In May, Mel and Nick from the UX team attended two days of Power BI training with QA. The training covered the basics of using Power BI Desktop and, through a mix of instructor-led and independent exercises, gave us a chance to transform data and build visualisations.

Mel’s reflections

Before the training, I’d only ever experienced Power BI from the other side, seeing polished dashboards and interactive visuals without really understanding how they were built. By the end of the training, I felt much more confident using Power BI and excited to start applying it in my work.

Learning through doing

The sessions suited the way I learn best: having a go, clicking around, experimenting and working through exercises rather than just watching demonstrations. Having the training in person made a big difference, as we could troubleshoot problems together and ask questions whenever we got stuck.

I also appreciated the pace and structure of the training. Our instructor, Jason, talked through each step clearly and acted as a guide throughout, explaining not just what to do, but why we were doing it. His knowledge of the system really came across and the sessions felt approachable rather than overwhelming.

Movie datasets solidified my understanding

The most enjoyable part of the training for me was working with the movie dataset. We pulled together information from sites like Box Office Mojo and Rotten Tomatoes to consider how data from multiple sources can be combined to tell a richer story. In doing so, the relationships between datasets, transformations and visualisations became much clearer.

This was  the point where I had the “eureka” moment of understanding how all the different pieces of the puzzle connect together within Power BI.

Keen to keep the Power BI momentum going

Since the training, I’ve been keen to build on what I learned by applying Power BI to real project work. I recently used it to explore qualitative survey data relating to digital design tools, using techniques from the training to clean and organise the data. The training materials proved especially useful, particularly the exercise workbook, which gave me something practical to refer back to.

Working with a familiar dataset made the process feel much less intimidating. It was rewarding to apply what I’d learned so quickly in a real project context.

Nick’s reflections

I thought this training was excellent. I’d seen Power BI dashboards before but didn’t know what you have to do behind the scenes to create them. I attended this training to learn a bit about how Power BI works and improve my skills around working with data more generally.

How Power BI can support UX work

I was interested to see how Power BI could support our work in the UX Service. We work with data that supports our administration of training sessions and our online course Effective Digital Content. We also sometimes deal with sitemaps and analytics, which can include a daunting amount of information. All of this data needs to be tidied up and visualised so we can quickly understand it and use it. While we can do some of that in Excel, spreadsheets have their limits and I wanted to find out what Power BI has to offer.

What we learned

The training involved clicking through activities with our instructor Jason. I found this was a good way to get to grips with the software, and I gradually built up a rough conceptual model of what was going on within Power BI.

In the session, we learned how to:

• ingest data from sources such as spreadsheets and webpages
• combine data from different sources
• tidy up data
• do operations on data
• visualise data

In person training worked well

Doing the session in person meant we got to catch up with colleagues in our department while completing the training. It also made it easy to get pointers when something didn’t work. We could quickly ask a colleague to help with the minor problems that inevitably crop up when you’re learning to use a new piece of software.

I came out of the training with an appreciation of what Power BI can do, and a better understanding of how it works. I’d recommend this training to any colleagues at the University who are interested in learning more about working with data.