Episode 2: Discovery & Learning

0:00Hello and welcome to episode number two of the What, So What, Now What Data and Tech Podcast.

0:06Today is the 30th of January and I'm joined by my co-host Ravi.

0:10Hello, good morning.

0:11Good morning for me at least.

0:14Where are you today?

0:15So today I'm on the east coast, so this it's fairly early for me, so five hours ahead of the UK, so it's about six thirty my time.

0:21Uh so I'm guessing about eleven thirty your time.

0:24Yeah, yeah, that's right, yeah.

0:26Cool, yeah.

0:26No, so I'm I'm across for just this week um and up early to record a nice fresh new pod.

0:35Good stuff.

0:35It's been a little bit of a break since our last podcast.

0:38I think uh we're going on a another two and a half week um schedule here.

0:42So um we're gonna get this out as soon as we can.

0:45And this time round it's gonna be available on iTunes.

0:48well so if you listen to iTunes um you'll be able to find this podcast there as well as SoundCloud and any other podcast app that uses those platforms.

0:57Now we'll try and get it on more platforms soon and our website should also be live very soon

1:02soon so uh we'll have a home for the podcast.

1:04Awesome, yeah, yeah.

1:05Hat tips for you for you to getting all that sorted as well.

1:08But I I I will say we're still on Arcadis for two put two podcasts a month, so just about just about we're still on that cadence.

1:15So it works quite nice

1:16Okay, so there you go, Ravi, Ravi, Ravi pretty much uh highlighted our routine.

1:21Uh two podcasts a month, um that's that's what we're going for.

1:24So what are we talking about today, team?

1:26What's our what's our topic?

1:27So this is actually our original uh first episode that we did before but didn't uh record uh concerning it from the last show.

1:35We're talking about discovery and learning.

1:37Um uh it's based off a uh

1:40uh blog post I wrote um in August of last year.

1:43So this is quite some time ago.

1:45But uh I think we're gonna expand a bit on it today.

1:47Absolutely, yeah.

1:48So I I think that it's it's a really important topic and we had definitely had a really good discussion last time or the first time we talked about this.

1:55And yeah, so I'll just kick off with the what.

1:58So just a reminder for the listeners, the structure of the podcast of course goes what, and then we talk about the so what and then the now what.

2:05Uh so Tim, tell tell me about what what you mean when you talk about sort of the learning versus discovering and teaching.

2:12So what what sort of what is your actual base with this topic?

2:15So the the the the thought process for this started actually when I discovered some of my first uh Tableau workbooks.

2:22Um and essentially I was trying to understand, you know, what's my journey up until this point

2:28been like and how normal or abnormal has it been?

2:32Um and the another question I often get asked was, you know, how do you learn Tableau?

2:38How like some people I I don't like this question when people ask it

2:41But they always ask, how can I get as comfortable as you or as confident as you in a particular thing?

2:47And it's kind of like an awkward question to ask because

2:50you know you put a very unique amount of time and energy into something.

2:53So when someone's essentially asking you to tell you that to tell tell them your secrets.

2:58It's kind of like, I don't know.

3:00I would I I feel uncomfortable sharing that because it's sort of my own unique thing.

3:04Yeah, so it's it's f it's always like a unique sort of approach, right?

3:07You're fairly idiosyncratic in the way you approach something like um

3:11you know, like like learning because y it's unique to that individual person.

3:16Um so it's it's it's definitely harder to s say to someone, well I just did this, this, this, this and almost list because I don't think anyone

3:24It goes about learning in that way.

3:25But sorry, yeah, continue.

3:27Exactly, exactly.

3:28And so what I what I tried to do is I I I tried to s I tried to sort of highlight

3:33the biggest pitfall I often see, which is too much emphasis on learning in the traditional sense.

3:40Um and i I

3:42I guess I have to be careful with the words I use today, but um learning and discovery, I'm going to turn them as different things, but they're all part of a learning process, okay?

3:50And so the way I sort of differentiated it was that, you know, you can go down the traditional route where you take some courses, you go online, you attend um, you know

4:01like classroom session, you go by the book, you buy some textbooks, and there's some great books out there, not just related to Tableau, related to data in general.

4:10And you can sort of assimilate that and and look at some of the skills that they teach you.

4:15But then there's another aspect to it which which I sort of believe quite firmly in that unless you actually put a little bit of energy and time yourself into trying these things

4:25sort of applying these techniques and discovering how those techniques actually come about, discovering the journey required to get to those steps.

4:34It's you sort of miss out on a fundamental aspect of sort of the the holistic nature of the information you need to sort of take in because a lot of what you do isn't just about you know building the viz or

4:46you know, learning this particular technique to handle data.

4:49It's actually also about being able to look ahead and look back and see what steps do I need to take in order for this

4:55to be even feasible.

4:57And so what I tried to do in the blog postage is basically list out a couple of techniques I encourage people to sort of immerse themselves in the community

5:05be exposed to things they're not often exposed to.

5:07Um I always tend to tell people that business problems are the worst kind of problems to solve because they're normally boring, they're not dynamic, the situation's always really luck laster, um, because people have higher aspirations than

5:19uh you know the you know the data actually allows them to achieve so I always I always tell people to you know step out of the business problems and go go pick another domain

5:28There's lots of data sets on Makeover Monday.

5:31There are lots of weekly challenges out there.

5:33Or pick a subject that you're passionate about.

5:34Maybe it's yourself and you know I do quantified self-data.

5:37Or maybe it's running, for example

5:39Take that data and actually work with that data.

5:43Understand what it takes to transform that data, change the data, pivot that data.

5:47Do all those different things because then you're starting to learn how those things sort of manifest.

5:53And by doing that, you discover more about what's capable.

5:57Not just for Tableau, I guess, but with a lot of things.

6:00You know, you sort of learn by doing, and by doing that, you develop a much richer, nuanced sort of understanding of a topic that goes beyond just the technical skill required, for example

6:09on how to build a waterfall chart, you know?

6:11I I guess my my sort of take on that is it really depends on where you started, the that foundational layer, right?

6:18So for

6:19For me at least, my journey to using Tableau is completely different from yours, right?

6:23So of yeah as I went as I sort of discovered it through the football analysis I was doing, so soccer for our American listeners.

6:30Um that would that sort of it I started with Excel and then I wanted to build something cooler like uh the stuff that people on Twitter were doing with around R and Python.

6:39But I didn't have the knowledge to s know where to start with code, so I found this blog by a guy called Neil Charles who who basically wrote a blog about, you know, how to do football analysis using Tableau.

6:49And that's sort of where my

6:50the series of accidents that led to me joining the data school happened.

6:54Uh compared to yourself, we and your journey is more, I guess, self directed, would you say?

7:00Yes, so I guess the context I have is I I I learnt mostly Tableau.

7:06Tableau is the first data tool that I use.

7:08And I want to be careful not just to talk about Tableau, but Tableau is the first data tool I use and then Altrix was was came after, very quick quickly after.

7:16So there was almost a three month gap between me using those

7:20things for the first time.

7:21However, I'd been exposed to Tableau previously at university, so I had seen the software but I never knew it was actually Tableau.

7:29And so

7:30When I realized that this was actually a tool that you could use, I was sort of driven by that.

7:34And you know, I got the opportunity to work at the information lab.

7:38uh through this.

7:39So essentially I I learnt Tableau by essentially being put in front of problems and then solving those problems one at a time.

7:48Uh there wasn't like a curriculum or

7:50or or structure.

7:51I just sort of took each problem as they came and I solved them.

7:54Uh or I asked for help and um obviously team at Information Lab was great.

7:59So I I got

8:00that support.

8:00So I I guess my but that's that almost sounds like the um sort of my experience with some clients where they they're using it in anger.

8:07So that instead of

8:09So I I always think of a tableau as a strange in a strange way because of that foundational curriculum structured learning that we do have in the formats of the data school, right?

8:16And the fact that you are taught what the green and blue means at a very early stage.

8:21um i in this in this sort of tool.

8:23But I guess my main overarching point is uh unless you have that sort of structured curriculum learning, uh the way you'd approach it in my opinion.

8:31um say for example if I'm trying to learn Python is by taking uh a sort of endpoint, right?

8:38So taking an endpoint and then working towards that rather than

8:42as you say, working towards just solving one single problem in a vacuum.

8:47Um working to almost build out from the ground up to get to a certain stage.

8:51But I guess it depends.

8:52I th this is where this is where we get into

8:55what is discovery versus what is um sort of uh structured learning, right?

8:59Like I think I feel like there's almost a hybrid there.

9:02Absolutely.

9:03And I I guess this takes me back because um

9:07Time and time again, and and and I guess you see this as well, uh many consultants will see this.

9:11You when you go into an organization and you're the expert uh in a particular domain, uh you're held as the expert.

9:18I'll say.

9:18Um I think what what what tends to happen is you see people using something and

9:26It's abundantly clear to you r from the minute you see them just even dragging the mouse to a particular location on the screen that they're not aware of some other feature.

9:35And you know, I get this all the time and it's

9:38It's sort of it's sort of really telling because unless you have the fundamentals really sort of well taught

9:46It's also hard to take part in something like discovery learning because you can almost hit this barrier where like you you've decided to take on a problem and you're gonna try and solve this problem.

9:57But because you are still learning, you don't know the scale of the problem.

10:01And as you get into it and you sort of start to dissect it, yes you're uh having a valuable learning experience because

10:08you're sort of taking these big blocks and making them smaller.

10:11But then if you've taken on something too big, then it can actually kind of put you off.

10:16And that's where I think the frustration you're talking about.

10:18that comes in because you want to do something really which you think is simple.

10:22You you don't really appreciate the software for what it's doing, right?

10:25You just kind of have this demanding uh sort of use of software

10:30Yeah, that's the familiarity, right?

10:31So like for example, you know the the one of the most common ones that I'm I'm sure you've heard as well is I can do this in Excel, but why can't I do it in X?

10:39Like you can't I can't do it in R, I can't do it in Python

10:42Like well, that's because Excel works in a fundamentally different way to all of these different tools that you're talking about.

10:48Um and it it's that familiarity complex, right?

10:51And I think that almost comes back to when you're taught in a structured way

10:55that you almost cycle through okay it's not this so it must be this.

10:59Okay it's not that so it must be this.

11:00So you'd have you almost have a a structure of

11:03If it's not this that solves the problem, I will try this other thing that I was taught, but you again you you're um throwing

11:11stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks rather than saying wait no let me take a step back and think about the tools I have in front of me and which elements I need in order to solve the problem in front of me at the at this point in time

11:23Yeah, totally.

11:24I totally I totally agree.

11:25And actually we're sort of we're we're sort of sort of midway through the you know, the so what bit and the important thing here is that

11:32I think I think if you have this context, if you have an understanding that it's it's just it's not enough to just essentially um

11:43you know, learn by the book, but also you have to do a m a mix and a blend of lots of different ways of learning, lots of different ways of immersing yourself in the topic.

11:52um that is suited to you because you know I'll hold my hand up.

11:55When I'm learning when I'm learning JavaScript, for example, uh the only way I could start with that was to go through a course.

12:02Um and I I went through uh Treehouse because

12:04I've been using Treehouse for years, they're great.

12:07And I had to start there because I'm learning something so radically different that just sort of blundering around the internet.

12:15wouldn't be a good way to start.

12:16Like discovering JavaScript doesn't sound like a catchy phrase either.

12:22No, not at all.

12:23Yeah, it's not it's not a tool.

12:25It's a it's a language.

12:26So

12:27Um, I guess what I'm saying, you know, I guess apply this apply this way of thinking, depending on what you're learning and what suits you

12:36But once you have this sort of good basis of understanding where you feel comfortable to, you know, go a bit further, you can start to sort of, you know, unravel yourself a little bit, let loose and just explore some of the uh more sort of nuanced technology

12:48and and and and and and see where you go.

12:51The other thing I'll say is it's really easy to learn in isolation.

12:56And it's actually really hard, and I encourage people to try and do this more, to take your learning and immerse yourself around others.

13:04So sharing with colleagues, going to things like user groups, uh, you know, take part in those sort of public weekly challenges and competitions to build something.

13:13Because those simulate a healthy sort of pressure in you to actually really understand the topic.

13:19Because um uh one of one of the best things I was ever told um by a colleague at Information Lab was

13:25You don't really understand something until you have to teach someone else.

13:30And that is that is the absolute sort of level.

13:33And that doesn't mean you know everything about the topic.

13:35But at that point

13:37You yourself are comfortable because not only do you understand it but you're able to articulate it back out to people.

13:42Yeah, absolutely.

13:43I think that that that's that's a massive, massive um message there, right?

13:47Because

13:47Once you have to start teaching it to someone who either knows nothing or knows very little about the topic you're about to explain to them, um then you actually end up having to start at the basics and unravel

13:59your own journey almost um or unravel at least the topic itself to say okay this is this is these are all the different elements and I need to uh sew this together into a cohesive thread thread

14:10I guess it's almost like meta storytelling, right?

14:13So if we're if we're talking about data being the storytelling, data without context is nothing, etc.

14:18Like

14:19this is almost like the meta-level of, yeah, but in order to learn that you have to tell them the story how to teach, you know, in order to teach that lesson.

14:25I guess one of the other things I I I'd like to touch on is the fact that you can

14:30uh looking at other tools and methods of approaching the same data for and also using that as a cross-industry c cross not not industry as you've mentioned in the um in the blog but almost cross

14:42um discipline, right?

14:43So for example, I think I I recall us having a conversation about um using the photography grids um in order to actually

14:51design a design a uh a visualization or infographic in a way that leverages all the knowledge that exists in photography in order to leverage everything that they know about taking a good picture or using u the use of colour

15:05um or ev even like um I I've often looked at storyboarding in comic books in order to structure my own sort of presentation in my head.

15:13So how does a comic book leverage, you know, the the page turn or the reveal or a

15:18you know, a s a s uh entire a four size spread versus uh a half sized panel, right?

15:24D these sort of techniques that designers are using because uh but but then I guess

15:29I guess the the problem is you can e that it's easier to find those examples with design, but less so with with the logical approach, you know, like um the mathematical side.

15:39Absolutely, absolutely.

15:40I I guess um

15:42Yeah, I I guess th that's more to do with uh sort of barriers to entry, right?

15:46Matt's uh is it's kind of an intimidating subject to some where it's you know, design is everyone everyone feels at some point they are a designer, right?

15:53Every

15:54You build your first dashboard, you kind of feel like a designer, you've built something, you've crafted something.

15:59But to go deeper into that, design isn't actually just about that.

16:03Like I always I always get on a high horse when it comes to design because I think people think it's um an own it's a purely aesthetic thing and I fundamentally disagree with that and

16:14sort of opinion.

16:15When uh clients talk to me about design, I don't start with colours, layout, um, or any of that.

16:22I actually start with a fundamental question, which is why are we doing what we are about to do?

16:29Like what is the problem you're trying to solve?

16:31Yes.

16:31Because a design a design sort of way of thinking is to say

16:36I'm a problem solver.

16:37I'm not a I'm not an aesthetic designer.

16:39I'm a problem solver.

16:41And the way I put content on a page, the way I lay information out, what colors I use, all those are just tools that serve a purpose.

16:50And the purpose is to make it functional.

16:52And that is what design is to me.

16:54And I think too many people will build a dashboard, then they'll term the next step they do, which is to make it look good, as in some design style

17:03steps and then let's let's make the design better I always hear or let's uh let's make this look nice.

17:08And it's kind of like flawed because if you're doing it at that point, you've kind of missed the point right at the beginning, which was

17:15I'd even challenge some people and go, when you're building your data model, you should actually be thinking about design then because

17:22the the fields and columns you put into your data model actually will make a big exp uh user experience uh benefit or you know

17:30know uh negative for your users at the very end.

17:33How many times do you craft nasty calculations um just so you can get like a filter working when if you'd built that into your data model the user would have a much faster experience

17:44at the at the end and that's a very simple example and I can you know I can go on and on and on.

17:48There's so many similar examples like this.

17:50Um and you have to go right at the beginning.

17:52Design isn't about aesthetic

17:55It's about problem solving and making really cohesive experiences.

17:59And the tool set is sometimes the things that the way they look, but most of the time it's purely just making sure you've thought things through.

18:09You've logically analyzed what needs to be done and you're using the full set of capability to do that.

18:16So I I I'd almost I'd say yes.

18:18I'd I agree with a lot of that, but I would

18:21challenge that sort of um that thinking because mainly because of the fact that that almost encourages that pixel perfect perfect for perfection and for me that isn't

18:31My my sort of mantra is always iteration and the fact that yes, you should start off with a standing start in the way that you describe where you are thinking about the design first.

18:40Yes, that's fantastic.

18:41But

18:42At each stage when you re-evaluate and you present and you get your crowdsource opinions, you have to get that feedback loop and you then get the feedback on the design as well.

18:52Um, and of course, and that is the stage where you then say

18:55Yes, we can do that or no, that'll require I used to either go back to the data model or in order for us to write a nasty calculation based on the time frames.

19:04This is this is the the other thing that you know the t time is the enemy of all design and

19:08uh even brevity, right?

19:10Like I think it was uh uh one of the famous writers, maybe Hemingway, who said, I would have written you a a shorter letter if I had more time.

19:17Right, because it's very easy.

19:19It's very easy to just get into this habit of just writing and writing w in in our case, coding and coding or building and building.

19:26just for the sake of it or getting as much content in there and not just thinking about what elements do I need and taking away that clutter, be it image, be it design, be it colors, be it even content, even data

19:38um whether that uh that number that will require a nasty calculation or the fact you have to take a step back into the data modeling stage, whether that's you know, is is it necessary?

19:47Is there a way that we can leverage something else in order to get the same level of information

19:52Absolutely.

19:52I I I kinda think that's why my Twitter feed ex has exploded because people just like now with the extra characters they're just annihilating the uh the tw the the feed.

20:03Um

20:04Yeah, absolutely.

20:05And you know, to go back to sort of the learning, learning thing, you know, you're learning from lots of different tools, lots of different perspectives and lots of different angles.

20:13It's impossible to learn all these things.

20:15You can't be expected to have, you know, go spend a whole day on typography or a whole day on colour theory, you know.

20:21You could get a lot people do like, you know, dissertations and and and

20:25and whole like sections of their careers just understanding these these principles.

20:30But I think what is good is that a lot of these communities, a lot of these sort of parallel disciplines

20:36have synthesized the key concepts very very well.

20:39And so I always encourage people, look, just before you choose a color palette, just go research some colour theory and understand what colours actually mean to an individual

20:47You know.

20:48In the tools we use every day, Tableau have done uh really good work on this.

20:52Uh a lady called Maureen Stone, who if you if you ever get a chance to see her at conference, absolutely go.

20:58She taught me so much in terms

20:59of little tips and tricks in terms of colour um and things that Tableau does with colour that you don't even realize unless you you actually start to interrogate like the colour values that are coming out.

21:08So you know just spend some time immersing yourself with those people

21:11people not because you want to turn into them but because you just want to learn from them, see how they see things.

21:18Um and I I think the one last one last point on on on this, I think you also have to make sure that

21:25When you use other tools, you don't fall into this overly critical perspective of not understanding the world that people who use that tool are in.

21:35I think it's very easy, for example, for I I see this a lot in the Tableau community.

21:39People just, you know, they've the they love Tableau, they use it very easy, and then in one split second they're just you know criticizing other tools.

21:47Click is often often the common one, right?

21:49And what they don't understand is that that tool's used in a completely different context.

21:53Even though it's a competitor, it doesn't necessarily mean that

21:57it you know people want to use it in the same way and and so you have to appreciate tools and uh things that you're learning for the context that they're used in not from the context that you're coming from

22:09Yeah, well yeah 100%.

22:11I think that that that sort of understanding of where where that that journey starts and what you're what you're actually using the tool for and the application for it.

22:20And also, you know, it's it's like the the Power BI is a great example for that because it's it's a very, very good reporting tool, right?

22:27It's it's ex i it's very slick and it looks nice and it's familiar for a user that's used to the Excel world.

22:32It's it's in in that reporting

22:35you know, the the the the car with no wheels scenario, it looks very nice, but um in terms of doing analysis, it can get quite tricky.

22:43So one thing I will mention actually on the Maureen Stone Point is Tableau do loads of research papers in general.

22:49So research.

22:50tableau.

22:51com

22:51is full of papers around visualization, around storytelling, or around colour choice as well.

22:56And Maureen herself has written loads of fantastic papers, but also the likes of Jock McKinley and Robert Cossaro who just do amazing stuff

23:04Even if you take one or two nuggets from a skim read of those papers, I think that really helps become a better practitioner.

23:11And I also think that uh Hadley Wickham, uh the one of the creators of R Studio and R, I believe

23:17Um he he does loads of this stuff as well.

23:19I think one of his one of the favorite uh one of my favorite papers and talks he's given is about thinking about the data structure and I'll I'll send send a link to add on the show notes

23:31And basically talks about before you start doing anything you have to get your data right and uh he he talks about the tidyverse, which is a way uh a cut a series of packages that in our

23:41that allow you to clean up data in in a certain way.

23:44I'm not an art practitioner, so I can't speak with intelligence about it.

23:47Um but the the the paper and the talk that Hadley's written about uh and talks about is really, really good.

23:53Just just while we're on Hadley Wickham

23:55on the on Hallie Weekham Point.

23:57He's he's got a really nice um he started doing this almost like a we talked about Twitch last time, right?

24:01He's he did a um

24:03almost like a Twitch cast of him using R Studio to build and solve a problem.

24:07Like he you sit there and he commentates um about Oh him in R Studio writing some script and what he's doing as he goes along with it, which is which is fascinating.

24:17I I found it

24:19It really, really good to see someone not only iterate in a different tool, but also commentate about what he's doing and why he's doing it and the sort of why he knows to do that versus something else.

24:29Um which is what which loops us back to that learning and then the teaching, right?

24:34The that teaching reinforces his own thinking of doing something.

24:38Good stuff.

24:39I think we're now on to uh now what, right?

24:42Yeah, exactly.

24:43So we're now on to the now what.

24:44So we've talked about the actual topic itself, so the sort of discovery, learning, and teaching cycle.

24:51Um the so what is us

24:54mentioning about you know all these different caveats to learning in that sort of way.

24:58So what's the what's the now what, Tim?

25:00What what is our um nugget of information information we want our listeners to take away?

25:05So I I think

25:07Uh I think I I'd pitch it at different people.

25:10Um I'm gonna I'm gonna take shots at the people who actually build these softwares and technologies in the first

25:15place because I think sometimes they get carried away with innovation and they forget they forget new users.

25:23Um and I'm hypercritical in this sense so uh

25:27I I might I might sound sensational here, but I don't think enough tools do a good job of thinking about the onboarding experience.

25:35I think um I I think after the Austin conference

25:38almost two years ago now.

25:39I I I waxed on about it for a whole year.

25:42I was I was criticizing Tableau a lot because their onboarding experience it

25:46i it isn't isn't great for a for a newbie and I know everyone in the community ha knows people so you know if you're in the community then great you have someone to hold your hand there are lots of blogs but if imagine you have no internet someone's installed Tableau on your machine

26:01and you need to open it.

26:03And there's actually in the in the design community for apps, there's actually a really brutal website.

26:07I'll have to find it and put in the

26:09in the show notes.

26:10But what they do is they take an application, they kill the internet, and then they try and use it.

26:15And uh and

26:19The feedback is so brutal.

26:21Uh you have you have such great feedback from very honest designers and it's all about user experience, but

26:28You know, if I gave if I gave a tool I use every day, like Tableau, to my grandma, uh kill the internet and said to her, Okay, here you go.

26:35Um uh you know your finances in Excel?

26:38Uh visualize them.

26:40How far could they get to actually even just opening the software?

26:43And for Tableau, there's so many steps actually.

26:45There's so many steps.

26:47So one thing I'd love Tableau to do is to think about progressive disclosure in their software.

26:54So that when I'm trying to do something that is hinting that I don't understand something, I'd love to see a little tooltip that says, hey, are you trying to do this?

27:02A bit like Clippy in Microsoft Word.

27:04Everyone loved Clippy, right?

27:07It was annoying as hell, but actually, that is exactly the kind of almost uh uh someone's gonna call it an AI, and it's not an AI, it's just

27:14It's just some logic, right?

27:15It's a bot.

27:16It's a bot.

27:17It's a bot.

27:17It's a bot that's just, you know, watching your behavior.

27:20And when you try and do something repeatedly and it knows, okay, this sort of behavior means you're trying to actually do X

27:27Then I think that would be really, really cool um thing to do.

27:31I'm I'm half working on like a concept video to try and show this um a little bit.

27:36Reimagining a tableau.

27:37Exactly, exactly.

27:39Um but there's so many other problems that you need to be solved before that.

27:43I know this is not like a super important thing.

27:44Tutorials are great, everything is out there.

27:47I just think at the point of use, we'll take something like level of detail calculation

27:51How on earth is someone supposed to know that A, that phrase exists, B what that means, and C, search for it.

27:58If they've not someone on their shoulder to tell them what it is

28:01Like you're trying to do this thing in Tableau.

28:04How would you know if you don't have internet to s go search for that phrase?

28:08Like even even if you had the internet

28:10How would you know to type that?

28:11There's there's nothing in the software to tell you, right?

28:14I I'd actually say one of the most frustrating things about a new a fresh install of tableau is when you open the calculations window, once you get that, once you get to the stage of opening a calculations window

28:23Right click, scroll down, edit.

28:26Yeah, exactly.

28:27Or go to yeah.

28:35Um the the right hand pane that that pops out when you click that little arrow, that should be there by default.

28:42I don't understand why it's not there by default.

28:44Like the amount of times I've gone into uh I've sat next to a new user who's just installed Tableau and

28:50I've said, okay, go to calculation field.

28:52One of the things we're going to do set up straight away is the fact that you click this button so you actually can see the different formulas you can use.

28:58Yeah.

28:59And it will be handy for you to know to do that.

29:02Um I sp I spoke to some devs at at conference about this exact thing.

29:05They're like, mm, yeah, that's a good idea.

29:07Um sort of thing.

29:09But um I uh it's really important

29:13Yeah.

29:13No, I I I do agree.

29:14I do agree.

29:15Um so I guess what we're w my my question to you then is what is a tool that has a really good

29:22um onboarding sort of experience.

29:24I guess Alterix has that getting started window that pops up and m has all those tutorials we can do, uh which is kinda handy.

29:32That that is candy, but it's it's invasive because it's shoved in your face.

29:38Okay.

29:38Right.

29:38And what do you do when shoving's shoved in your face?

29:41you close it straight away.

29:43So it's about uh and again, you know, the credit to Altrix for actually developing really good tutorial content because I think theirs is there's some of the best I've come across.

29:52But that said, because it's shoved in front of you, you're even more desensitized to it.

29:57It's like w when you get used to seeing adverts on the internet, your eyes just get really good at ignoring them, right?

30:02Um and it's the same sort of it suffers from that problem.

30:05What I'd love is as I'm dragging something onto the toolpane and I'm struggling to do something.

30:10or I'm struggling with the calculation, I'd love it just to pop up and say, hey, I notice you're struggling with X.

30:16Are you trying to do this?

30:17Oh here's some help tutorials on how to do X.

30:19X, you know, it's that sort of progressive disclosure.

30:22And so here's here's a like an ideal world, okay?

30:24So you're probably thinking, what do you actually mean with this idea?

30:27So I'm gonna run really quickly with this idea

30:29Number one, you need some sort of user profile setup.

30:32Adobe has this, uh it synchronizes through all your software.

30:35So when you open Adobe and you've never been on the machine before, you log in, boom, all your settings are there

30:39So you need a way of storing all this information so you know what a user has and hasn't done before.

30:45Number two, you need to learn what the user is doing.

30:48Okay, and typically that means the cloud.

30:50So you have to store this information somewhere in the cloud

30:52So the profile synchronizes across all the machines.

30:55Number three, uh you start to score a user based on what they are using and what they're not.

31:00So as they use the tool over time, you start to notice that they haven't used the tool

31:04certain set of tools or they have and you start almost creating a a a progression um status.

31:10So you say, ah you've used 60% of the tools available in Tableau or the tools available in Nortrix or the tools

31:16and packages available in R.

31:18And you're tracking this over time.

31:19And then at periodic moments you surface that to the user and say, hey, we've noticed you've been using Tableau for three months and you haven't created a calculation.

31:28Maybe you should uh go watch this video written by Ravi, you know, on the information on our blog post

31:35And that's the whole point.

31:36It's not about creating the content.

31:38It's about linking the user to the content at the time of most need.

31:42And that time of most need is really hard to do if you don't have those steps previously

31:47Yeah, 100%.

31:48And then what you feel like, so I'm I'm more all about the sort of corporate strategy side of things and a lot of these things because I'm like on one hand I'm like self-service is a fantastic thing.

31:57On the other hand, you're sort of stuck with this

31:59Yeah, but you want to lock down certain things because that's how companies kind of work.

32:05But anyway, um the my my sort of view with that is it'll be great if when someone logged in

32:11it was connected to the active directory, was ab you're able to import the company's custom colour palettes.

32:16You'd be able to give them stencils and f um formats of all the different fonts they that the company uses.

32:22And all the th these things are built in

32:25As well as as well as a link to content which the person who's rolled out the desktops or the server

32:34Can say, okay, I want the user to be able to see these videos.

32:39I want them to be able to see this video, this video, this video, this video.

32:42these contents or I want the t tableau to pop up regularly with the getting started pack.

32:48So the the Tableau have two different different really good uh sections for you to get started.

32:53Firstly is all those the suite of videos

32:55that we know and love.

32:57And also there's a um a pack which is getting started um day by day.

33:01It's like a training pack sort of thing where you watch some things, you do some things, you

33:05read some white papers, etc.

33:07And that's a really good structured way of learning it, but it's not enforced enough, it's not shared enough, in my opinion at least.

33:14Yeah.

33:14Um so how how would you let's let's so we talked about that sort of initial learning stage.

33:19Uh what about I guess that ties into discovery as well.

33:22So what's our now what for teaching?

33:28I guess it because w in in our sort of realm of space as consultants it's fairly easy to tick that box because when you got to consult you have to know something to explain to a client.

33:39about how they're teaching something or you have to teach them something.

33:42And, you know, that's uh easier to do in this space than it is for say, uh Joe Bloggs at X Corp who is working in finance but loves Tableau.

33:53and there's no center excellence setup.

33:58Yeah, and yeah, I agree.

34:02I

34:03I sort of think with teaching, I'm gonna say something uh a little bit harsh, but less spoon feeding.

34:10I'd love I'd love there to be less

34:13This is exactly how to do that end-to-end solutionizing and more of you know getting people to actually go through the process of learning how to do things.

34:27because that's the problem with having a great community.

34:29There's so many blog posts on exactly how to do X.

34:32And a lot of people at the time of need they just blast through uh that like a task list and they just do A B C D and they're done.

34:40And they

34:40They send off their report and they're done.

34:42They don't look at it again.

34:43What they missed is why that particular process is maybe better than three other blogs that have done something similar but have achieved it in a different way, right?

34:53I gu I guess that that sort of comes back to um the there's there's that there was that great image during the rounds on Twitter recently, oh at least before Christmas.

35:01which was h how do I code?

35:03I just take someone else's and tweak bits till it works for my data set.

35:07Which is basically what you're doing for a tutorial, right?

35:09Where it's a step by step recipe.

35:11You know, I uh 'cause a lot of tutorials

35:14I mean I've done this.

35:15I like when I first started vlogging, I just did step by step do this, do this, do this without having that descriptive explainer of what's happening and why it's happening.

35:25Yeah.

35:26Absolutely.

35:27And um the other the other element of that i is that um uh I also wish um that

35:36people uh promoted other people's content more rather than recreating solutions that have already been you know talked about in the community.

35:45I'll give a shout out to Kurt Harris actually because he does this really, really well.

35:49Whenever anyone creates a blog about something that's been done in a different way, he always goes out of his way to highlight the other

35:57p the other perspective.

35:58And he doesn't he he doesn't do another blog.

36:01He he just says, hey, this is this blog over here.

36:03And I think something that we're all very guilty of and

36:06I certainly realized mum the amount of stuff I blog just fell through the floor when what I what I did when I had a blog idea is uh instead of just writing it, I actually just Googled and saw, are there any other blogs out there?

36:20Yeah.

36:20Yes.

36:20Do they answer the question well enough?

36:22Yes.

36:23Um can I offer an alternative perspective?

36:25And quite a lot the answer was no.

36:27And so I just didn't write the blog.

36:29And um what I didn't do then is you know showcase this blog and say, oh, this is really

36:34Help me out, but I'm starting to do improvement.

36:38Yeah, exactly.

36:39But I think I wish I wish more people would do that.

36:41Or even build another people's box.

36:43I'd love to see more examples of

36:45Hey, um, you know, this person has done this great blog.

36:49Uh, I'm gonna follow on from that and I'm gonna add this, this, and this to it, you know?

36:55So actual community building where we're building on each other's solution

36:58and going out of our way to look for things that have already been done and adding to it because it it can create noise in the in a world where everyone's trying to sort of

37:08you know, add something, you create noise when you start to search for stuff and you've got, you know, fifteen hits on Google, you always hit the top one.

37:14But perspective is really important.

37:17And actually if you could create this sort of neural network of community posts

37:22that sort of come together to enhance everyone's understanding and that would be amazing.

37:26Cool.

37:26Yeah, no, um I mean w this is a topic that I think we when we were sort of circulating the ideas that we could talk about

37:34This was like one of the really meaty ones because we can literally just c carry on talking about it on an hour.

37:39I think we did cast.

37:42Yeah, I think it was uh it was a solid uh fifty, sixty minutes.

37:46Absolutely

37:48I think we've rounded the the topic off well.

37:51Um we'd love to know your feedback.

37:52This is the last second episode, so um

37:55Uh we'd love to have your feedback on the show.

37:57Um forgot to top and tell the show actually and say that this was a a data and tech podcast um at the very beginning.

38:03So in case you're wondering, if you've made it this far, then clearly you're into the content.

38:08But uh that that's what we're about.

38:10And um give us some feedback online and about the show, Twitter, you can get in touch uh with us directly.

38:17Um just DM us, you can find us on all major platforms.

38:20And um yeah, I think we'll we do our next show probably in in early February.

38:25Yeah, early February, I think.

38:26Yeah, so I th I I think we got some really good feedback after the first one, uh, especially on Twitter and and and such.

38:32So uh yeah, keep that coming in.

38:34I think one of the things I um one of the really g w one of the good ideas I had was

38:40having a ding each stage.

38:42Um let us know if that's something that you think would be useful for this sort of thing given that is we're trying to at least keep it to some structure whether the ding would be helpful as an audio cue.

38:52You know what, Ravi?

38:54I'm gonna go one step better.

38:55I'm gonna add it to this episode.

38:57So tell us whether the ding worked in this episode.

39:01Or not for each stage.

39:03Fantastic.

39:03Okay.

39:04The powers of post-processing.

39:06Exactly.

39:07Cool.

39:08Alright.

39:09Thanks for the call, man.

39:10Nice one, no worries.

39:12And take it easy, and I'll see you

39:14Probably next week sometime.

39:15Absolutely.