Hi Andy!
Thanks for the clarification. I thought that was the case but as you figured out, it's not possible to force a tester to follow a specific order. All you can do is try to make it obvious by the display order or you might want to consider adding numbers/references into the test case name so that it's even clearer what order to execute them.
Regarding the dashboard approach, I shared an example recently of a dashboard I created for testers on my current project. There is some detail included in how to create a dynamic 'outstanding tests' report for each tester.
View for Users to See All Assigned Executions - SmartBear Community
Best of luck with it but if you need any help just post a message and we'll try to help 🙂
Best, Andy