II Shreeram II

Data Visualisation
Module 1

Why Data Visualisation is important for the organisations

Data is a powerful tool. It empowers businesses to recognize trends, conduct analyses, make
informed decisions, and set realistic goals. And yet, a company can have all of the data it needs to be
successful and still fail if no one knows how to understand or leverage it.

Datasets can seem like an alien language to many in an organization outside of the analytics team.
This is where data visualization comes into play. Using data visualization, professionals can take
raw data and turn it into something easy to interpret.

Below is an overview of what data visualization is and why it’s important, along with a list of some of
the top data visualization tools available to business professionals.

Data visualization is the process of creating a visual representation of the information within a
dataset.

While there are hundreds of ways to visualize data, some of the most common data visualization
techniques include:

 Pie charts
 Bar charts
 Histograms
 Gantt charts
 Heat maps
 Box-and-whisker plots
 Waterfall charts
 Area charts
 Scatter plots
 Infographics
 Maps
WHY IS DATA VISUALIZATION IMPORTANT?

Visually depicting data often makes it easier to understand and draw insights from. As such, data
visualization is an effective means of making data more accessible across an organization. This, in
turn, can empower employees to back their actions using concrete information instead of relying on
assumptions—resulting in more data-driven organizational processes.

Data visualization can also play an important role in communication with parties outside of a
business, such as the media, investors, regulatory agents, and other stakeholders.

Data visualization has become so important to modern business that many organizations are now
specifically hiring individuals proficient in it, among other data science skills.

WHAT ARE DATA VISUALIZATION TOOLS?

A data visualization tool is a form of software that’s designed to visualize data. Each tool's
capabilities vary but, at their most basic, they allow you to input a dataset and visually manipulate it.
Most, but not all, come with built-in templates you can use to generate basic visualizations.

DATA VISUALIZATION TOOLS FOR BUSINESS

1. Microsoft Excel (and Power BI)

In the strictest sense, Microsoft Excel is a spreadsheet software, not a data visualization tool. Even
so, it has useful data visualization capabilities. Given that Microsoft products are widely used at the
enterprise level, you may already have access to it.

According to Microsoft’s documentation, you can use Excel to design at least 20 types of charts using
data in spreadsheets. These include common options, such as bar charts, pie charts, and scatter
plots, to more advanced ones like radar charts, histograms, and treemaps.

There are limitations to what you can create in Excel. If your organization is looking for a more
powerful data visualization tool but wants to stay within the Microsoft ecosystem, Power BI is an
excellent alternative. Built specifically as a data analytics and visualization tool, Power BI can import
data from various sources and output visualizations in a range of formats.

2. Google Charts

For professionals interested in creating interactive data visualizations destined to live on the
internet, Google Charts is a popular free option.
The tool can pull data from various sources—including Salesforce, SQL databases, and Google Sheets
—and uses HTML5/SVG technology to generate charts, which makes them incredibly accessible. It
offers 18 types of charts, including bar charts, pie charts, histograms, geo charts, and area charts.

Members of the Google community occasionally generate new charts and share them with other
users, which are arranged in a gallery on Google's website. These charts tend to be more advanced
but may not be HTML5-compliant.

3. Tableau

Tableau is one of the most popular data visualization tools on the market for two main reasons: It’s
relatively easy to use and incredibly powerful. The software can integrate with hundreds of sources
to import data and output dozens of visualization types—from charts to maps and more. Owned by
Salesforce, Tableau boasts millions of users and community members, and it’s widely used at the
enterprise level.

Tableau offers several products, including desktop, server, and web-hosted versions of its analytics
platform, along with customer relationship management (CRM) software.

A free option, called Tableau Public, is also available. It’s important to note, however, that any
visualizations created on the free version are available for anyone to see. This makes it a good option
to learn the software's basics, but it’s not ideal for any proprietary or sensitive data.

4. Zoho Analytics

Zoho Analytics is a data visualization tool specifically designed for professionals looking to visualize
business intelligence. As such, it’s most commonly used to visualize information related to sales,
marketing, profit, revenues, costs, and pipelines with user-friendly dashboards. More than 500,000
businesses and two million users currently leverage the software.

Zoho Analytics has several paid options, depending on your needs. There’s also a free version that
allows you to build a limited number of reports, which can be helpful if you’re testing the waters to
determine which tool is best for your business.

There are many other tools that work similarly to Zoho Analytics and are tailored to sales and
marketing professionals. HubSpot and Databox are two examples, both of which include powerful
data visualization capabilities.

5. Datawrapper

Datawrapper is a tool that, like Google Charts, is used to generate charts, maps, and other graphics
for use online. The tool’s original intended audience was reporters working on news stories, but any
professional responsible for managing a website can find value in it.
 While Datawrapper is easy to use, it’s somewhat limited, especially compared to others on this list.
One of the primary limitations is that it doesn’t integrate with data sources. Instead, you must
manually copy and paste data into the tool, which can be time-consuming and liable to error if you
aren’t careful.

Some common outputs include scatterplots, line charts, stacked bar charts, pie charts, range plots,
and a variety of maps and tables. Free and paid options are available, depending on how you intend
to use the tool.

6. Infogram

Infogram is another popular option that can be used to generate charts, reports, and maps.

What sets Infogram apart from the other tools on this list is that you can use it to create infographics
(where its name comes from), making it especially popular among creative professionals.
Additionally, the tool includes a drag-and-drop editor, which can be helpful for beginners.

Visualizations can be saved as image files and GIFs to be embedded in reports and documents, or in
HTML to be used online. Like most of the other tools on this list, Infogram has tiered pricing, ranging
from a free to enterprise-level version.

Explain Data visualization process flow

1. Determine the decision you want to make

2. Identify the metrics that inform the decision

3. Develop the story you want to tell

4. Select the appropriate visual

5. Add relevant elements to the visual

6. Clearly label and review the visual

7. Let a nonexpert review the visual

1. Determine the decision you want to make

“One of the biggest pitfalls in data visualization is people worrying too much about making the
visuals look a certain way. The important work happens long before that point,” says Cook. In
other words, don’t get wrapped up in colors and other aesthetics too soon.
Your first step is figuring out what decision you’re trying to make. You can have all the data in the
world, but it won’t mean much if you’re not sure what to do with it. Cook recommends posing
the decision in the form of a question so you’re clear on the answer you’re seeking. “If you aren’t
clear on your decision, your visual won’t be either,” he explains

Identify the metrics that inform the decision

You likely have tons of data available to you, but only certain data points will be relevant to your
decision. Before getting overwhelmed by data sets, consider which specific points would be most
helpful for answering your decision question.

Once you identify the right metrics, determine whether you can actually collect them with any
accuracy. You may find that some data points either aren’t available or are inaccurate. In this
case, you typically have two alternatives: Kick off a project to collect the data (such as developing
and distributing a survey) or revisit the first step and adjust your question.

Develop the story you want to tell

Next up is developing a story from your data. Cook shares a few questions you can use to prepare
your narrative:

 Is the data about comparison? You may be making a decision based on metrics being
bigger or smaller — or faster or slower.
 Is the data about changes over time? Your decision may concern entering a new market
or tracking product launch performance over time.
 Is the data about categorization? You may have a cost-based decision that needs to
identify where the business is losing money.

Select the appropriate visual

This part of the data visualization process is fairly simple, as most visuals naturally follow the type
of story you want to tell. Consider these examples:

 Comparison stories typically work best with bar graphs.

 Time-based stories pair well with line charts.
 Categorical stories typically necessitate tree charts.

Add relevant elements to the visual

“Now is the point in the data visualization process when you can focus on aesthetics,” says Cook.
The purpose of this step is to make choices about your visual that aid in not only its appeal but
also fostering comprehension.
You may need to add callouts to your chart to emphasize certain data points or add important
context. For instance, say you created a chart that was missing a week of sales data. The
audience may assume you made a mistake, but you didn’t include the data for good reason — a
hurricane caused the business to close that week. A well-placed callout can prevent this
confusion.

Clearly label and review the visual

Where the previous step was about choosing visualization elements, this step is about making
note of the choices you made. Title the visual appropriately. Make sure units are correct (e.g.,
dollars vs euros) and incremented consistently. Ensure there’s a legend to explain color
meanings.

Let a nonexpert review the visual

“The last step of the data visualization process is quite important. You need a different set of
eyes on the visual you’ve created — preferably eyes that don’t have the same knowledge or
experience as your own,” says Cook.

Giving your visual to someone else to review, especially someone who doesn’t know much about
the subject matter or underlying data, is an important spot check. Ideally, they should be able to
comprehend the story you’re trying to communicate without any issues.

SHORTCOMINGS OF TRADITIONAL INFORMATION ANALYSIS

In any given BI using organization just over 8 percent of employees are actually using BI tools. Even
in industries that have aggressively adopted BI tools (e.g., wholesales, banking, and retail), usage
barely exceeds 11 percent.

1.The tools are too difficult to learn and use.

2.Technical experts were needed to create reports.
3.The turnaround time for reports is too long.
- When BI system reports are received, traditional tools often employing appropriate visualization
methods.
- People want to make informed decisions with reliable information.
- They need timely reports that present the evidence to support their decisions. They want to
connect with a variety of datasources, and they don’t know the best ways to visualize data.

BUSINESS CASE FOR VISUAL ANALYSIS

Use Recruitment as business case and prepare the data points as below

Many function : Many requisitions : Many candidates : getting Business Visuals on changing
requirements from business and change of recruitment live analysis of need of human resource
strength require at any point of time for the large mfg. company.
Packaged Data Source (.tdsx) — contains all information in the data source (.tds) file, as well as a

copy of any local file-based data or extracts.

A packaged data source is a single zipped file. Use this format if you want to share your data source
with people who do not have access to the underlying data that is defined in the connection
information.

How to Save a data source

1. In Tableau Desktop, open the workbook that has the connection to the data you want to
save as a file.
2. At the top of the Data pane, right-click (Control-click on Mac) the name of the data
source, and then select Add to Saved Data Sources.
3. Enter a file name, select the file type (.tds or .tdsx), and then click Save.
By default, Tableau saves .tds and .tdsx files to the Datasources folder under your Tableau repository.
When you use the default location, you can connect to the data source on the Connect pane.

If you specified a different location, you can connect to the data source by selecting File > Open and
navigating to it.

If you move a local data file that a .tds file contains a reference to, when you try to open the data
source in Tableau, you will be prompted to locate or replace the original data source. If you replace
the original data source, the replacement data must be of the same type (for example, Excel or
MySQL). To avoid saving a specific file path, save the data source as a .tdsx file.

A Tableau data source is the link between your data and Tableau. It is essentially the sum of your
data, the connection information, and the customizations that you make on top of data to work with
it in Tableau. The data source can contain:

 Information about where the data is located, such as a file name and path or a network
location. Or, details on how to connect to your data, such as database server name and
server sign-in information.

 The names of any tables in the connection, as well as information about how the tables
relate to each other.
  A layer of customizations that you make on top of your data but that are not part of the
riginal data itself, such as calculations, groups, and renamed fields. For details,
see Organize and Customize Fields in the Data Pane.

After you connect to your data and select the first table to interact with from your
database, a basic data source is created for you.

 Explain the differences between using live connections versus extracts

“Extract” is a word you’re going to hear a lot in Tableau. Extracts are one of the most powerful but
overlooked tools in Tableau’s arsenal.

Tableau Data Extracts are snapshots of data optimized for aggregation and loaded into system
memory to be quickly recalled for visualization. Extracts tend to be much faster than live connections,
especially in more complex visualizations with large data sets, filters, calculations, etc.

For a deep dive into how Tableau extracts are created, check out Gordon Rose’s fantastic blog post on
the subject.

When you create an extract from a local file (such as a .csv or an Excel workbook) or an on-premise
database, you’re speeding up the workbook through optimization. As a result, Tableau doesn’t need
the database to build the visualization. Instead, Tableau’s in-memory data engine queries the extract
directly.

However, because an extract is a snapshot of the data, the extract will need to be refreshed to
receive updates from the original data source, whether it is a local file or an on-premise database.

Live connections offer the convenience of real-time updates, with any changes in the data source
reflected in Tableau. But live connections also rely on the database for all queries. And unlike extracts,
databases are not always optimized for fast performance. With live connections, your data queries
are only as fast as the database itself.

There are also more variables at play when using a live connection. Workbook speeds are affected by
a variety of factors, including your network speed, traffic on that network, and any custom SQL.

 Create an extract

Though there are a number of places in your Tableau work flow where you can create an extract, the
primary method is described below.

1. After you connect to your data and set up the data source on the Data Source page, in the upper-
right corner, select Extract, and then click the Edit link to open the Extract Data dialog box.
 2. (Optional) Configure one or more of the following options to tell Tableau how to store, define
filters for, and limit the amount of data in your extract:

Conditions for using the “Multiple tables” option

To store your extract using the “Multiple tables” option, the data in your extract must meet all of the
conditions listed below.

All joins between tables are equality (=) joins

Data types of the join columns are identical

No pass-through functions (RAWSQL) used

No incremental refresh configured

No extract filters configured

No top N or sampling configured

When the extract is stored as “Multiple tables,” you cannot append data to it.

Note: Both the “Single table” and “Multiple tables” options only affect how the data in your extract is
stored. The options do not affect how tables in your extract are displayed on the Data Source page.

For example, suppose your extract is comprised of three tables. If you directly open the extract
(.hyper) file that has been configured to use the default option, “Single table,” you see one table
listed on the Data Source page. However, if you open the extract using the packaged data source
(.tdsx) file or the data source (.tdsx) file with its corresponding extract (.hyper) file, you see all three
tables that comprise the extract on the Data Source page.

Determine how much data to extract

Click Add to define one or more filters to limit how much data gets extracted based on fields and their
values.