What we can learn from Taylor Swift about creating data visualizations

Interview with Nicholas Lowthorpe

Today, we are talking about Taylor Swift and visualizations.
Does it seem like a very unreasonable thing?
I thought so as well but then I read this interesting LinkedIn post where I laughed hard but it really made sense!

Join us in today’s episode as we are talking about the following points:

LyricAnswerQuestion
“Cherry lips, crystal skies
I could show you incredible things.”
Taylor talks of her mastery of colour, as she alludes to the incredible insights she can display through just a splash of red against a crystal-clear background.What are your key learnings regarding colour?
“Find out what you want
Be that girl for a month.”
Unlike many data projects, Taylor’s will succeed – because she takes the time to find out what her stakeholders want, and agrees clear deadlines.How does your practice look like to learn about the needs of the stakeholders?
“So it’s gonna be forever or it’s gonna go down in flames.”Unlike many data projects, Taylor’s will succeed – because she takes the time to find out what her stakeholders want, and agrees clear deadlines.How does your practice look like to learn about the needs of the stakeholders?
“But I’ve got a blank space, baby
And I’ll write your name.”
Taylor’s only mistake. My advice would be to leave that space blank and clutter free.How do you measure the success of your visualization?

Reference blog: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6709808936557580289/

Nicholas Lowthorpe

Research & Enterprise Analyst

He is an Engineer-turned-analyst passionate about empowering people to build their data communication & visualisation skills.


Much of his career has been in high-pressure defence and national security roles, where he has excelled at informing rapid decision making through translating complex technical concepts to lay audiences. At the heart of this was effective data visualisation and presentation. He was also a FAMELAB regional heats winner, a public speaking competition intending to find charismatic and engaging speakers on STEM topics

He has developed complementary experience in engineering, data science and project management, and this has shown him that there are a huge amount of people who need to interact with data who don’t identify as a data scientist, programmer or mathematician.

This makes data literacy one of the most important skills, especially in a world where data is increasingly used to inform evidence-based decision making and business success.

He wants to play his part in helping people feel less intimidated by communicating with data and selling their impact. 

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