Descriptive Analysis

Data visualization
• Converting data into information to understand past and current
performance is the core of descriptive analytics and is vital to making
good business decisions. Techniques for doing this range from plotting
data on charts, extracting data from databases, and manipulating and
summarizing data
• Data visualization is the process of displaying data (often in large
quantities) in a meaningful fashion to provide insights that will
support better decisions
• Visualizing data provides a way of communicating data at all levels of
a business and can reveal surprising patterns and relationships
Tabular versus Visual Data Analysis
• Data visualization is also important both for building decision models
and for interpreting their results
• Visualizing the data will help to identify the proper relationship and
use the appropriate data analysis tool. Furthermore, complex
analytical models often yield complex results. Visualizing the results
often helps in understanding and gaining insight about model output
and solutions.
Dashboards
• A dashboard is a visual representation of a set of key business
measures
• It is derived from the analogy of an automobile’s control panel, which
displays speed, gasoline level, temperature, and so on
• Dashboards provide important summaries of key business information
to help manage a business process or function. Dashboards might
include tabular as well as visual data to allow managers to quickly
locate key data
Tools and Software for Data Visualization
• Data visualization ranges from simple Excel charts to more advanced
interactive tools and software that allow users to easily view and
manipulate data with a few clicks, not only on computers, but on
iPads and other devices as well
• While we will only focus on Excel-based tools in this book, you should
be aware of other options and commercial packages that are
available. In particular, we suggest that you look at the capabilities of
Tableau (www.tableausoftware.com) and IBM’s Cognos software
(www.cognos10.com). Tableau is easy to use and offers a free trial
Creating Charts in Microsoft Excel
• Microsoft Excel provides a comprehensive charting capability with many features.
With a little experimentation, you can create very professional charts for business
analyses and presentations. These include vertical and horizontal bar charts, line
charts, pie charts, area charts, scatter plots, and many other special types of charts
• To create a chart in Excel, it is best to first highlight the range of the data you wish
to chart. The Excel Help files provide guidance on formatting your data for a
particular type of chart. Click the Insert tab in the Excel ribbon. From the Charts
group, click the chart type, and then click a chart subtype that you want to use
• Once a basic chart is created, you may use the options in the Design and Format
tabs within the Chart Tools tabs to customize your chart. In the Design tab, you can
change the type of chart, data included in the chart, chart layout, and styles
Creating Charts in Microsoft Excel
• The Format tab provides various formatting options. You may also
customize charts easily by right-clicking on elements of the chart or by
using the Quick Layout options in the Chart Layout group within the
Chart Tools Design tab.
Column and Bar Charts
• Excel distinguishes between vertical and horizontal bar charts, calling
the former column charts and the latter bar charts. A clustered
column chart compares values across categories using vertical
rectangles
• Column and bar charts are useful for comparing categorical or ordinal
data, for illustrating differences between sets of values, and for
showing proportions or percentages of a whole.
Data Labels and Data Tables Chart Options
• Excel provides options for including the numerical data on which
charts are based within the charts. Data labels can be added to chart
elements to show the actual value of bars
• Line Charts:-Line charts provide a useful means for displaying data
over time. You may plot multiple data series in line charts; however,
they can be difficult to interpret if the magnitude of the data values
differs greatly
Data Labels and Data Tables Chart Options
• Pie Charts:-For many types of data, we are interested in
understanding the relative proportion of each data source to the
total. A pie chart displays this by partitioning a circle into pie-shaped
areas showing the relative proportion
Data Labels and Data Tables Chart Options
• Scatter Chart:-Scatter charts show the relationship between two
variables. To construct a scatter chart, we need observations that
consist of pairs of variables
• Bubble Charts:-A bubble chart is a type of scatter chart in which the
size of the data marker corresponds to the value of a third variable;
consequently, it is a way to plot three variables in two dimensions.
Miscellaneous Excel Charts
• Excel provides several additional charts for special applications. These
additional types of charts (including bubble charts) can be selected and created
from the Other Charts button in the Excel ribbon. These include the following:
• A stock chart allows you to plot stock prices, such as the daily high, low, and
close. It may also be used for scientific data such as temperature changes.
• A surface chart shows 3-D data.
• A doughnut chart is similar to a pie chart but can contain more than one data
• series.
• A radar chart allows you to plot multiple dimensions of several data series.
Data- categories of Data
• Qualitative Data Type
• Nominal
• Ordinal
• Quantitative Data Type
• Discrete
• Continuous
Introduction
• Data science is all about experimenting with raw or structured data.
Data is the fuel that can drive a business to the right path or at least
provide actionable insights that can help strategize current campaigns,
easily organize the launch of new products, or try out different
experiments.
• In simple terms, data is a systematic record of digital information
retrieved from digital interactions as facts and figures
• When dealing with datasets, the category of data plays an important role
to determine which preprocessing strategy would work for a particular
set to get the right results or which type of statistical analysis should be
applied for the best results.
Qualitative Data Type
• Qualitative or Categorical Data describes the object under
consideration using a finite set of discrete classes. It means that this
type of data can’t be counted or measured easily using numbers and
therefore divided into categories. The gender of a person (male,
female, or others) is a good example of this data type.
• These are usually extracted from audio, images, or text medium.
Another example can be of a smartphone brand that provides
information about the current rating, the color of the phone, category
of the phone, and so on. All this information can be categorized as
Qualitative data
Qualitative Data Type
• Nominal:- These are the set of values that don’t possess a natural
ordering. Nominal data types in statistics are not quantifiable and
cannot be measured through numerical units. Nominal types of
statistical data are valuable while conducting qualitative research as it
extends freedom of opinion to subjects.
• It is not possible to state that ‘Red’ is greater than ‘Blue’. The gender
of a person is another one where we can’t differentiate between male,
female, or others. Mobile phone categories whether it is midrange,
budget segment, or premium smartphone is also nominal data type.
Qualitative Data Type
• Ordinal:- These types of values have a natural ordering while maintaining their class
of values. If we consider the size of a clothing brand then we can easily sort them
according to their name tag in the order of small < medium < large. The grading
system while marking candidates in a test can also be considered as an ordinal data
type where A+ is definitely better than B grade.
• These categories help us deciding which encoding strategy can be applied to which
type of data. Data encoding for Qualitative data is important because machine learning
models can’t handle these values directly and needed to be converted to numerical
types as the models are mathematical in nature.
• For nominal data type where there is no comparison among the categories, one-hot
encoding can be applied which is similar to binary coding considering there are in less
number and for the ordinal data type, label encoding can be applied which is a form of
integer encoding.
Difference Between Nominal and Ordinal
Data
Aspect Nominal Data Ordinal Data
Categories data into distinct classes or Categories data into ordered or ranked
Definition categories without any inherent order or categories with meaningful differences
ranking. between them.
Education levels, customer satisfaction
Examples Colors, gender, types of animals
ratings
No meaningful mathematical operations Limited mathematical operations can be
Mathematical Operations can be performed (e.g., averaging performed, such as determining the
categories). mode or median.
Categories have a specific order or
ranking, but the magnitude of
Order/ Ranking No natural or meaningful order exists.
differences between ranks may not be
uniform.

Mode, median (middle category), but

Central Tendency Mode (most frequent category) mean is not typically used due to lack of
uniform interval between ranks.

Rating scales, survey responses,

Example Use Case Classifying objects, grouping data
educational levels
Quantitative Data Type
• This data type tries to quantify things and it does by considering numerical values
that make it countable in nature. The price of a smartphone, discount offered,
number of ratings on a product, the frequency of processor of a smartphone, or ram
of that particular phone, all these things fall under the category of Quantitative data
types.
• Discrete:- The numerical values which fall under are integers or whole numbers are
placed under this category. The number of speakers in the phone, cameras, cores in
the processor, the number of sims supported all these are some of the examples of
the discrete data type.
• Discrete data types in statistics cannot be measured – it can only be counted as the
objects included in discrete data have a fixed value. The value can be represented in
decimal, but it has to be whole. Discrete data is often identified through charts,
including bar charts, pie charts, and tally charts.
Quantitative Data Type
• Continuous:- The fractional numbers are considered as continuous
values. These can take the form of the operating frequency of the
processors, the android version of the phone, wifi frequency,
temperature of the cores, and so on.
• Unlike discrete data types of data in research, with a whole and fixed
value, continuous data can break down into smaller pieces and can
take any value
• Continuous types of statistical data are represented using a graph that
easily reflects value fluctuation by the highs and lows of the line
through a certain period of time.
Difference between Discrete Data and
Continous Data
Aspect Discrete Data Continuous Data
It can take any value within a given
Definition Consists of distinct, separate values.
range.
Number of students in a class, coin
Examples toss outcomes (1, 2, 3), customer Height, weight, temperature, time.
count.
Usually involves whole numbers or Involves any value along a continuous
Nature
counts. spectrum.
Gaps between values are common and Values can be infinitely divided
Gaps in values
meaningful. without gaps.
Measured with decimal numbers or
Measurement Often measured using integers.
fractions.
Typically represented with bar charts Represented with line graphs or
Graphical representation
or histograms. smooth curves.
Typically involves counting or Involves arithmetic operations,
Mathematical Operations
summation. including fractions and decimals.

Typically represented using Typically represented using

Probability Distribution
probability mass functions
Counting occurrences, tracking
Example Use Case
integers.
probability density functions.
Measuring quantities and analyzing
measurements.
Enterprise content management (ECM)
• Enterprise content management (ECM) is a set of capabilities for
capturing, storing, activating, analyzing and automating business
content, used to provide new value from data that was previously
unstructured and unavailable.
• With enterprise content management, an organization can take full
advantage of the customer information and company knowledge
embedded in its content. When effectively managed across the
organization, this content can be used to engage customers, automate
business processes and enhance collaboration.
enterprise content management is important
• Content is the currency that fuels and funds digital transformation.
Content possesses useful information about customers—their
behaviors, sentiments and value to the organization—but only if you
can harness it. Collectively, content buried in repositories, file shares
and cloud folders across the enterprise represents the knowledge of the
organization.
• As content grows at unprecedented speeds, organizations are taking
concrete steps to streamline their processes relating to content
services. “Content chaos”—the lack of digitized content and the
inability to access the right content at the right time—is a pervasive
barrier to businesses today.
How to get started with ECM
• Organizations that are serious about digital transformation can start
with the basics. First, capture the content, classify it and apply
governance rules. Then, control who can access it and provide tools to
find it. Finally, put the content in motion for business processes and
collaboration.
• Identify the role content plays in your business
• Select an initial project
• Extend ECM across the enterprise
People Analytics
• People analytics is the practice of collecting and transforming HR data and
organizational data into actionable insights that improve the way you do
business. You'll also see people analytics called HR analytics or workforce
analytics—they’re the same thing.
• It helps to think about the growth trajectory of a people analytics team as a
stairway with five steps. The best teams don’t climb directly from one step
to the next one; they are constantly iterating—retracing their steps and
climbing the same stairs again—at every level of the journey to the top.
• The term “analytics” is often used interchangeably with other terms like
“reports” and “business intelligence,” but these aren't the same thing.
Why is people analytics important?
• People analytics gives you the information you need to make data
driven decisions that impact your organization’s most important
areas: your people and the bottom line.
• People analytics teams help HR, business, and people leaders make
data driven decisions to maximize employee potential and business
results
Stairway to impact
How does people analytics work?
• To move from the first step of the stairway (poor data) to the second step (good
data), an organization must focus on building a foundation of high-quality data
• Once a strong data foundation is in place, the people analytics team can climb to
the third step, making the useful data accessible to the organization and
experimenting with new technologies to analyze and disseminate the data
• Teams that mastered descriptive and automated reporting at step three are ready
to climb to step four and build advanced-analytics capabilities. Data scientists,
rather than business-information specialists, use programming languages like R,
Python, and Julia to join disparate sources of data, build models to help
understand complex phenomena, and provide actionable recommendations to
leaders making complex and strategic business decisions.
Data and data management
• All great analytics teams are enabled by strong data standards,
engineering, and management, and our interviews confirmed that this
is no different in people analytics.
• Significant and dedicated data-engineering resources:-benefit of
dedicated data-engineering resources is that they enable strategic
alignment. Data engineers who are steeped in the strategic context of
their organization’s people analytics teams are able to design the data
foundation and analytics solutions more thoughtfully and deliberately
from the beginning.
• Breadth and depth of data sources