Good stories always have heroes, even data stories. So who is the hero in your story? So technically, a story is just a sequence of events. And you can layout a sequence of events without the use of characters. But thinking of your stories, and telling them, through the eyes of characters (especially a good […]
128 Evaluation Cartoons for Presentations and Blog Posts
Looking for an evaluation related cartoon for your next presentation or blog post? Well, over the last decade I’ve drawn thousands. In this post, I’m sharing 111 128 of my evaluation cartoons (added a few new ones), including a lot of community favorites. Please feel free to save to your computer, add to your presentations, […]
What is Card Sorting? UX Methods for Data People
Card sorting is a user experience research method useful in discovering how people organize and prioritize different topics. The method is pretty simple. You start with a set of topics on notecards or sticky notes. Then you ask your research participant to organize those cards in a way that makes sense to them. At least […]
How to become a data designer.
Ever wonder why some data teams deliver really nice looking reports while others seem like they’re stuck in the late 90s? The more I work with different research and evaluation teams, the more I find that reporting quality usually comes down to the skills of just a few people. First, you need a manager who […]
How to create a scatterplot in Canva!
The scatterplot is one of my favorite graph types. So how do you create one in Canva? Just an FYI – Canva acquired Flourish in 2022. A couple of years later you can see some small changes in some of Canva’s graph designs. But for the most part, I find it better and smoother to […]
My Cartoon Illustration Process – Realist Evaluation Comics
Back in 2017 I was commissioned by the RAMESES II project (funded by *NIHR) to draw a series of cartoons on realist evaluation. They have been made available for royalty-free use at ramesesproject.org, along with a collection of other realist evaluation resources. In this blog post I want to take you through my cartoon illustration […]
Evaluation versus Monitoring
Today’s post started as a comic request and turned into a Q&A. Here is the question that came to me from Randi Knox. I’m looking for a comic to communicate the difference between program monitoring vs program evaluation. I didn’t see anything specific to this in your existing materials. I was wondering if you’d be […]
Canva Templates – Inspired by the Nature Conservancy
Trying out a new series this week. The idea is simple, I find some inspiration and then use that inspiration to create a set of Canva report page templates. If you keep your eyes open, design inspiration is literally everywhere. Mailers, posters, text books, magazines, websites, and social media are just a handful of potential […]
Evaluation Ethics Fails, 8 illustrations
I’m sick this week, so instead of writing something new, I thought I republish something valuable from 11 years ago. This cartoon was inspired through a conversation with my good friend Ann K. Emery. This was back when Ann was a full time evaluator and before the launch of her super successful training academy and […]
Building Your Creativity Toolkit
“Creativity is not a talent. It is a way of operating” These are words that came from comedy icon, John Cleese. Head to YouTube if you want to watch one of his talks on creativity, and the source of this quote. The quote itself has really stuck with me over the years as I have […]
5 Baby Steps to Better Reports
A couple of years ago I put out a book called the Reporting Revolution. And while I still believe just about everything I wrote in that book, I know many of you are not actually looking to start a revolution. You just want to start creating better reports. So, with that in mind, today’s post […]
Is your team, report deficient?
Long, boring, dusty-shelf reports might be a problem, but it’s rarely the biggest problem most data teams face. When teams decide to start tackling their report design problems, that’s where they start. They think that if they can turn their long, boring, dusty-shelf report into something that’s not as long, not as boring, and more […]