Create and edit forecast boards

Who can use this: Business admin

Available on: Gong Forecast

Ideal for: RevOps

Where to go: Deals > Forecast

Configurable forecast boards let you control how forecast data is structured, displayed, and calculated, so you can match your board setup to how your team actually forecasts. This setup works for any forecasting motion, including new business, renewals, and hybrid models.

This article details the process of building and managing configurable forecast boards.

Before you start

Before you start building a forecast board, make sure the metrics and targets required for your board are configured. You can go back and build new ones and make changes as needed.

Build a forecast board

To build a new configurable forecast board:

Go to Deals > Forecast, click > Add board  

Note:

Until legacy forecast boards are fully retired, both configurable boards and legacy boards are available.

The sidebar has all the sections listed and you can use this to go straight to the right place.

General settings:

• Details

• Board columns

• Period

• Cadence

• Company snapshot

Deal-related settings:

• Drill-down view

• Briefs

• Update CRM

• Warnings

• Deal analytics

When you’ve completed setting up your forecast board, click Save. Once it's saved you can share it with others, duplicate it and make tweaks, edit or delete it.

Details

Give the board a meaningful Name and a Description for some context. When team members forecast, the name of the board appears where they pick the period and what they’re forecasting for:

Board columns

Add columns to the board columns. You can add metric, forecast submission, or target columns.

Period

Select the period your company forecasts for: monthly, quarterly, or both.

Cadence

Here you can turn on/off Send a reminder when forecast is due and set the day and time of the notification. Notifications are sent to everyone via Slack (if your company has a Slack integration) and via the Gong desktop and mobile apps when it’s time for them to forecast or review their team’s forecast.

Company snapshot

In Company snapshot, set the day and time when forecast numbers are locked for the week, typically right before the weekly forecast meeting.

Warning:

The selected snapshot time applies to all forecast boards, not just the one you’re currently editing.

Note:

Team members can change their numbers at any time, but the numbers taken at the time of the snapshot are submitted and used to calculate progress in forecast trends, week over week.

Drill-down view

Set the view that opens when team members click to inspect deals in this board:

1. Click +Add column.

2. Click   to remove a column. Columns with next to them can’t be removed.

   The drilldown view is displayed when team members click a cell > <#> deals:

   

Briefs

Define which briefs appear in the Briefs and Score tabs of the deal panel that opens when team members inspect a deal.

Deal review: Select a default brief type that highlights key deal updates and insights, and define the time period the brief covers when generated. Team members can adjust these settings when inspecting a deal.

Deal health: Select a brief type that surfaces health indicators impacting the deal’s likelihood to close, and define the time period the brief covers when generated. These settings can’t be changed by team members during deal inspection.

Update CRM

Add CRM fields that require team member updates. These fields appear under Update CRM when a cell is clicked, and all inputs sync with the CRM.

Warnings

Turn on/off the warnings to include in the board, and the threshold for each warning.

Deal analytics

In Deal analytics, turn on analytics to generate out-of-the-box trends, changes, accuracy and pacing reports.  

Note:

Deal analytics give you insight into pipeline trends, including forecasting accuracy and reasons behind changes in forecast amounts. Analytics isn’t supported for boards with multiple fields, opportunity teams, opportunity splits, and multi-currency.  

1. Turn on analytics: Turn on if this board tracks open vs. closed-won pipeline based on consistent user, date, and amount CRM fields.

2. Set deal attributes: Set the CRM fields associated with deals included in the reports.

3. Define deal status indicators: Define the conditions for open and closed-won deals.

4. Set target: Set the target to measure your bookings against, and track performance and attainment in trends and pacing reports.

5. Define forecast categories: Define the conditions for deals in each forecast category.

6. Show projection in board columns: Select which column to display projection in, and set reference periods. Turn on projection to help team members see where they are likely to land by the end of the period. Projection is based on deal attributes (2) and status indicators (3).

Note:

Projection is based on deals that were expected to close in the reference period, and whether they were won or lost by the end of the period. They are based on deal attributes (a) and status indicators (c).  

Once your forecast board settings are complete, click Save. Once saved, the board can be edited, duplicated or hidden.

Note:

To align your reports with changes made to your data, reach out to your Gong CSM after your board is set up. Learn about historical data backfill

Hidden team members

Team members can be hidden from a forecast board for one of two reasons: they’re Inactive or they’ve been Excluded.

You can view both inactive and excluded users by clicking on the forecast board.

Inactive team members

Inactive team members are hidden by default and only appear on the board if they have relevant data for the selected forecast period (such as a target, submission, or deal inventory). No action is required. When shown, inactive users appear with an Inactive badge.

Example: Brian left the company in Q3 FY26

• Historical view (Q2 FY26): If Brian contributed to the forecast during this period, he appears on the board with an Inactive badge, preserving visibility into historical submissions and attainment.

• Current view (Q3 FY26): If Brian has no relevant data for this period, he’s hidden from the board.

Excluded team members

Excluding or including team members requires the Manage Forecast board permissions (under Pages). When a team member is excluded, their revenue data (including closed-won deals and submissions) is removed from: Forecast rollups, Forecast analytics, and Projection calculations.

Exclusion is a view-level action on the configurable forecast board, not part of board setup. Once excluded, the team member remains hidden for all board viewers until included again.

When to exclude a team member

Admins may want to exclude a team member in the following scenarios:

• The team member is not quota carrying and should not provide a forecast, for example, assistants, marketing, or product roles.

• The team member should not provide a forecast for a specific revenue stream or business motion. For example, you should exclude customer success from a board focused on New business.

Exclude a team member:

1. Hover over the team member’s name and click .

2. Click Exclude to confirm.

Include a team member again:

1. Click to view hidden users.

2. Hover over the relevant team member and click Include.

   

Edit a forecast board

1. Go to Deals > Forecast, click > Edit board.

Duplicate a forecast board

1. Go to Deals > Forecast, click > Manage boards.

2. Select the board to duplicate, click> Duplicate.

Edit the duplicated board by following the instructions above.

To hide or unhide a board and clean up your view:

1. Go to Deals > Forecast, click> Manage boards.

2. Select the board to hide/unhide, click > Hide/Unhide.

Best practices

• Start simple: Build a basic board and iterate. Many teams begin with one board before branching into others.

• Keep logic centralized: Reuse existing metrics and filters from your dashboard environment to avoid duplications.

• Building a renewal board? See this recipe from the Gong Academy.

• Building a new business board? See this recipe from the Gong Academy.  

Visit our Academy and find out how to utilize your dashboards to boost efficiencies and refine revenue operations