Of the dozen or so “go to” books I have on my desk at work, 4 of them are by Edward Tufte.
Acknowledged as the godfather of information design, Tufte was an academic whose first self-published book, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, became an instant classic and filled a huge unknown void. It was named one of the “100 Best Non-Fiction Books of the Century” by Amazon. He has since followed up with 3 more books (Envisioning Information, Visual Explanations, Beautiful Evidence) along with his screed on the evils of Powerpoint, The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint.
Tufte is a passionate advocate for clear and effective data and information design, so much so that he was recently appointed to the President’s Recovery and Reinvestment Act advisory panel “to provide transparency in the use of Recovery-related funds.”
At times, I think Tufte goes a bit overboard in his railings against PowerPoint in that he views the software as synonymous with presentation itself (and bad presentation at that) and not simply as a tool—that can be used for good or for evil. Still, his analysis of and conclusion that the misuse of PowerPoint contributed to the Columbia Shuttle disaster is absolutely fascinating reading, and a worthwhile warning for anyone who relies on presentation to communicate a difficult, but important message.
While Tufte’s book are beautifully designed works of art, they can be a little daunting at time to the average reader. Still, I strongly recommend his regular one day seminars held around the country to anyone who has to present as part of their job. Seminar registrants are given a copy of each of the 4 books. From Tufte’s website, here are the upcoming seminars.
- Denver, CO — June 11, 2010
- Portland, OR — June 14, 2010
- Seattle, WA — June 15 & 16, 2010
Tufte coined the term “chart junk” which I’ve talked about —all those extraneous gridlines, tick marks, 3D effects and redundant labels. And here Tufte shows his minimalist approach to data design. But he is also a big fan of packing as much useful information as you can into a graphic. Think of a well-designed train schedule or a subway map. In this area, Tufte always refers to a famous 1869 Charles Minard analysis of Napoleon’s disastrous 1812 March to Moscow as “the best statistical graphic ever drawn.” In a single visual, Minard elegantly plots a half-dozen variables, each of which could warrant its own separate chart.
