In a manufacturing process everything is volatile and the main driver of that volatility is demand. Customer relationship management (CRM) system is the best place that reveals to us whether a product is in demand or not. The CRM system shows what will be bought and by whom. Earlier, assistants would gather data from people or reports, combine these data into spreadsheets, and then make the calculations. But, nowadays, dashboards are used to reduce the workload. David Gillman (Analyst with Studio B), writes in his article link about some common metrics that manufacturers need from the CRM system. Read more at: http://it.toolbox.com/blogs/insidecrm/crm-dashboard-data-that-matters-most-to-manufacturing-executives-66197