Data Authors: Skilled Designers of Data Presentations - Data Fluency: Empowering Your Organization with Effective Data Communication - page 95

kind of art majors he hires, but all they need to do is use the simplified
formula: (83.33 * Comp %) + (4.16667 * Yds per att) + (333.333 * TD pct)-
(416.667 * INT pct) + 25 / 12.
CREATING STRuCTuRE AND FLOW TO YOuR DATA PRODuCTS
Your job as an author of data products is multilayered. The last section dis-
cussed choosing the right metrics. Your next challenge is to bring order and
structure to the way your data is visualized. What is the general structure of
the content you want to communicate? How does the content connect? How
does one data or visualization element flow into the next? Like an author
writing a topic, there should be a starting point, themes, segues between
chapters, and a conclusion.
In this section you gain ideas for the different ways that data products can
be structured, guiding your audience along a path of discovery, and tips for
laying out a page or screen with content.
A Guided Path: Structure and Flow
Some people describe this process as data storytelling . As mentioned in the
introduction, storytelling might not be the right analogy. Stories are fixed and
narrow in interpretation. Data is less so because it is always changing and can
tell new stories. The creator of a data product is closer to a “guide”—laying
out a path for the audience to travel along, but the findings and conclusions
of the audience are more fluid. The landscape may always be changing.
Where do you want to lead your audience? As an author communicating with
data, your objective is to help readers travel a path through the presented
data in a way that they can move their understanding forward. Unfortunately,
the standard practice for laying out most dashboards and reports has been to
simply fit everything on the page in a grid or a jumbled mass of information.
Figure 5-6 shows a dashboard with a grid overlay.
This rigid structure tells you nothing about how different charts relate to
each other. It offers no clue as to where to begin understanding the data and
nothing about what information is most important. Creating a layout that
helps frame the content of your data product is one of the most undervalued
areas of information design. The dashboard in Figure 5-7 starts with the few