Randall Bolten Blog

In my last post we looked at using a table, instead of a graph, to present a more complete, precise, and arguably understandable picture of how the composition of the U.S. House and the president’s party interrelate. And we were still able to take advantage of data visualization! This time, let’s take a look at using one of the most powerful tools in the quantation arsenal – the humble ratio – to really get a message across.

We’re back, and I’m hoping you all enjoyed the holiday. As I suggested in the last post, let’s try using a table instead of a graph to see how House of Representatives election results correlate with the incumbent president’s party!

The composition of the U.S. House of Representatives provides great material for data visualization. We’ve already produced a graph (click here for the original post, here for the improved version) that, like the Minard graphic of Napoleon’s march to Moscow popularized by Edward Tufte, presents seven types of data in a single two-dimensional space. It paints a rather complete picture. But does it really feed the bulldog?

Let’s take a little more time to consider the question of choosing a health insurance policy. In my last post we looked at these choices:

We shift gears from recent posts to address a critical – and extremely timely – decision: choosing a health insurance plan, which you must do by 12/15 if you want a new plan in place by 1/1/15. If you’re a finance professional, you will be doing your coworkers and your friends a huge favor if you can help them through this important and expensive decision. And data visualization plays a big part in this task.

I’m including this post in the series because of the extremely insightful suggestions offered by my new friend, Hicham Bou Habib, on LinkedIn’s Certified Corporate FP&A Professionals group discussion thread.

At last week’s terrific Association for Financial Professionals (AFP) national conference, there was much discussion of “data visualization,” a major information-presentation buzzword these days. Last week’s U.S. elections seem to provoke the same urges to barrage us with graphics. But do all these beautiful pictures really get us anywhere?

I am speaking next week at the annual national conference of the Association for Financial Professionals (AFP) in Washington, DC. Since financial planning & analysis (FP&A) professionals are a key AFP constituency, I thought now would be a good time for an open letter to the FP&A folks.

Today’s USA Today story about last night’s World Series game (GO GIANTS!) includes an interesting graphic, showing the success of “wild card” teams since they were first included in Major League Baseball’s postseason playoffs in 1995. 2014 is the first year that two wild card teams have faced off in the World Series – yes, a major-league record!!!

“Is Math Liberal?” – a recent review on the Mother Jones website of How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking, a book by University of Wisconsin math professor Jordan Ellenberg – suggests that math is not just about computation, but also a framework for thinking through problems intelligently.