When I first started talking about presenting data effectively, Kylie Hutchinson came up to me in her bad ass black leather jacket and said if I needed a mentor, she was available. That’s how cool she is. When I talk about how effective it can be to introduce the element…
The folks at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation are serious about investing in the greater good and equally as serious about making sure those dollars have an impact. To that end, the hire organizations to investigate and evaluate what’s going on in Kauffman-funded programs. Those organizations apply the most appropriate…
Data visualization is so cool because it helps you see things that would otherwise take a looooooot of effort. Here’s an example. Some very sweet clients in Maricopa County, Arizona (that’s the greater Phoenix area, friends) had a habit of presenting super important data in the most hard to digest…
In years past, I designed for you cards to help you celebrate Valentine’s Day and the winter holidays like the data nerd you really are. But truth be told, my favorite holiday is Thanksgiving. I love the food, the focus on family, and the deep expressions of gratitude. Does your…
This is the kind of post you either love or hate. You hate it if you are a graphic designer. When graphic designers are in my workshops, they usually spend the first part nodding their heads in passionate agreement because I’m educating their research team on…
Here’s the deal: People primarily look at pictures. That’s why we visualize data – to get people to look at it. But if we waste the short amount of attention people are willing to extend to us by showing them visuals that don’t convey…
The end of August marks an important moment for me because it is when I quit my salaried job to work on data visualization and design full time. 5 years! It remains one of my best decisions. So, I like to celebrate it with you. Last year, I launched the Evergreen Data…
Yes, I know the jig is up. All of my examples in books and workshops are pretty tidy, as if every response options was addressed by every single respondent. The truth is that life and data collection are messy. How can we show that different questions have different sample…
As I usually do in my workshops, I talked to a group in Warsaw, Poland about how we should use color intentionally in our data visualization and that, in fact, the color choice itself can help us tell our story. I prepared a little activity around this issue, in…
Few things are more tragic than excellent non-profits doing great work to help struggling families but can’t tell their story effectively. In this blog post, I’m going to step you through the redesign of a one page handout I created for my clients at the Education Development Center. Their…
