Business Information Visualization: Guidelines for Research and Practice

Abstract

Business Information Visualization is a relatively new field and has just started to gain researchers' and practitioners' attention. Similar to Scientific Visualization and Information Visualization, it is intended to consider human cognition and perception characteristics and provide insight into data by computer generated visual representations. However, owing to the nature of business data, Business Information Visualization faces special challenges such as dealing with non-geometric data and incorporating human problem-solving processes. In research and practice, there is a need to understand the specific challenges of visualizing business data and the procedures of how to do it. This paper gives a brief overview of the history and development of Business Information Visualization. It then presents a methodology for developing business information visualization systems to enhance human problem solving and decision-making. This methodology includes one proposition, three technical challenges, and four stages in a visualization model. The author then presented a visualization system where this methodology is applied. Finally, the author discusses several issues that researchers and practitioners need to face.