“Oh yeah, we have someone like you.” I remember when I first heard that. I thought to myself, “really, you have a cartooning sociologist techie and blogger who also happens to have a decade of experience in research and evaluation?” That’s not what they meant of course. What they really meant was that they had a creative. […]
Articles
Want better visuals? Make the process cheaper, easier and faster.
Saying that we should budget more money or time towards data design is like saying we should increase teacher pay. You can get a lot of nodding heads from decision makers but when it comes time to actually commit the funds… That’s a no go. So you’re left with a few options. Option 1: Keep fighting the […]
Understand. Reach. Engage. A 3-part digital dissemination strategy
Far too many research and evaluation teams prioritize high quality dissemination like I prioritize learning a second language. It’s definitely on my list of things to do one day, but it’s so far down in priority that unless something changes it will likely never happen. So instead, we keep with the status quo. We write […]
The Dashboard as a Dataset Interface
In practice we see two very different types of dashboards. The first, the literal translation that evaluators tend to latch onto, is the dashboard that gives you all the data you need at your fingertips. These are hard to build because you need to both have the data your audience really needs AND actually understand […]
Reporting for the Small Screen
Just a guess here, but I don’t think smart phones are going away anytime soon. I think it’s time to really start focusing on how we can use the technology as a reporting tool. And stop pretending that it’s not the place where a large number of our stakeholders engage with our programs on a […]
What is diydatadesign in 28 cartoons.
So I’ve been running a digital data design workshop now for several months, and the feedback I’ve received from those inside of it is awesome. But there are a lot of people still on the fence, not sure about what the workshop is exactly, what it involves, or if it’s for them. I get that. […]