Boris Gorelik recently joined us to present on The Biggest Missed Opportunity in Data Visualization based on his recent talk at the NDR conference. Boris was a data scientist at Automattic, is now a data science consultant, and blogs regularly on data visualization and productivity.
Some of highlights (along with a handy timestamp) include:
- Keep the “main thing” the main thing of your presentation (1:03). Most people don’t do this, but it doesn’t have to be this way!
- There are formal ways to learn a domain skill, but learning how to communicate effectively to an audience of non-experts is hard. (9:00)
- The “main thing” in presentations is often obscured by information of no relevance to the audience. (15:57)
- Use the audience’s natural tendency to read text to make the titles in your graph and slides count (16:90). Daniel Kahneman’s work on slow vs. fast thinking comes in here.
- Focus on answering the audience’s “so what” question. (21:00)
- In title slides and captions, focus on writing the conclusion. (23:50)
- Don’t be afraid of the risk of giving your professional opinion on a conclusion (35:00) — you should have some skin in the game.
Data for Breakfast 