Delightful, strategy-shifting, and totally free ideas for your next data viz

Visualizing Likert-type Data: Try Aggregated Stacked Bars

Man, do researchers love Likert-type data! You know what I mean – the kind of survey response options that range from Strongly Agree to Strongly Disagree (or vice versa, depending on your allegiances). Probably the most common way of visualizing that data is via a stacked bar chart, just like…

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When It’s OK to NOT Start Your Axis at Zero

UPDATE: This post was written in 2014 and my thinking has evolved since then. Here’s the newest post on how to handle all of your axes. You can also join us at the Evergreen Data Visualization Academy where we banter back and forth about these ideas and apply…

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Announcing The Rad Presenters Podcast!

I know some really rad presenters. One of the raddest in Jon Schwabish, which is why I’m absolutely thrilled to launch a brand new podcast with him. The Rad Presenters Podcast! Each episode we will cover a new topic related to presenting – picking great images, the array…

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Evergreen Evolving

I took a deep breath and I did it. I changed my Twitter handle. This is a big deal. Things sure are evolving around here. It goes like this: I fell into the field of evaluation. Like most people on the planet (including my parents), I had no idea what…

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Death Penalty Graphics

What kind of imagery do you use when talking about the death penalty? I was out west a few months ago, working with Rakesh Mohan and his army of awesome. In the past, I had pressured them to use graphics in their reports and slides. And they did! Only the…

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Declutter Dataviz with Small Multiples

Are you making graphs that look like this crap? I won’t make you raise your hand. But let’s just agree not to do this, yeah? It’s SUPER hard to compare the tops of a bunch of bars. Two side by side bars per region ain’t so bad but beyond…

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The Easiest Way to Make Bullet Charts in Excel

There are lots of ways to make bullet charts, some easier than others, some better suited for specific visualization contexts. Hell, there are plug-ins you can purchase that make it a snap. Except when my plug-in broke and I had to remake about a…

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Guest Post – Charting Confidence Intervals

Hi there! I’m Angie Ficek and I’m a program evaluator at a small evaluation consulting firm called Professional Data Analysts, Inc. (PDA) in Minneapolis, MN. In a previous post, Stephanie wrote about adding standard deviations to a dataviz. I responded to her post with an example of…

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What the Hell is Wrong with the Projector & How to Fix It

Meet a hero. This is Kailen Brooks. A few months ago, I was giving a workshop on data visualization to about 40 people at the AEA Summer Institute when pretty much everything that could have gone wrong almost did. Someone’s spilled drink ran dangerously close to my computer.

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Adding a Benchmark Line to a Graph

This simple line packs so much power. Adding a benchmark line to a graph gives loads of context for the viewer. Here’s how to make one right inside Excel. It’s so easy you might pass out. My data table looks like this: I have my data and I have the benchmark…

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