7.6.16

Hey Tableau Analyst. What does the Data Say?


I like a lot of charts.  I have nothing against any particular chart and have probably used and abused all of them at one time or other.  I'm not a stickler for rules and I don't demand best practices of myself or my charts.

I try to find the best possible way to SEE the results. That's in the context of the dashboard as a whole and mostly, most importantly, the chart chosen depends on the data's distribution.

Before I begin to analyze and investigate the data, I can't tell you what chart(s) I'll settle on for the dashboard.  And halfway through building a dashboard, many charts will get discarded or radically changed [I don't draw my dashboards out first either].

The example below shows how sometimes the chart you think would be perfect, may not be the best chart possible.  Fortunately, you're a Tableau analyst.  You have the tool that allows you to explore your data FAST. You don't have to decide on a chart and then put your data in it. It's ok to not know which chart will be right at the beginning of the process - it's a discovery process.


I hope that what you take away from this is the fact that none of these charts are right or wrong, but that this is the process you sometimes have to go through in order to get the best view of your results. In this case, the Small multiples worked because aside from the '18-34 year old males', the groups were so closely distributed that it was difficult to see trends, differences, patterns.