The Big Book of Dashboards: Visualizing Your Data Using Real-World Business Scenarios

Table of Contents:

Acknowledgments vii

About the Authors ix

Introduction xi

Part I A Strong Foundation

Chapter 1 Data Visualization: A Primer 2

Part II The Scenarios

Chapter 2 Course Metrics Dashboard 38

Chapter 3 Comparing Individual Performance with Peers 48

Chapter 4 What-If Analysis: Wage Increase Ramifications 62

Chapter 5 Executive Sales Dashboard 70

Chapter 6 Ranking by Now, Comparing with Then 80

Chapter 7 Are We on Pace to Reach Our Goals? 92

Chapter 8 Multiple Key Performance Metrics 98

Chapter 9 Power Plant Operations Monitoring 106

Chapter 10 Showing Year-to-Date and Year-over-Year at the Same Time 118

Chapter 11 Premier League Player Performance Metrics 130

Chapter 12 RBS 6 Nations Championship Match Performance Analysis 138

Chapter 13 Web Analytics 146

Chapter 14 Patient History Analysis of Recent Hospital Admissions 156Chapter 15 Hospitality Dashboard for Hotel Management 164

Chapter 16 Sentiment Analysis: Showing Overall Distribution 174

Chapter 17 Showing Sentiment with Net Promoter Score 186

Chapter 18 Server Process Monitoring 202

Chapter 19 Big Mac Index 210

Chapter 20 Complaints Dashboard 224

Chapter 21 Hospital Operating Room Utilization 236

Chapter 22 Showing Rank and Magnitude 246

Chapter 23 Measuring Claims across Multiple Measures and Dimensions 258

Chapter 24 Showing Churn or Turnover 268

Chapter 25 Showing Actual versus Potential Utilization 282

Chapter 26 Health Care Provider Productivity Monitoring 294

Chapter 27 Telecom Operator Executive Dashboard 306

Chapter 28 Economy at a Glance 316

Chapter 29 Call Center 328

Part III Succeeding in the Real World

Chapter 30 Want to Engage People? Make Your Dashboards Personal 338

Chapter 31 Visualizing Time 352

Chapter 32 Beware the Dead-End Dashboard 382

Chapter 33 The Allure of Red and Green 390

Chapter 34 The Allure of Pies and Donuts 396

Chapter 35 Clouds and Bubbles 404

Chapter 36 A Journey into the Unknown 410

Glossary 419

Bibliography 423

Index 425

STEVE WEXLER is the Founder and Principal of Data Revelations. He has helped scores of organizations worldwide understand and visualize their data.

JEFFREY SHAFFER is the VP of Information Technology and Analytics at Unifund and Adjunct Professor teaching Data Visualization at the University of Cincinnati.

ANDY COTGREAVE is Technical Evangelist at Tableau and writes the Living With Data column for ComputerWorld.

Praise for THE BIG BOOK OF DASHBOARDS

"The Big Book of Dashboards provides a solid treatment of the fundamentals of data visualization, but the numerous examples are what set this book apart. The comments from the authors after each chapter remind the reader that creating influential dashboards is both a science and an art. This book will spend more time on my desk than on my shelf--incredibly practical."
--Jeffrey Camm, Inmar Presidential Chair, Associate Dean of Business Analytics, Wake Forest School of Business

"Some books about visualization focus on principles and guidelines, but they don't devote enough pages to explain how to apply them to the design of complex, multi-section displays, like business dashboards. This book is the opposite of that. While the book contains an introduction to data visualization fundamentals, it is the numerous examples of real dashboards that sets it apart. If you've ever found yourself stuck when creating a dashboard, you will likely find a solution here."
--Alberto Cairo, author of The Truthful Art: Data, Charts, and Maps for Communication

"This book is full of beautiful dashboards along with uber-practical advice from three authors with many years of experience. It is a treasure chest for hardcore data-viz geeks and business leaders needing to get smart on how to present data to optimize operations."
--J.D. Whitlock, VP, Enterprise Intelligence, Mercy Health

"This book provides you with a vast array of real-world dashboards, and shares the thoughts and considerations that have gone into each example. The authors even provide a full explanation that acts as a user guide. Mix and match these ideas, and you'll find what you need to visualize your data."
--Josh Tapley, Director of Data Visualization, Comcast Corporation

"The artful combination of technique and problem solving come together in The Big Book of Dashboards as the authors demonstrate powerful design principles using real world use cases. Apply these principles to your next dashboard and watch your data come alive."
--Bruce Henry, Managing Partner, False Peak Ventures

The definitive reference book with real-world solutions you won't find anywhere else

The Big Book of Dashboards presents a comprehensive reference for those tasked with building or overseeing the development of business dashboards.

Comprising dozens of examples that address different industries and departments (healthcare, transportation, finance, human resources, marketing, customer service, sports, etc.) and different platforms (print, desktop, tablet, smartphone, and conference room display) The Big Book of Dashboards is the only book that matches great dashboards with real-world business scenarios.

By organizing the book based on these scenarios and offering practical and effective visualization examples, The Big Book of Dashboards will be the trusted resource that you open when you need to build an effective business dashboard.

In addition to the scenarios there's an entire section of the book that is devoted to addressing many practical and psychological factors you will encounter in your work. It's great to have theory and evidenced-based research at your disposal, but what will you do when somebody asks you to make your dashboard 'cooler' by adding packed bubbles and donut charts?

The expert authors have a combined 30-plus years of hands-on experience helping people in hundreds of organizations build effective visualizations. They have fought many 'best practices' battles and having endured bring an uncommon empathy to help you, the reader of this book, survive and thrive in the data visualization world.

A well-designed dashboard can point out risks, opportunities, and more; but common challenges and misconceptions can make your dashboard useless at best, and misleading at worst. The Big Book of Dashboards gives you the tools, guidance, and models you need to produce great dashboards that inform, enlighten, and engage.