Department of Health (Victoria)

Ensuring the public understand and inform Victoria’s COVID-19 response is an important aspect of the response. Health research in particular can be challenging to communicate, and to support this work, Data Knowhow’s Lisa Cornish was engaged to provide strategies and support in translating information to digestible insights.

A range of products were being used by the Department to help provide insights – including Excel, Power BI, Tableau and R. These products provided a range of different looks, making it difficult for audience to get used to a consistent visual style.

Expanding upon existing branding guidelines, Lisa developed a data visualization guide to support their particular needs – with specifics on colours, fonts and icons to support better communication. Templates were developed for various products and Power BI dashboards redesigned to support clearer communication of information.

Lisa was also responsible for implementing a communication style for research insights, editing and approving content for public use. Approximately 30 reports were released to help with improved knowledge on the impacts of COVID-19.

The new visual style was approved for use within the Department and was credited for making information clearer to communicate. Daily COVID reports used the improved communication style, and were considered more engaging by its audience.