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What Reporting Dashboards Matter Most for Executives?
Executive Reporting: Translating MDM Data into Leadership Insights
When managing an enterprise environment, your Mobile Device Management (MDM) platform generates an overwhelming amount of raw data. However, executives do not want to see raw logs—they need high-level, actionable insights that answer business-critical questions about risk, cost, and efficiency.
This FAQ document is designed to help IT Directors and administrators translate technical Hexnode UEM data into strategic reports tailored for specific leadership personas, complete with exact UI paths and system prerequisites.
1. The CISO / Security VP: Focus on Risk, Security, and Compliance
The Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) is primarily concerned with risk mitigation, regulatory compliance, and the organization’s threat posture. They need proof that the fleet is secure and vulnerabilities are being patched.
Q1: How do we prove to security leadership that our endpoints are compliant and secure?
The Why: The CISO needs to know if devices are violating corporate security rules (e.g., missing passcodes, unencrypted drives, or jailbroken/rooted status), which could lead to a data breach or compliance audit failure.
The Hexnode Execution: Navigate to Reports > Built-in Reports > Device Reports > Device Compliance to instantly export a list of non-compliant devices and the specific reasons for their failure. Pair this with Reports > Built-in Reports > Policy Reports to prove that baseline security policies (like Wi-Fi restrictions and password rules) have been successfully applied across the fleet, isolating any devices where application has failed.
Q2: How do we report on our vulnerability management and patching cadence?
The Why: Unpatched operating systems are the leading cause of security incidents. Security leaders need visibility into OS version fragmentation and concrete risk metrics.
The Hexnode Execution: In the Hexnode console, navigate to Reports > Built-in Reports > Patch and Update Reports. For the CISO, export the Applicable Vulnerabilities report. This provides a clear list of all vulnerabilities affecting enrolled devices, giving security leadership the exact risk calculations they need for compliance audits. The report tracks the most critical forensic data, including the CVE ID, the CVSS Rating, and the specific Affected Devices.
2. The CFO / Operations VP: Focus on Cost Management and Asset Utilization
The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and Operations leadership care about maximizing ROI, preventing asset loss, and controlling recurring IT expenses. They want a hard audit of hardware inventory and software utilization.
Q1: How can we give finance visibility into our hardware fleet and prevent asset loss?
The Why: “Ghost” IT assets—devices that are lost, stolen, or sitting inactive in a desk drawer—represent a massive sunk cost. Finance needs to reconcile the hardware inventory they paid for against what is actually being used in the field.
The Hexnode Execution: Run the Inactive Devices report under Reports > Built-in Reports > Device Reports. This provides a clean list of hardware that can be reclaimed, retired, or investigated.
Admin Note: A device’s “Inactive” classification is not arbitrary; it is entirely determined by the timeframe threshold your team explicitly defines under Admin > General Settings > Inactivity settings. Ensure this threshold aligns with your company’s operational rhythm before pulling reports for the CFO.
Q2: How do we track software licensing and data overages to optimize IT spend?
The Why: Paying for unallocated application licenses or absorbing carrier overage penalties drains operational budgets. The CFO needs a hard audit of actual software footprints and network utilization.
The Hexnode Execution: Navigate to Reports > Built-in Reports > Application Reports > All Applications to cross-examine active software instances across the fleet. Here, you can audit your licensing footprint by reviewing columns such as App license type, Total VPP Licenses, Available VPP License, VPP Licenses in Use, and VPP Organization Name. To track data consumption, go to Reports > Built-in Reports > Usage Insights > Data Usage to sort by Total Data and Mobile Data.
Crucial Caveat: The Wi-Fi and mobile data metrics in the Data Usage report will only populate if a Network Data Usage Management policy has been actively deployed to your target Android/iOS endpoints. Without this prerequisite policy continuously aggregating telemetry, the report columns will display zero data.
3. The IT Director / CIO: Focus on Accountability and Operational Efficiency
The Chief Information Officer (CIO) or IT Director bridges the gap between technology and the business. They care about team productivity, administrative accountability, and identifying systemic infrastructure bottlenecks.
Q1: How do we track IT team productivity and ensure administrative accountability?
The Why: If a critical policy is deleted or a device is accidentally wiped, the IT Director needs to know exactly who did it and when. They also need to measure how effectively the helpdesk is executing remote commands.
The Hexnode Execution: Under the Built-in Reports dashboard, use the Audit Reports module to review portal forensic logs (such as profile modifications or technician logins). To monitor operational efficiency, jump to Action Reports, and audit the exact execution states (Success, Pending, or Failed) of remote bulk commands. If a high percentage of remote lock actions are failing, it helps the CIO spot localized network infrastructure bottlenecks rather than user error.
4. Delivering Executive Insights Effectively
Executives rarely log into the MDM console themselves. They expect clean, formatted data delivered to them automatically on a predictable cadence.
Q1: Can we combine different data points into a single, customized dashboard for leadership?
The Hexnode Execution: Yes. While built-in reports are comprehensive, executives often want specific cross-sections of data. Using the Custom Reports feature, an IT admin can combine multiple filters—for example, isolating “Inactive Android Devices in the Sales Department missing the latest OS patch.” Once you build a report that management approves of, save it as a Custom Report Template, ensuring you don’t have to rebuild complex filter queries from scratch next quarter.
Q2: Executives don’t want to log into the MDM portal. How do we deliver these insights directly to them?
The Hexnode Execution: Fully automate delivery using Hexnode’s Scheduled Reports feature. Instead of manually exporting data every Friday, configure Hexnode to automatically generate any built-in or custom report and email it directly to the C-suite’s inbox.
- Frequency: Define a daily, weekly, or monthly cadence.
- Format: Select PDF for easy, high-level reading on mobile devices, or CSV if the finance team wants to manipulate the raw data in Excel.
This guarantees leadership gets the insights they need without adding manual administrative overhead to your IT helpdesk.
