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Best Practices in Presenting Data

Best Practices in Presenting Data. Created by Sarah Marschall, Client Services Manager Social Entrepreneurs, Inc. www.socialent.com. Extensive data is available to tell the story Strong demand for understanding Technology makes it easier and faster

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Best Practices in Presenting Data

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  1. Best Practices in Presenting Data Created by Sarah Marschall, Client Services Manager Social Entrepreneurs, Inc. www.socialent.com

  2. Extensive data is available to tell the story • Strong demand for understanding • Technology makes it easier and faster • Too much (or too little) information creates new frustrations and communication problems Why It’s Important

  3. Best Practices or Just Preferences?

  4. When it comes to data (like candy), some like toffees, and others go for raspberry crèmes. • Is there really best practice, or just preferences? • While there is certainly room for diversity, some basic principles make data – more digestible! What Makes for Data Presentation Effective?

  5. Clear & Clean Communicates Visualization Principles

  6. You + Data

  7. There is the data you want to share • Try to design it so that it communicates to your audience. To do this , you have to • See it first, then you can • Share it with your audience • This takes some space and timeto: • analyze, • reflect, • Design…. and then • Refine. See it …then,Share it!

  8. Using Color • Blueis a great color for data. • Colors mean different things in different cultures, and to different people… • If in doubt, get some feedback.

  9. Contrast is important • Colorblindness, visual disabilities are common • Textures and shading can replace or supplement colors Using Contrast

  10. Cleaning Up Graphs and Figures Some real-life “before and after” examples

  11. Table Before:Too much dataHard to readNot clear

  12. Table After:Less data & Sorted to answer evaluation question

  13. Table Before:Requires additional narrative to understand

  14. Table After:Sorted furtherReversed axesRevealed new patterns (core & additional)

  15. Bar Chart Before:Hard to read labelsA lot of grey

  16. Bar Chart After:Shortened labelsRemoved gridlinesColor to and size to emphasize key opportunities

  17. Qualitative Before Hard to know what matters most

  18. Qualitative AfterCallouts draw reader back to the list “[I] learn[ed] that it’s very important to read, read.” “Asking question and talking [and] getting answers [from] a person”

  19. ….WORDS …WORDS ...WORDS … Spatial BeforeNarrative used to describe geographic breakout “Families represented a broad geographic distribution from within the county. Over half of the total population (57%) was from one of five zip code areas (89502, 89431, 89433, 89506 and 89512). Parent University reached more people in more areas of the county than in 2011-12, including rural areas of Nixon and Wadsworth (Social Entrepreneurs Inc. and WCSD Office of Family School Partnerships, 2011-12). Summary based on data from parent surveys; 1,139 of 1,244 total surveys included information on their 5-digit home zip code. Map contains 97% of all participants by zip code. 14 zip code areas had 4 or fewer participants and are not shown on map. “ ….Catch all that???…

  20. Spatial After:Create a map!

  21. Report is boring. • Bring out your qualitative data. Stories and voice is compelling (to most) Graph is hard to understand. • Consider several small graphs • Reorder your data • Re-make it to communicate • Use color or size Information is spatial. • Make a map - many new tools are web-based and easy for beginners Challenges and Suggestions

  22. Sick of smart-art. • Get out the pen and draw • Get help visualizing your data (Ask your co-workers or consumers to draw with you) Simple doesn’t tell the whole story. • Make it simple. Put the details in an appendix or companion document. If you can’t see it – how can your audience? Challenges and Suggestions

  23. Reports may be printed in c0lor, black and white, or grey-scale. • Printing (including to PDF) sometimes results in changes to the look of your charts and tables • Check your final versions to make sure your document still communicates your data. Finally…Printing Data

  24. Tools and ResourcesCheck these out! Color: Check out Design Seeds for amazing color inspiration.http://design-seeds.com/ Inspiration: Check out PBS Backstory about Data Visualization highlighting the art and science from the forefront…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdSZJzb-aX8&feature=share&list=PLTOiUmhVCEQQ9Kokk-awLgscBo_3MHr_k A Leader in the Field: Stephanie Evergreen blogs, writes, and holds webinars on the subject. Awesome tips for those of us that like (or don’t like) Excel. http://stephanieevergreen.com/blog/ Professional Guidance: The American Evaluation Association has extensive resources – membership provides access to regular information just like this. http://www.eval.org/ Google: Use the image search feature in google to see lots of examples all at once. www. images.google.com Chris Metzner’s Blog http://www.chrismetzner.com/blog/

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