Data Visualisation

 

 

14 May 2020

@maartenzam

Boehringer Ingelheim

4.Dashboard design

Today

1. Data visualisation fundamentals

2. Online and interactive data visualisation

3. Going beyond bars and lines: non-standard visualisations

4. Dashboard design

Dashboard design

Dashboards?

Know your audience

Visual information seeking mantra

Basic design principles for dashboards

Examples

Exercise: dashboard design evaluation

 

Dashboards?

Any display with a bunch of charts on it"

"Dashboard design best practices" are like "Document writing best practices"

All dashboards have different

data

audiences

goals

Types of dashboards

Monitoring

Anwser specific questions

  • Everything ok?
  • Processes ended?
  • Cause of problem?
  • Where to invest resources?

Exploration

Gain insights 

  • Who are our customers?
  • How are people using our webshop?
  • What are the patterns in our sales?

Monitoring

Anwser specific questions

  • Only show relevant data
  • Data and context
  • Time frame is short
  • User is most important
  • Should lead to action
  • Tool = operational dashboard
  • Limited interactivity

Exploration

Gain insights

  • Show all the data
  • Data
  • Time frame is long
  • Data is most important
  • Should lead to insight
  • Tool = analytical dashboard
  • Filters, tabs, sliders, ...

Monitoring dashboard

Analytics dashboard

Monitoring dashboards:

Know your audience

Who is going to use your dashboard?

Topical knowledge?

Technical skills?

Goals?

What tasks does the user need to perform?

Objectives?

Key information to reach those?

How to get to key information?

Actions after interacting with dashboard?

What is the context the dashboard will be used in?

How much time does the user have?

What devices are used?

How to get to key information?

Actions after interacting with dashboard?

Example

Delivery load dashboard

Visual information seeking mantra

Overview first,

zoom and filter,

then details-on-demand

The Information Seeking Mantra, Ben Shneiderman

Illustration: Stephen Few

Overview first

The whole dataset, summarised

Only higher level components

No individual records

Can be a single number, or a single chart

 

Zoom and filter

Zoom in on items of interest

Filter out items not of interest

Might require UI, which should be obvious

Details on demand

Get details of single items, or of a group of items

Dashboard design principles

User centric,

not data centric,

not dashboard centric

Layout

Use a grid

Layout

Use the Z pattern

Layout

Use whitespace

Less is more

Create hierarchy

Group

Be consistent

Color

 

Be consistent

Sparse: draw attention, call to action

Accessible

Numbers

 

Round: 1.2M instead of 1.245.543,23€

Include context (targets, averages, ...)

 

Text

 

Create visual hierarchy

Include all necessary explanations,

but limit/hide them

Visualisation

 

Use appropriate chart types

Respect basic rules of data visualisation

Guide attention

 

Colors

Grouping

Fonts

Grid

Guide action

 

Actions to perform

People to contact

Interactivity

 

Obvious

Undo/Redo, Go back

Tooltips for details on demand

Examples

Exercise: dashboard design evaluation

Exercise

 

What kind of dashboard (monitoring, exploration, what-if, ...)?

Who would be the end user?

What is the goal of the dashboard?

What is good about the dashboard?

What could be improved?

 

Thank you!

slides.com/maartenzam/boehringer-4

 

www.maartenlambrechts.COM

@maartenzam