Coastal Removals
Year over year growth slide with ten metrics in one table
A year over year slide is a test of which measures a business is actually run on, because ten rows leave no room for decoration. This one compares two financial years at Coastal Removals, a fictional removals company, with the operating measures that a depot manager would recognise.
What is on the slide
- Headline
- Where Coastal Removals Moved Most, with the subtitle naming FY24 and FY25 as the two periods.
- Volume and value
- Jobs 1,840 to 2,105, up 14%. Revenue $6.9M to $8.1M, up 17%. Average job value $3,750 to $3,848, up 3%.
- Capacity
- Trucks 14 to 16, crew 58 to 66.
- Service quality
- Net promoter score 41 to 49, repeat and referred share 22% to 27%, on time arrivals 87% to 93%.
- Cost and risk
- Damage claims per hundred jobs 2.4 to 1.6, fuel cost per job $96 to $88.
When this is the right slide
Ten rows in a table suit an operating review where the audience wants the whole year on one page and will question any row that looks out of pattern.
What to swap it for
Metrics: KPI Scorecard Table. Swap to the scorecard when the comparison that matters is against target rather than against last year, so the columns become plan, actual and variance.
What this slide shows
The headline reads Where Coastal Removals Moved Most and the subtitle names the two periods being compared. A four column table follows: a wide measure column, FY24, FY25 and change, with column widths weighted four to one to one to one so the statements in the first column never wrap. Ten rows run from volume down to risk: jobs completed 1,840 to 2,105, revenue billed $6.9M to $8.1M, average job value $3,750 to $3,848, trucks 14 to 16, crew 58 to 66, net promoter score 41 to 49, repeat and referred share 22% to 27%, damage claims per hundred jobs 2.4 to 1.6, fuel cost per job $96 to $88, and jobs where the crew arrived inside the window 87% to 93%. The change column mixes formats on purpose: percentages where a percentage is meaningful, plus two where the count is small, and plain words where a fall is the improvement. Nothing sits under the table, so anything further about the two periods, such as whether the figures are audited, belongs in the pack rather than on the canvas.
Who this slide is for and when to use it
An annual operating review, a lender pack or a management meeting that opens the new financial year. The audience knows the business well enough to read ten rows without explanation, and they will go looking for the row that broke pattern. That is why the row set spans volume, capacity, quality and cost rather than being ten revenue measures. The slide is not for an external audience, who will read ten unfamiliar rows as noise and remember none of them, and it is not for a team meeting about one metric, where a single trend chart does more. Ten rows is also the ceiling for this layout, so a business with twenty measures needs to choose, and choosing is the useful work.
How to adapt it
First, pick rows the business can act on. Trucks and crew are on this slide because a removals company changes them deliberately; a ratio nobody owns would sit there looking meaningful and change nothing. Second, keep one row type per line and one unit per row. Counts, dollars, scores and percentages can all appear in the same table provided each row is internally consistent across its two periods. Third, write the change column in whatever form is clearest for that row rather than forcing every row into a percentage. A move from 2.4 to 1.6 claims per hundred jobs is clearer as 0.8 fewer than as minus 33%. If the more useful comparison is against plan rather than against last year, the scorecard layout swaps the two period columns for target, actual and variance and keeps the same scanning behaviour.
What makes this slide work
Volume, value and revenue reconcile
2,105 jobs at an average of $3,848 is about $8.1M, which is the revenue row. A reader who spots the relationship can then see that growth came mostly from volume rather than from price, which is the finding the slide exists to deliver and which no single row states on its own.
Two rows improve by falling
Damage claims fall from 2.4 to 1.6 per hundred jobs and fuel cost falls from $96 to $88 a job. The change column says 0.8 fewer and 8% less in words, so the direction is unambiguous without arrows or colour. Mixing rows where up is good with rows where down is good is exactly where a change column earns its keep.
The first column is written as a statement
Rows read jobs completed across the year and jobs where the crew arrived inside the window, rather than jobs and on time. Sentences in the wide first column remove the definitional footnotes a terse table would need, and the layout is built with a weighted first column precisely so they fit on one line.
Questions people ask
How many rows fit on a year over year slide?
Eight to ten with this layout, and this slide uses ten. The constraint is legibility at the back of a room rather than space on the canvas. If you need more, group them into two slides by theme, such as commercial measures and operating measures, rather than shrinking the type to fit fourteen rows.
Which metrics belong on it?
Ones the audience can influence and would notice if they moved. A mix of volume, capacity, quality and cost tells a fuller story than ten financial lines, because it shows whether growth came with the resources and the service levels to support it. Every row should be able to trigger a question worth asking.
How do you show a metric where lower is better?
Write the change in words rather than as a signed percentage. This slide uses 0.8 fewer for damage claims and 8% less for fuel cost per job. That removes the ambiguity of a minus sign, which a reader must interpret differently depending on the row, and it avoids needing a colour key the theme would fight.
Should the table be sorted by the size of the change?
Only if the point is ranking the movements. Grouping by theme, as here, helps a reader who wants to check a particular area, and it keeps related rows adjacent so the volume and value rows can be compared. Sorting by change is better when the slide is titled around the biggest movers and nothing else.
Do the periods need to be labelled as financial years?
Yes. Two companies can both say FY25 and mean different twelve months, so the subtitle names both financial years being compared and the presenter states the year end. Anything further, such as whether the numbers are audited or management figures, belongs in the pack rather than squeezed onto the canvas.
Is this better as a chart?
Not for ten different units. A chart works when rows share a scale, so ten percentages could be a dot plot. Here the rows include counts, dollars, a score and percentages, and a table is the only honest way to put them together. Give the one or two rows that deserve a trend their own chart slide instead.
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