Caitlin Walsh

Caitlin joined the Data School after completing a Masters degree in Digital Humanities at UCL, which provided an introduction to data visualization, UI best practice, XML and SQL.

During her client placements at The Data School - first at IRIS Software Group and later at Forterra PLC - Cait has worked alongside stakeholders from Finance, Customer Success, Surveying, Commercial and Product Planning teams, honing the following skills:

- developing and enhancing Tableau dashboards;
- using Microsoft SQL Server to query and reshape data;
- migrating Power BI reporting to Tableau;
- requirement gathering and stakeholder management;
- connecting to PostreSQL repository to provide additional reporting on Tableau Server usage.

Prior to her MA course, Cait studied Classics and worked for several years in arts and charity administration.


Certifications

Blog Posts

Avatar
Tue 09 Apr 2024 | Caitlin Walsh
Quick Tip: clustered bar charts with Measure Values
If users want to see a side-by-side bar chart with 'grouped' spacing, Tableau developers can sometimes be limited by the hierarchy of dimensions and measures. If you are working with Measure Values, however, this quick tip offers an alternative.
Avatar
Wed 04 Oct 2023 | Caitlin Walsh
Right Round: rounded edge UI design in Tableau
A short summary of a few options for including rounded edges in Tableau, and why this design feature might have become so popular.
Avatar
Mon 25 Sep 2023 | Caitlin Walsh
Daylight Savings: a matter of Time...
If you are creating a Tableau workbook that will use UTC as its default timezone, you might not see daylight savings reflected when you use TODAY() and NOW() functions. This quick tip provides some logic that could be used to dynamically work out when an extra hour might need adding
Avatar
Tue 19 Sep 2023 | Caitlin Walsh
Shopping List: utilize Tableau parameter strings
In this blog, I showcase a method of using REGEX and string parameters in Tableau to construct a Shopping List style dashboard. Work out the total price of a list of products, where different products have different quantities.
Avatar
Thu 13 Apr 2023 | Caitlin Walsh
Comet Charts in Tableau: quick tip
Year on Year growth in certain metrics can be important for users to see in Tableau dashboards. The comet chart is a visually interesting way of representing this information, and is not too difficult to build.
Avatar
Wed 18 Jan 2023 | Caitlin Walsh
Time after Time: using LOOKUP with date filters
Using the LOOKUP table calculation we can create a simple bar chart to compare this year’s monthly values to the same time last year. Date Parameters can also be added to make the chart more dynamic.
Avatar
Tue 22 Nov 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Dynamic Default Date Parameters: no time like the present
A simple feature I only recently became aware of: using a calculated field to set the default parameter value of a workbook. In this example, we can use dynamic date calculations to set a relevant parameter date that will be future-proof.
Avatar
Fri 09 Sep 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Dynamic Sorting: parameters for a customisable view
We can narrow down and sort a view using some parameters and the INDEX() table calculation, instead of using a Top N filter.
Avatar
Mon 04 Jul 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Basic butterfly charts: visualising demographic data
A very simple guide to Butterfly Charts in Tableau, with steps for building out a simple version of this for survey response data.
Avatar
Mon 04 Jul 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Dashboard Week Day 5: on your bike
Another day, another dashboard - for the end of Dashboard Week, DS30 worked with a recent interview dataset about cycling in the city of Austin.
Avatar
Thu 30 Jun 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Dashboard Week Day 4: KPIs on KPIs
For our penultimate day of training (!!!), DS30 were challenged to make a 'very very well-designed' KPI dashboard, based on San Francisco renting data.
Avatar
Wed 29 Jun 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Dashboard Week Day 3: Accessible Road Repair Dashboards
This was DS30's second day working with Accessibility and Universal Design Principles. Here are some thoughts on today's brief, and my own challenges and successes!
Avatar
Tue 28 Jun 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Hands-On: creating accessible dashboards for keyboard-only users
For the second day of DS30's dashboard week, we were introduced to some key concepts around accessibility and universal design. Here I've summed up 3 main takeaways for designing in Tableau.
Avatar
Tue 21 Jun 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Filter Actions: using Menu
A short guide to adding Dashboard filter actions, using the 'Menu' option to navigate to a new view.
Avatar
Tue 21 Jun 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Quick Tip: instant calc building
Save time when you build common calculated fields, with the help of this drag and drop method.
Avatar
Thu 09 Jun 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
It's all in the Details
Level of Detail calculations (LODs) can be very useful when trying to find and highlight key info in our data. In this example, we can highlight the Latest Month, Prior Month, the Month one year before the Latest, and the First Month in Superstore.
Avatar
Mon 06 Jun 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Fake it 'til you make it: dummy data in Mockaroo
Dummy data can be a lifesaver when you're trying to create demo or sample dashboards. In this example, I've used Mockaroo to create a dummy dataset.
Avatar
Mon 16 May 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
'There and Back Again': navigation buttons
When one dashboard on its own is not enough, we can instead tell a data story across a series of dashboards and add navigation. This blog gives a short summary of how to include navigation features in your Tableau workbook.
Avatar
Tue 10 May 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Building Box and Whisker Plots
Box and Whisker Plots are a simple but effective tool for understanding the distribution of our data: here is a short summary of the steps for making one.
Avatar
Wed 27 Apr 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Changing your spots: Dynamic Highlight Scatterplots
Highlighting a certain area of a scatter plot can be a useful way to focus the user's attention: this blog gives a quick overview of how to colour a scatter plot dynamically.
Avatar
Tue 12 Apr 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Starting your Data School application: top tips
A short guide for people thinking of applying to the Data School, including some pointers on the application process, and some useful resources for making a start in Tableau.
Avatar
Mon 04 Apr 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Splitting strings in Alteryx: RegEx
The RegEx tool in Alteryx can be used to parse different parts of a text string and create new columns for them. Here, I work through one such example.
Avatar
Mon 28 Mar 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Using Parameters in Tableau
A quick look at parameters, and how we might use them to make our dashboards more interactive.
Avatar
Tue 15 Mar 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
Pie charts 101: making simple pie charts in Tableau
A very quick breakdown of how to make a simple pie chart and donut chart.
Avatar
Mon 07 Mar 2022 | Caitlin Walsh
DS30 Week One: getting to grips with Alteryx
In this first week of DS30, I've made a note of some key learnings from our intro to Alteryx.
Powered by The Information Lab
1st Floor, 25 Watling Street, London, EC4M 9BR
Subscribe
to our Newsletter
Get the lastest news about The Data School and application tips
Subscribe now
© 2025 The Information Lab