‘Tis the Season

Published by

Kathy Rowell

on

‘Tis the season of red and green, which is wonderful for those of us who are able to discern these traditional holiday colors… sadly though, approximately 10% of males and 1% of females who suffer from “colorblindness” don’t share our joy in seeing these colors.

wreath

This of course also means that these folks cannot distinguish the differences in reports where “poor” results are color coded in red and “good” results as green. Therefore, to ensure that our fellow colorblind colleagues are able to see these important differences remember to avoid using a combination of red and green in the same display.

And for several alternatives to red and green check out my newsletter “Red, Yellow, Green is SO Last Year” and pass it forward if your colleagues say they “like” all that non-data ink… hopefully they will reconsider.

Happy, Happy & Joy, Joy to the world!! Here is wishing you a wonderful holiday.

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Comments

2 responses to “‘Tis the Season”

  1. Donna Avatar
    Donna

    Your comments concerning color are duly noted, but in fact, one of the reasons for the colors is so that more than just two categories can be represented. In your solutions, I can tell that all of the boxed numbers miss the target in the first example, and in the second I can see that the last set is to be dealt with, but there is little way to say there is some measure of improvement, or how far from the mark the numbers are. (There are only two choices – in or out). Whereas, with the the stop light example I can encourage some people by showing that although we have not met the goal, there has been improvement (by going from red to yellow). Or conversely we have slipped some from achievement (by going from green to yellow – but are not yet really in the dog house, which would be red. I see an advantage to having three choices.

    Reply
  2. Kathy Avatar
    Kathy

    Donna–
    Thanks for your note — and you have caught one of the flaws in my example–which is that there could and most likely should be a variance from goal column. This would then provide the viewer with the difference between current performance and goal.
    Thanks for your comments!

    Reply

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