Thread: problem deciding the best way to "chart" my data.

Hi

I have a problem deciding the best way to "chart" my data.

I have Students entering the company, on different student schemes (12 in total), with Years of entry over the past 15 years.

I want to be able to compare trends, which looks at pay improvements, Grade changes, position changes and the length of time it takes in years, and their performance each year.

When I start to even think of showing this in a graph with multiple "drop-downs" and secondary axis, it still looks so so busy.

Plus I need to compare it against another group, so double the trouble!!!

So if anyone has any ideas of an approach I should take, please feel free to comment.

Appreciate your time

Ronan

It is good to attach files, so users can assist you with your problems.

I am not sure why you are trying to graph multiple criteria on the same graph. Maybe that is where you are getting a busy chart...

I would start by making individual charts that reflect what trends you are trying to visualize. For instance, make a chart with each series representing each student, your x axis will represent time, and your y axis will represent pay improvements. Obviously you will have to scale your "x" axis back enough so that you can get a comparison between all the students, so if you can break it down to 3 months or 6 month intervals, you wont be showing as much data but you will still be able to visualize the trends...

Once you have points that overlap, you will start to see the trends and be able to see approxiamtely when pay improvements have been made.

And then do the same to the next trend that you want to visualize.

Also, you can do this with dropdowns, but I am not sure why you would want to, as it just limits what you are able to see.

Thanks for the reply.
Sorry, Hard to add a sample without anonomising the data.

I suppose my real problem is that when I show New students by "number started" and "leavers", then a secondary axis for attrition.., Of course if I try to add a comparison group to compare and all those series ar then doubled.... And then my boss wants to be able to see what Grade the leavers were and whether or not they were high performance and what schemes they had been on etc...?

Ronan

I think your trying to put too much data into one graph, I would break it down and give your boss a good visual represention, by sorting the data and figuring out what percentages of the employees met each of the fields. You can show most in a graphs whether line graphs or pie charts. Again without seeing your sheets, I would have a layout something like this:

Names Scheme Promotion 1 Promotion 2 Promotion 3 Promotion 4 Promotion 5 Pay Rate "Leaver" Days
John Doe 1 Yes Yes No No No $2.00 Yes 120
Jane Doe 1 Yes No No No No $1.00 Yes 60
B Smith 2 Yes Yes Yes No No $3.00 No 240