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.