Scatter Chart of Restaurant Stock Valuations

Have a Charting Question? Ask Me ('The Expert').

I'm excited to start an 'Ask an Expert' feature on our web site.  Any Mekko Graphics customer can send me a charting question and I will do my best to answer it.  I find it challenging and fun to dive into a data set, understand the key messages in it, and develop a chart or set of charts to help explain the messages.  Here are some questions that I've tackled:

  • An analyst provided me with current revenue and projected revenue for the next four years for 24 market segments.  They wanted to contrast current market size with growth potential.  I developed a bar mekko chart that displayed market size versus market growth.
  • A marketing manager wanted to track revenue by product line and channel over time.  There were three major product lines and two channels (direct and indirect).  I developed a single 100% stacked bar chart and a set of stacked bar and Marimekko charts to display the data.

Why am I an expert?  I'm one of the co-founders of Mekko Graphics and have worked with our charting software for over 15 years.  I am a trained social science researcher with a Ph.D. from the MIT Sloan School.  I conducted research on manager's use of information while I was a faculty member at Harvard Business School, Sloan School and the Boston University School of Management.  According to Google Scholar, my research has been cited in over 3000 articles.

I have applied my research training to learn how our customers can use Mekko Graphics to deliver highly effective presentations to senior managers.  I have met with many of our customers, viewed the charts they created and developed a strong sense of how our customers use charts to tell a story.  I know which types of charts work best for which types of data and analyses and how to put together a group of charts to deliver a message to senior management.  I've even applied my skills to develop the charts we use to manage our Mekko Graphics business.

Want to to give me a try?  Click here to bring up the "Ask the Expert" form and send me your question.