Making Data Beautiful for Business Users Tips for Creating Rich, Visual, and Actionable User Experiences

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1 Making Data Beautiful for Business Users Tips for Creating Rich, Visual, and Actionable User Experiences David Stodder Director of Research for Business Intelligence TDWI September 23, 2014

2 Sponsor 2

3 Speakers David Stodder Research Director, Business Intelligence, TDWI Allen Bonde VP, Product Marketing and Innovation, Actuate 3

4 Agenda Visualization: The age of beautiful data Meeting the goal of improving decisions Visualization and business intelligence Meeting diverse user requirements Best practices for visual data interaction and discovery Where dashboards are headed amid technology changes Visualization options: many choices Reducing the noise and increasing understanding Recommendations 4

5 Visualization: Seeing What Hides in Data Graphics reveal data. Indeed graphics can be more precise and revealing than conventional statistical computations. Edward Tufte The 20 billion or so neurons of the brain devoted to analyzing visual information provide a pattern-finding mechanism that is a fundamental component in much of our cognitive activity. Colin Ware Geolocation of cell phone reports of dengue fever outbreak in Lahore, Pakistan. Credit: MIT Technology Review Credit: Stephen von Worley, 5

6 Confluence of Science and Practice Human powers: We perceive meaningful patterns, structures, and outliers in what we see Scientific focus: How we respond to graphical stimuli; how we use memory to process information Common discourse: Media employs visual data representation to explain current events Credit: 6

7 Cognitive Perspective on Visualization Humans & Data: Visualization is the interface between the human visual system that finds patterns and makes decisions and the powers of data computation Making sense of the data tsunami: One of the greatest benefits of data visualization is the sheer quantity of information that can be rapidly interpreted if it is presented well. (C. Ware) Collaboration: People communicating with computer visualizations are much more cognitively powerful; thinking occurs through interaction between individuals, using cognitive tools, and operating within social networks. (Ware) 7

8 Enabling New Perspectives and Analysis See what is unforeseen: Visualization allows perception of emergent properties that were not anticipated. The perception of a pattern can be basis of new insight. (Ware) Exposing quality issues: Visualization often enables problems with the data to become immediately apparent; it reveals things not only about the data itself, but about the way it is collected. (Ware) Data relationships: How are data objects linked or related? Visualization can make these more apparent 8

9 Visualizations: Some Easy, Some Hard Visualization as a sensory language Understanding pictures without learning Symbols that are hardwired into the brain; understood across cultures Visualization as a learned language; learning curve Diagrams: symbols based on social interaction Semiotics : about how symbols convey meaning What is meaningful to one is nonsense to another Can be hard to learn, easy to forget 9

10 Visualization: Goal is Decision Making J.J. Gibson s Affordance Theory : That we perceive in order to act, to operate on the environment; goal-directed Top-down view of visualization: We do not perceive points of light; we perceive possibilities for action Performing operations: math ops, merging, inverting, transforming, splitting into components, etc. Forming new kinds of data Pattern perception: dividing regions into simple patterns (e.g., same colors); detecting motion 10

11 Multiple Objectives Coming Together Calibrating to the user s experience & knowledge To gain and keep the user s attention Context: Addressing the user s role Presenting available data accurately Inspiring good decisions and actions 11

12 Visualization and Business Intelligence Key to self-service trend: Visualization is essential to making BI easier for nontechnical users to consume and interact with data Shortening path to insight: What BI has always been about; visualization accelerates users progress Business agility: Viz key to enabling data-driven decisions But: Success depends on data; bad data = bad visualizations 12

13 Key ROI Focus: Better Operational Efficiency Organizations want to use visualization to reduce time to insight for all types of users in many different scenarios From Data Visualization and Discovery for Better Business Decisions, TDWI Best Practices Report, Third Quarter

14 Most Important Visualization Objectives 14

15 Visualization: Diverse User Requirements View of visualization usage patterns in three key areas Source: Data Visualization and Discovery for Better Business Decisions, TDWI Best Practices Report, Third Quarter

16 Visualization & Display/Snapshot Reporting Snapshots: Scheduled rather than requested ad hoc; users want to personalize based on roles Visualizations must be accurate and consistent KPIs and scorecards: Orienting users toward goals and objectives Can users or developers make the look more exciting using fun visuals? Drill-down flexibility: Critical Source: Claimcare.net 16

17 Operational Alerting: Avoiding Fatigue Situations that demand immediate attention: watch out for alert fatigue Using color, size, animation, etc., flexible visualization can help users prioritize and recognize sources Spotting trends and anomalies in event data streams Time is of the essence: Real (or near real) time vital Mobile devices: form factor a visualization concern Credit: 17

18 Visual Data Discovery and Analysis Fusion: Analytics, test-andlearn data exploration, and advanced computation matched with visualization A visual path: data interaction through filtering, comparing, and correlating visual data relationships Business data laboratory: Enabling exploration of who, what, when, why behind events and transactions 18

19 Visual Discovery Best Practices Guidance is necessary: Self-service and freedom are important, but most users need guidance A blank slate with too many visual options can be intimidating Metadata matters: Common models, hierarchies, dependency mapping, etc., enable users relate different data sources and metrics Big data access is often important: Viz helps users cope with the data tsunami Yet, limits to how much data can really be shown mean that aggregation, chart selection, and well-designed dashboards are critical Scale and performance: Ensure data infrastructure support In-memory and cloud are potential options 19

20 Good Visual Data Interaction: Imperative Too much is too much: Drowning users with data even if presented well is useless if users can t do what they need to Goal: Get users beyond putting pretty pictures on numbers and toward more immersive data experiences Critical: Drill down, slice and dice, filtering, sorting and modifying data, customizing report items Sanctum, Rogue Pictures,

21 Encouraging Storytelling, New Forms of Collaboration Using visualization to narrate the data story being told Most visualization stories begin with some kind of question that orients the viewer to the topic and context within which the data is most meaningful. Steele and Iliinsky What data are we looking at? In what time frame does the data exist? What notable events or variables influenced the data? 21

22 Dashboards: Bringing It All Together Visual, role-based view of actionable information Nexus of self-service BI and analytics Performance mgmt: visibility via access to data-driven, outcomes-oriented metrics Integration at the glass: internal and external data, metrics, content Many types of dashboards and often many dashboards Source: Credit: 22

23 Old and New Visions of Dashboards First-Gen Dashboards Tabular reports with few and only simple charts Limited number, variety of data sources Limited methods of finding, interacting w/data Dependent on IT developers to create and modify Tied to single tool or application Where They Are Going Libraries of chart types; drag-and-drop selection Role-based, single view of data from multiple sources Integration of search, advanced analytics tools Self-service creation, preferably managed or guided by IT expertise Integrated view; seamless experience on mobile 23

24 Visualization Options: Many Choices 3D visualization example Heat map example Scatterplot example Bullet graph example. Credit Stephen Few, Gauges and dials example. Credit: Sparklines example. Credit: 24

25 Choosing Visualizations: Best Practices Avoid clutter; no eye candy Consider the audience: executive? A team? Pay attention to context; emphasize what matters Aim for relevance; don t mislead or confuse Step beyond convention but do so with purpose Source: Data Visualization and Discovery for Better Business Decisions, TDWI Best Practices Report, Third Quarter

26 Recommendations Gauge where users are right now with data interaction Are they using spreadsheets? Enterprise BI reporting? What role does data play currently in their decision processes? Assess the learning curve: are visualizations more sensory or learned? Make visualization part of effort to achieve BI/analytics democratization Visual can help nontechnical users who struggle to interact effectively with data especially big data Tools alone don t make it easy; remember context, role, purpose Match users requirements to match the right capabilities Display, snapshot reporting, or scorecards? Operational alerting? Visual data discovery and analysis? 26

27 Closing Recommendations Increase data interactivity with broader visualization options and functionality But rather than give users a blank slate, ensure that they have guidance, either through software or from IT developers Data provisioning: Ensure you have a scalability and data performance strategy for visual discovery and analytics Consider expansion to the standard BI/DW architecture, such as in-memory computing and cloud options Dashboard clarity and relevance: Employ data visualization to reduce (not increase) confusion and clutter and increase speed to insight Match functionality with users decision processes; allow for personalization and customization; aim for single view rather than dashboards for each app or (mobile) platform 27

28 Thank You! For a visual to truly be beautiful, it must go beyond merely being a conduit for information and offer some novelty. David Stodder Director of Research for BI dstodder@tdwi.org (415) When done beautifully, successful visualizations are deceptive in their simplicity, offering the viewer insight and new understanding at a glance. J. Steele and N. Iliinsky Beautiful Visualization: Looking at Data through the Eyes of Experts, J. Steele and N. Iliinsky, O Reilly Media,

29 Making Data Beautiful and Actionable Allen Bonde VP Product Marketing & Innovation, Actuate Actuate Corporation

30 Computers like data people like answers! 30 Actuate Corporation

31 What do you want to visualize? 31 Actuate Corporation

32 Insights for everyone, everywhere 32 Actuate Corporation

33 Supporting all channels requires SCALE CLOUD ARCHITECTURE Interactive Viewer Metrics Manager Dashboard BIRT Studio BIRT ihub RDBMS, NoSQL/NewSQL, Hadoop, Cloud, Social Media, Enterprise Applications, Document Archives, Print Streams, Data Warehouses 33 Actuate Corporation

34 Follow the Crowd (open is better) 34 Actuate Corporation

35 WHITE LABEL is key to embedding One of the main reasons why we chose Actuate was the API structure and the architecture. Being able to customize the workflows, being able to customize the UI, and how that was exposed to our customers was very, very important. BIRT Embedded in OEM and SaaS offerings and other partners 35 Actuate Corporation

36 Are you being? helpful relevant engaging Your users will decide! 36 Actuate Actuate Corporation

37 Learn more: Follow me: Twitter.com/abonde Actuate Corporation

38 Questions? 38

39 Contact Information If you have further questions or comments: David Stodder, TDWI Allen Bonde, Actuate 39

40 Learn More! TDWI Big Data Analytics Solution Summit Big Data Analytics for Customer Insight & Engagement Scottsdale, AZ November 2-4, 2014 * TDWI World Conference Emerging Technologies 2015 Orlando, FL December 7-12, 2014 See: 40