From John D. Cook, some comments on: Painting with numbers : presenting financials and other numbers so people will understand you by Randall Bolten (WorldCat).
From the summary at WorldCat:
“Painting with Numbers is a thoughtful, yet practical and readable, guide to presenting numerical information effectively. The chapters are divided into two sections: “Technique” – focuses on how readers and listeners perceive numbers and what they look for in reports, describes how reports should be laid out and organized, and provides tips on how to take advantage of the available tools – principally Microsoft Excel – to minimize time spent “beautifying” reports.”Content” – provides thoughts and guidelines on specific types of reports. One chapter alone is devoted to the “Natural P&L”, the statement that is the cornerstone of management financial reporting. Other chapters discuss other reports common to businesses, reports relevant to other walks of our lives, and information that especially lends itself to presentation in graphs rather than tables”-
I did like John’s quoting:
I like #17: “I know most of you can’t read the numbers on this slide, but …”
We have all heard that about markup, code, diagrams, charts, etc.
I would like to never hear it again.
Suggestions?