Certificate programme
Data Visualization and Business Intelligence
Organisations are no longer short of data; they are short of readings of it. Databases pile up, reports get longer, and yet the decision-maker's question stays the same: what am I supposed to do with this figure? Data visualization and business intelligence answer exactly that. They turn a mass of rows into a few visual markers that can be understood in ten seconds and acted upon. This certified programme starts from the principle that a good dashboard is never the product of a piece of software, but of reasoning. So we begin with the grammar of charts: which chart for which question, which scale, which colour, which reading order, and above all which representation traps mislead the reader. Once that foundation is in place, the tools become mere executants. The technical chain is then covered from end to end. Excel first, because it remains the tool everyone has to hand and already allows a great deal. Then Power BI, for preparation with Power Query, modelling, DAX measures, publishing and automatic refresh. Finally Looker Studio, for situations where the dashboard has to be free, online and shareable through a simple link. The programme ends with a full individual project, carried out on the participant's own data where available, then presented to the group. That project is what determines the award of the certificate: here we do not certify attendance, we certify output.
- Duration
- 5 weeks, 8 sessions, 40 hours
- Format
- In person or online
- Credential
- Training certificate
Tuition150,000 XOF
By the end of the programme, you will be able to
- Turn a vague request into precise indicators: definition, formula, unit, frequency and source
- Choose the chart that fits each question and spot misleading representations
- Prepare and clean a dataset in Excel and Power Query
- Build a star schema with a date table and write the common DAX measures
- Design a steering page that is layered, interactive and navigable
- Publish, share and refresh a Power BI report, then build a simple version in Looker Studio
- Tell the story of the data: structure a message and defend your figures before management
- Run a dashboard project on your own, from the raw source to the defence
Who it is for
Target audience
The course is for anyone who has to report through figures: monitoring and evaluation officers and managers, project officers, management controllers, sales and marketing managers, stock managers, analysts, consultants, civil servants and heads of department.
Prerequisites
Four requirements:
- Master Excel at intermediate level: structured tables, common formulas, sorting and filtering, pivot tables. This is the decisive prerequisite, far more than any diploma
- Hold a secondary school leaving certificate or, failing that, proven professional practice in data processing
- Have a laptop running Windows 10 or later — Power BI Desktop has no macOS version — and a work or school email address
- Bring your phone, to test how a report reads on mobile
No prior experience of Power BI is required. Someone who cannot yet build a pivot table, however, will struggle from the third session onwards, because the whole logic of modelling rests on those reflexes. A ten-minute telephone conversation is offered to anyone unsure of their level: not an examination, but an honest check meant to avoid a frustrating enrolment.
Teaching method
The course runs over five weeks: two sessions each weekend — Saturday and Sunday, 8.30 a.m. to 1.30 p.m. — in weeks 1 to 3, then one session each weekend in weeks 4 and 5: eight five-hour sessions and 40 supervised hours. Personal work takes two to three hours a week, and three to four during the project weeks.
The format is hybrid: video capsules given to each participant are watched remotely before each session, about an hour and a quarter, at any time. Theory and demonstrations go there; the sessions are spent working at the computer on the participant's own data. The course can be followed in person in Ouagadougou, entirely online, or alternating, at the same price.
The course starts from a principle: a good dashboard is never the product of a piece of software but of a line of reasoning. We begin with the grammar of graphics — which chart for which question, which scale, which colour, which traps mislead the reader — after which the tools become mere executants. Excel first, because everyone has it; then Power BI, for preparation, modelling, DAX measures, publishing and refreshing; finally Looker Studio, for when the dashboard must be free, online and shareable by a simple link. The certificate rests on a project presented, not on attendance. The cohort is limited to fifteen.
Licences, stated plainly: Power BI Desktop is free and stays free. Sharing a published report, however, requires a Power BI Pro licence, billed by Microsoft and not included in the course fee; the sharing features are demonstrated in class and a free trial is activated for the duration of the course. Looker Studio is entirely free and needs only a Google account — which is precisely why it is here. Excel is used in its 2016 version or later, or Microsoft 365; participants who have neither are helped to a legal solution before the first session.
Workstation: a laptop running Windows 10 or later, 8 GB of RAM recommended (4 GB at the very least), 3 GB of disk space. Mac users should say so when enrolling, so that a solution can be prepared.
Every participant leaves with:
- The complete course material in PDF, organised session by session
- The video capsules for each session
- The Excel files, Power BI files and Looker Studio reports used in class
- The practice datasets and their detailed solutions
- A cheat sheet of the DAX measures most used in activity monitoring
- An illustrated catalogue of chart types, with recommended and discouraged uses
- A dashboard template ready to adapt, with a date table and standard measures already built
- An indicator sheet and a design grid to fill in before any new project
- A one-page summary note template to accompany a dashboard
Detailed program
8 sessions · 40 h of teaching
Week 1 — Foundations: making data mean something
2 sessions · 10 h- Start from a real request: identify the decision-maker, the decision expected and the alert threshold
- Turn the request into indicators: definition, formula, unit, frequency, source
- Match each question to a family of charts and justify the choice
- Repair faulty charts: truncated axis, dual scale, three-dimensional effects, arbitrary colours
- Exercise: build the indicator sheet for three indicators of the participant's own department, with the chart that presents them
- Going further, in the course material: scatter plots, box plots, maps and summary indicators (gauges, traffic lights)
- Straighten out a collection file: dates, numbers stored as text, duplicates, misspelled labels
- Clean and structure the data with Power Query in Excel, then load it into a structured table
- Build a monthly dashboard on a single sheet, with slicers linked to several pivot tables
- Exercise: produce a department's monthly dashboard from one of the participant's own files
- Going further, in the course material: combination charts, secondary axis, calculated fields and in-cell sparklines
Week 2 — Building with Excel and Power BI Desktop
2 sessions · 10 h- Install Power BI Desktop, set the regional formats, then connect to Excel and to a CSV file
- Prepare the data with Power Query, including combining the files in a folder
- Create the relationships, check cardinality and filter direction, then mark a date table
- Exercise: build the star schema of an activity monitoring system from the participant's own files
- Going further, in the course material: bidirectional relationships, hiding technical fields, connecting to a database or a web page
- Write the first measures — sum, average, count — then understand filter context with CALCULATE
- Compute a running total, a change, a completion rate and a gap to target
- Sketch on paper a three-level steering page: headline, breakdown, detail
- Exercise: build five key indicators of an activity monitoring system and their steering page
- Going further, in the course material: the IF and SWITCH functions, DAX variables, organising measures in a dedicated table
Week 3 — Designing, sharing and refreshing a dashboard
2 sessions · 10 h- Add slicers, sync a slicer across two pages, set the interactions between visuals
- Build a drill-down from national level to the municipality, then bookmark-based navigation
- Organise the report into pages: summary, analysis, detail, methodological notes
- Exercise: make the report built in the previous session interactive and navigable
- Going further, in the course material: custom tooltips, the selection pane, natural-language questions and answers
- Publish the report to a workspace and configure its scheduled refresh
- Check what the recipient actually sees before sharing, then export to PDF
- Build a simple Looker Studio page from a Google Sheets file
- Exercise: publish the participant's report and schedule its refresh
- Going further, in the course material: row-level security, alerts and email subscriptions, Power BI Mobile
Week 4 — Telling the story and scoping the project
1 sessions · 5 h- Write a title that carries a conclusion, then structure a message: finding, explanation, recommendation
- Prepare a ten-minute presentation and anticipate objections about data quality
- Scope your project: target decision-maker, decisions expected, indicators chosen, sources available
- Exercise: have your scoping approved by the trainer; without data of your own, pick one of three supplied cases
- Going further, in the course material: exporting to PowerPoint and PDF, a one-page summary note template
Week 5 — Project, defences and certificates
1 sessions · 5 h- Finalise the dashboard: consistent labels, publication and refresh
- Present your project in ten minutes with the dashboard on screen, then answer five minutes of questions
- Receive critical feedback from the trainer and from peers, against the announced grid
- Exercise: defend your project in front of the group; defences are held in two subgroups if time runs short
- Going further, in the course material: the detailed assessment grid and examples of projects from earlier cohorts
Assessment and certification
This programme leads to a training certificate, not a simple attendance slip. It is awarded on an admission average out of 20, made up of three components:
- The certification exam (50%) — 25 questions drawn at random from a bank of more than eighty, in 80 minutes. Two attempts are allowed, seven days apart, and the better one counts.
- The dashboard project (30%) — defended in the eighth session.
- Attendance (20%) — recorded session by session. An absence announced at least three days in advance counts as half; an unannounced absence does not count.
The admission average is 12 out of 20. A mark below 8 out of 20 in the exam is eliminatory: neither the project nor attendance can make up for it. As soon as the average is reached, the certificate is issued automatically and becomes available in the participant's account.
The certificate is issued by Waaldé Impact, signed by the trainer, and states the course title, the 40 hours, the period, the list of modules completed and the subject of the dashboard project presented. Each certificate carries a unique number and a verification code.
Participants who do not reach the average receive a certificate of attendance. They may retake the exam and present their dashboard project with the following cohort, at no extra cost.
Each participant also receives:
- The Excel files, Power BI files and Looker Studio reports used in the sessions
- An illustrated catalogue of chart types, with recommended and discouraged uses
- A ready-to-adapt dashboard template, with a date table and standard measures already built
- An indicator sheet and a design grid to complete before any new project
- A one-page summary note template to accompany a dashboard
Upcoming sessions
Next dates being prepared
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Frequently asked questions
150,000 XOF per participant. Training for a team or an organisation is quoted on request.
5 weeks, 8 sessions, 40 hours.
Yes: you can attend onsite or online, as you prefer.
Four requirements: master Excel at intermediate level: structured tables, common formulas, sorting and filtering, pivot tables. This is the decisive prerequisite, far more than any diploma ; hold a secondary school leaving certificate or, failing that, proven professional practice in data processing ; have a laptop running Windows 10 or later — Power BI Desktop has no macOS version — and a work or school email address ; bring your phone, to test how a report reads on mobile ; no prior experience of Power BI is required. Someone who cannot yet build a pivot table, however, will struggle from the third session onwards, because the whole logic of modelling rests on those reflexes. A ten-minute…
Yes: participants who meet the completion requirements receive a Waaldé Impact certificate with a unique number that employers can verify online.
Fill in the online enrolment request: no payment is taken on the site. The firm reviews your application, then contacts you to confirm your place and the payment terms. No session is scheduled yet: leave your email on this page to be told when registration opens.
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