Mobile Health Infographic

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Thanks goes to Dashboard Spy reader Thérèse for alerting me to this interesting infographic on the booming mobile health field. The concept of mobile health revolves around using the now ubiquitous mobile toolset (cell phones, tablets, and other such devices) to transmit health related information such as blood pressure, blood sugar and similar vital signs to health providers for remote monitoring.

Here is the infographic:

Mobile Health Trends Infographic

Infographic on Mobile Health Trends

Here is the post that Thérèse pointed me to. BTW, Thérèse is a Project Manager in Healthcare IT, and can be found on LinkedIn at http://ca.linkedin.com/in/theresebernier.

http://www.smartphonehc.com/2012/04/25/mhealth-app-infographic

Data Visualization Student Challenge

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I just came across this data visualization contest held by the U.S. Department of Transportation. I missed the whole thing. Did any of you hear about this? The idea was very interesting. Too bad it didn’t receive more publicity.

Check it out at:

http://dataviz.challenge.gov

It’s worth visiting the site and looking at the finalists and winners.

Here’s a quick snapshot of a couple of the entries.

Our business intelligence dashboard tax dollars at work!

Hubert Lee
The Dashboard Spy

Free Chart Icons for Your Business Dashboard

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Dashboard designers and anyone who is mocking up business intelligence dashboards should avail themselves of the many free chart and graph icons that exist. Take a look at this screenshot and I think you’ll agree that these icons would work well for business intelligence applications.

You can download these icons and more at this link:

http://findicons.com/search/chart

Use this as a jumping off point for your search for the right icons for your BI application.

Be sure to send us a screen shot of your app. We’d love to feature your design on http://executivedashboards.org

Design Elements for Dashboard Applications

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Available as a free download for a limited time, the “Inspire” Backend Admin Template is presented as a PSD (photoshop) file. Even if you can’t personally open a PSD file, you should download this very helpful template for your development team or user interface designer. They’ll love you for it.

Here’s the link:

http://www.mightydeals.com/free_stuff

And here’s some screenshots of the graphic design elements the UI Kit contains:

2012 Information Technology Salary Guide

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Dashboard Spy readers are always interested in knowing how their salaries stack up against others. How much does their knowledge of business intelligence and enterprise dashboards translate to in terms of a salary difference?

Here’s a direct link to the 2012 annual Salary Guide for IT professionals from Robert Half Technology.

While the report won’t tell you exactly how much your dashboarding skills will bring, it does mention that the focus of Business Intelligence was rated as one of the top technical skills in demand according to the 1600 CIOs surveyed for the poll.

The other hot skills are:

  • Network Administration
  • Database Management
  • Desktop Support
  • Windows Administration
  • Wireless Network Management
  • Web Development / Website Design
  • Telecommunications
  • Virtualization
  • ERP implementation
  • Business Intelligence

Here is the link:

2012 IT Salary Guide

The cover of the report:

What is Data Governance?

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What exactly is data governance and why should you care?

Here are some characteristics of data governance programs. Data governance has a purpose, is cross-functional, requires resources (and hence project and program management requirements) and has multiple entry points.

Take a look at this excellent video to learn more:

The Dashboard Spy Song

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Dashboard Spy readers seem never to tire of the Dashboard Spy theme song. I get questions every week asking for the mp3 file.

Well, did you know that there’s a video of the Dashboard Spy Theme Song? I don’t think it will ever make it on to VH1 or MTV, but, hey, you never know! Here’s the video:

Can’t believe there’s actually a song about metrics, portlets and data tables, right?

Hubert Lee
The Dashboard Spy

http://www.enterprise-dashboard.com/the-dashboard-spy-song

What Makes a Pie Chart Compelling?

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No, this is not another post about which chart or graph is best for data visualization. For that discussion, we have posts like this one: Why line charts are better than pie charts.

And nor is this about the history of the pie chart. See The First Pie Chart (yes, you can see the very first pie chart!).

What I’m aiming at in this particular post is that what makes a pie chart compelling is simply the data itself. Data visualization is about telling a story. Yes, it’s got to be dramatic, compelling, obvious, and, of course, truthful.

I’m saying this because I came across a pie chart diagram in my email. It was from September 21, 2010 when the firm Canaccord first released a “buy” recommendation on Apple stock (then trading at $356 a share – now at $629, nearly a doubling of the price in less than 2 years). Here it is:

Wow – is that data compelling or what? Look at the incredible profitability relative to the market share.

Yes, that’s a powerful pie chart.

And it’s because of the data.

Warmly
Hubert Lee
The Dashboard Spy

Using Excel to Create Slick Infographics

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A Dashboard Spy reader recently pinged me to ask for that cricket infographic done entirely in Excel. I featured it a while back. It comes from our friend and long time Dashboard Spy supporter, Chandoo.

Here’s what it looks like:

Want to download the excel worksheet and play around with the file? Maybe you can leverage it to create your own infographic. Chandoo has very nicely provided it here:

Cricket Infographic in Excel (zip file)

View Chandoo’s comments on this excel worksheet here:

http://chandoo.org/wp/2010/02/26/sachin-tendulkar-odi-poster

Be sure to send me your infographic. Whatever you come up with, I’d be happy to take a look and feature it on this blog.

Warmly,

Hubert Lee
The Dashboard Spy

Salesforce.com Mobile Dashboards for the iPad

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Mobile dashboards for the iPad have steadily grown in popularity. Here’s a quick look at Salesforce.com’s mobile dashboards. The sales force, of course, is constantly on the run and, subsequently, being able to pull up relevant dashboards quickly on mobile devices is a big need. The salesforce.com app saves time by using “recent” and “followed” dashboard views as a key navigation style.

Take a look at this screenshot from an iPad. It shows recently viewed dashboards.

When you click on one, it comes up like this Sales Activity dashboard:

And this screenshot shows the dashboard being configured. Note the styling details.

Here is a video explaining these dashboards in more detail.