I’ve had 10,000+ students in my online courses since 2018, and I get a lot of questions about this process, like…

• How did you turn your keynote into a full-length online course?

• How did you turn your private, on-site workshop into an asynchronous online course?

In this video, you’ll go behind the scenes and learn about the course creation process.

What’s Inside

First, you’ll see the student’s perspective:

• 0:00 Intro
• 0:31 Student Perspective: Inside the Videos and Lessons via Teachable
• 2:25 Student Perspective: Private Community via LinkedIn
• 2:38 Student Perspective: Weekly Messages via Kit
• 3:39 Student Perspective: Live Office Hours via Zoom

Then, you’ll learn about the instructor’s perspective:

• 5:10 Instructor Perspective: Step 1 – Make the Content
• 6:54 Instructor Perspective: Step 2 – Record (via Camtasia)
• 7:15 Instructor Perspective: Step 3 – Edit
• 7:35 Instructor Perspective: Step 4 – Upload (e.g., captions and transcripts via Descript)
• 9:36 Instructor Perspective: Step 5 – Get People to Register
• 10:45 Who’s Involved (Outsourcing)
• 11:43 How Long it Takes

Resources Mentioned

• https://teachable.com/
• https://kit.com/
• https://www.techsmith.com/store/camtasia
• https://web.descript.com/
• https://zapier.com/

The post How to Make Online Courses appeared first on Depict Data Studio.

In this podcast episode, I sat down with Heather Sager to share behind-the-scenes tips on managing parenthood and entrepreneurship.

How to Listen

• LISTEN to the full  episode on Apple Podcast or Spotify
• READ the episode transcript

What’s Inside

• Owning the ‘make it work’ mindset
• Aligning your work schedule with your energy levels
• Making tough choices around your time
• Ann’s surprisingly simple tip to maintain her business boundaries
• Focusing on financial goals over chasing trends
• The real deal with passive income
• Ways to bring more help into your personal life
• Embracing the long game of entrepreneurship

Episode Quick Guide

• 0:00 Self-Employed Pregnancy and Maternity Leave
• 3:58 Navigating Business and Pregnancy
• 14:18 Transition to Short-Term Projects and Simplify Business Operations
• 20:32 Travel and Work Independently
• 24:58 The Challenges of Performing and Recovering
• 35:31 Balancing Work and Rest in Self-Employment
• 42:06 Simplifying Business and Avoiding Time-Wasting Activities
• 48:31 Shift to Digital Courses
• 58:29 Balancing Personal and Professional Brand
• 1:04:08 Using Your Voice for Marketing Success

The post Entrepreneurial Insights for Expecting Mothers on Heather Sager’s “Hint of Hustle” Podcast appeared first on Depict Data Studio.

Exercise, eat breakfast with the family, work on energizing projects for a few hours… 

… and then call it a day. 

Take the kids to gymnastics. Volunteer at field day.

Take off the entire summer for bucket list adventures.

Months-long road trips around the United States. 

Cruises through Europe.

Passports full of stamps.

Meg K. Wheeler from The Equitable Money Project invited me to speak on her podcast about building a thriving business around your life — not building a life around your business.

Listen to the Podcast

Search for the “Disrupt Your Money” podcast on your favorite podcast app.

Or, listen on Spotify here:

Watch the Podcast

Or, you can watch our conversation:

Learn More

Meg asked me to write a blog post about my experiences, too. You can read that post here.

Inside, you’ll see how my business has evolved over the past decade. I also share behind-the-scenes revenue and expenses info. And, you’ll see five tips for transitioning from burnout to summers abroad.

Your Turn

What types of questions do you have about building a business that fits your family? Comment below!

The post Building a Business that Fits Your Family: Disrupt Your Money Podcast appeared first on Depict Data Studio.

Samir Sharma is a data strategy and analytics leader, CEO and Founder of datazuum. He has a history of helping data executives and leaders craft and execute their data strategies. His passion for data strategy led him to launch the Data Accelerator Workshop and host the Data Strategy Show.

Watch the Podcast

Listen to the Podcast

You can also listen to the podcast here:

• Stitcher
• Apple Podcasts

What’s Inside 

Here are some of the topics we talked about.

Challenges Faced by Companies Trying to Visualize Their Data

Samir asked what are typical data visualization challenges that come up again and again. Ann said, “I think a big challenge I see with organizations is the people with data backgrounds, I think it’s so easy for us to forget that not everybody is a data person. I have to constantly remind myself, ‘Most people hate spreadsheets. They see it as a chore, and a burden, it’s just overly detailed and they can’t find what they need.”

While Samir serves as the bridge between business leaders and more data focused people, Ann noted that “if you’re trained in the weeds and details like I was, you’re never exposed to those business leaders. You have no training on how to work with those people necessarily.

Ann said she sees, “Organizations that will spend weeks or months creating the perfect dashboard or the perfect such and such tool. But they’ve never really tested it along the way. And they’ll get user feedback like, “I don’t like the colors.” Something really irrelevant but it just show the user is not really thinking deeply about the data because they weren’t engaged in the process.”

What We Should be Thinking About When Creating or Re-Designing Dashboards

“I see people assuming that developing a dashboard is going to take forever and cost a ton of money. That it’s going to be this months long process where they have to buy this new software program, they have to send their staff to training on this software program, they have to link all these data sources…”, Ann said. “They think it’s going to be this huge process so they think as long as this dashboard is taking forever, it better serve all of our needs. It better be this audience and this audience and this audience.”

Ann shared that during the planning process of each new project, she asks, “Who is this dashboard for?”

How to Learn More about Data Visualization

Samir asked what Ann’s advice would be for someone who wants was starting out in data visualization. Ann said, “I think a lot of us get wrapped up in tools, but there are so many tools available, more being invented. I think it’s really stressful, daunting, overwhelming for someone entering the field [to think], do I learn coding? Do I do the spreadsheet route? Do I do a drag-and-drop-dashboard route like Tableau or Power BI? There’s also the more graphic design route like do you specialize in Illustrator? Publisher? I think we feel like we have to master all of them and that’s just not possible. You’d spend your whole career just learning tools.

She advises to earn what’s out there and then specialize in just one tool. “I had this big crossroads maybe five years ago where I felt this pressure to go learn R. I just felt so much pressure and I just had to kind of let that go,” Ann said.

“The first step to getting started is letting go of this ridiculous, ambitious goal that we have that, ‘I’m going to learn every single tool, get certifications in it. I’m going to put all these skills in my resume.’ Just learn a tool and very, very comfortable and confident with that.”

Connect with Samir Sharma

LinkedIn: @samirsharma1

Website: www.datazuum.com

The post The Data Strategy Show with Samir Sharma appeared first on Depict Data Studio.

Emily was a guest speaker in our Report Redesign course. She walked us through the basics of sketchnoting, her career, why hand drawn images stop the scroll, the cool brain science behind sketchnoting, and then led us through some drawing exercises. We wanted to share Emily’s tips with you, too!

Watch Our Conversation

What is Sketchnoting?

Emily explained that sketchnoting is when you’re writing and drawing at the same time. “The whole purpose to remember information, and it’s just more engaging and interesting to look at,” she said. 

Sketchnoting is also called:

• Visual notetaking
• Graphic recording
• Visual facilitation
• Graphic facilitation

What is Sketchnote Academy?

Emily founded Sketchnote Academy in 2018. She offers online courses to help you learn how to sketchnote and then level up your skills. 

Emily’s Previous Career Experience 

Emily Mills’ background is in graphic design. She was an in-house designer in education, nonprofit, and a healthcare start-up.  “I just get bored doing the same thing year after year like an annual report… again. While the data, pictures and information might change, it was still the same project… year after year,” she said. 

How Emily Got Started with Sketchnotes

Emily fell into sketchnoting from a weekly cartoon that she would draw on a whiteboard outside her office. 

She said that a former co-worker remembered those cartoons. When he went to work at a video studio, he contacted her, saying “We just booked a video client for something called a whiteboard video. We don’t really know what it is, but we need somebody to draw for it. Will you come to Houston and draw for our video?” Emily agreed and created a whiteboard video with them. 

“I was really proud of it and I put it online. Someone found it through keywords and hashtags and they said, “This is so cool! Have you heard of sketchnoting?” I hadn’t but [realized] it was pretty much the same thing,” she said. After that, she attended a sketchnote-specific workshop, and then challenged herself to sketchnote every day for a month. 

Hand-Drawn Images Stop the Scroll

Emily once shared with Ann that hand-drawn art/graphics get more view time than stock photos or computer generated graphics. Ann asked her to tell us more as we’re all trying to create reports that people *actually* want to read. 

Emily explained how hand-drawn images can stop the scroll. 

If you think about your average Instagram feed, she explained, you’re probably seeing mostly pictures, some stock photos,, an inspirational photo with a quote on it. She said that we’re used to those images now, and our brains are automatically thinking, “I’ve seen this before; show me something new.” 

Emily said when you see something different like a hand-drawn cartoon or someone’s artwork, you really stop because of human curiosity. “We keep asking questions,” she said. “Hand-drawn images invoke a lot of our human curiosity and take longer to engage with because you’re asking those questions.”

The Cool Brain Science Behind Sketchnoting

“Drawing is what I call the human language,” Emily said. 

Drawing was around before written language. We’ve been communicating in pictures for thousands of years. 

Studies also show that pairing an image with words also allows for better brain retention than just images or words alone.

Drawing Data Can Help Simplify Data

She gave an example of being at a conference where the speaker has a PowerPoint slide with a huge pie chart with 10 different slides and lots of labels. 

If you’re trying to take visual notes, there’s no way you can capture that entire pie chart, all the data points, and what all the colors mean. 

“But there’s usually one story that you’re trying to communicate with your data,” she said. Focus on just that main point rather than try and capture every single detail. 

Drawing Can Help You Sketch Drafts Quickly

Emily said she was taught in design school that you don’t even touch the design software until you have 50 designs drawn on paper first. 

“The reason is, it’s tracking your progress. I’m forced to go slow because I’m limited by how fast I can draw,” she said. 

She suggested giving yourself 30 seconds to draw what you’re trying to communicate. Then give yourself 10 seconds and then 5 seconds. This will allow you to see what you’re naturally drawn to and what can get cut. 

“See what you’re cutting and what you’re keeping, and that’s your data story. That’s the main point,” she said. 

Sketchnoting with Emily

Materials needed: Pen and paper (preferred) but an iPad is fine too. 

Emily gave us an introduction to drawing that you can follow along with. She said that every single drawing can be condensed into three things:

1. A dot (a point)
2. A line (a dot that went on a trip)
3. A shape (a dot that went on a trip and came back home)

She then shared the seven building blocks of all drawings:

1. Dot
2. Straight line
3. Curvy line
4. Crooked line
5. Circle
6. Square/Rectangle
7. Triangle

Her final tip: Go for recognizable rather than realistic. 

Grab your pen and paper and join in! 

Connect with Emily Mills

Instagram: emily_a_mills

SketchnoteAcademy.com 

Free Course: Beginner Sketchnote Drawing

Your Turn

Comment with your favorite part of learning with Emily. 

The post Getting Started with Sketchnoting: A Conversation with Emily Mills appeared first on Depict Data Studio.

Women in Data is an international non-profit organization started in 2015 whose mission is to bring women together for career advancement and an opportunity to uplift one another. They have chapters throughout the world and each hold quarterly symposiums that include enlightening talks, expert panels and networking opportunities. 

Co-presenter Rebecca Pop is the founder of Vizlogue, a data visualization and storytelling lab that offers training and consulting services. 

Watch the Recorded Panel 

What’s Inside 

Here are some of the topics addressed during the panel. 

• Can you share your personal journey and how you got started with data visualization? 
• How do you approach data visualization problems? When you are working on a dataset, do you have standard steps/best practices that you follow every time? Are there any key focus areas one should be mindful of? Ann said, “Something so important to know in advance, is whether your audience is technical or non-technical. Technical audiences are people who like data, who love opening a spreadsheet, and are in a data career on purpose. Non-technical audiences are the opposite. They’d rather hire a consultant or let another staff member handle it. It’s probably the last thing on their to do that they want to tackle (and they probably procrastinate!)” 
• Important aspects to keep in mind while working with data are data integrity and data ethics. What is your take on data integrity and data ethics?  
• For someone just getting started in data visualization, it can be overwhelming with the number of tools and courses available these days, what is your advice for beginners? Can you also share some resources? Ann said, “At first, learn the one-hour version of about 10 different tools, but then take a 10-hour training on just one tool and go deeper and specialize. There’s a lot of great courses out there.”  
• What is the future of data visualization? How do you anticipate data visualization to differ in the coming years? 
• Data visualization is a very competitive field, how can one stand out from the crowd and make an impression? Ann said, “Don’t worry too much about having to be the best at everything, I don’t think it’s even possible. Just pick one and play on the strength that you already have and make that public in some way… For example, if you like Tableau post a lot of visualizations on your Tableau public profile. If you like R, post to your code on Github and connect with other people.” 
• What are the key skills required to be successful in data viz? How important is the tool? Ann said, “Chart choosing [is so important]. Are you going to use a pie chart, bar chart or something else altogether? It’s very difficult to take a table, rows and columns of summary statistics and figure out what chart that is going to be. I think a lot of people go to the standards like pie charts or bar charts.” She added, “One activity that you can try for yourself is find a table of data, set a timer for 10-15 minutes and see how many ideas you can come up with in that time period. When I started doing this, I could only come up with a couple of ideas in a 15-minute brainstorming session. Now I come up with 15 ideas in that same time period.” 

Learn More 

Here are some of the resources we mentioned during the panel: 

• The 3-step process for sharing data with users through data placemats: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/ev.20181  
• Ann’s favorite dataviz podcasts, which were mentioned in the Q&A after the recording ended: Explore Explain with Andy Kirk, Data Stories with Enrico Bertini and Moritz Stefaner, Data + Love with Zach Bowders, Data Viz Today with Alli Torban and Storytelling with Data with Cole Knaflic.

The post Women in Data appeared first on Depict Data Studio.