the initial requirements given, to avoid unexpected comments from the users.