Bar Chart with Waterfall (Structure) ‐ How to read
This example is inspired by the chart on page 199 of the book "Solid, Outlined, Hatched" which is a good book about IBCS and charting.
On the top, you'll see two bars. A solid grey bar and an outlined bar. The text at the axis indicate Europe. As explained on the IBCS‐inspired-page the outlined column with 467 is the plan (PL) or budget value for Europe which is 467 million EUR (mEUR). The solid grey column with 458 is the actual value of the previous year (PY) of Europe in 2022, so this is the actual value of Europe in 2021 which is 458 mEUR.
At the left, you'll see countries of Europe. For all mentioned countries you'll see solid (almost) black bars. These have values (53, 39, 40, et cetera) for their respective countries. Each country also has a plan-bar that is partially hidden behind the actual bar and are here just to give a visual feeling about the amount of this plan. The sum of all the plan-values is visible on the top (467 mEUR).
At the bottom, you'll see a solid and (almost) black bar with the value of 496. This is the sum of all the solid bars representing the actuals (AC) of the mentioned countries of Europe which is 496 mEUR.
At the right at the same height of their respective countries you'll see the variance bars. The variance bars start at the line which starts at the plan-bar with value 467 as we are comparing the actuals with the plan. You can also see that with the 'Delta PL'-mark just between the value 467 and the value +20. Additionally to the 'Delta PL'-mark, you see an arrow heading down. This indicates that the variance values are ordered from high to low (with exception of the 'Rest of Europe' bar). The variance bars show each country the difference between the actual and the plan (in formula: AC - PL). You'll see the colors green and red indicating if this variance is good (green) or bad (red) from the perspective of the business. For example: The variance bar for Spain is green with a value of +20, indicating that the actual was 20 mEUR greater than the budget and this is good from the perspective of the business.
Next to that, the variance bars form a waterfall: Each lower located bar starts at the end of the higher located bar and will count up to the most lower located variance bar which will ultimately connect these variance bars to the total of the actual bar on the bottom.
At the bottom-right you'll see a few colored indicators. You'll see a green indicator with the value +29, indicating that the total of the actual (AC) bar is 29 mEUR greater than the plan (PL) and that is good from the perspective of the business. Next you'll see a green indicator with the value of +38, indicating that the total of the actual (AC) bar is 38 mEUR greater than the previous year (PY) and that is also good from the perspective of the business.
This chart makes it easy for storytelling. With some storytelling-attributes you can help the eye track to what the message will convey, but even without these attributes you can easily tell a story, for example this one:
The actual of 496 mEUR is 29 mEUR higher as planned due to the fact that most countries have overscored on their plan except for Slovenia, Denmark, Netherlands and France.