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Datafam Day 2026 – Amsterdam

by Johan de Groot

With Tableau Conference 2026 in just a few weeks, a special event was organized by Tableau at Tableau (Salesforce HQ Amsterdam): Datafam Day.

Not to be confused by Datafam Europe (from last december), Datafam Day was an evening with very interesting sessions from Visionaries and Ambassadors about the latest and greatest developments from Tableau (earlier that week also in London).

After a warm welcome the event started with an inspiring keynote from Vidya Setlur, senior director of Research at Tableau. Her talk was about the power of imperfection: many important inventions have been made ‘by accident’ – for example penicillin and X-rays. Being curious is an important factor for innovation.

Presentations & Hands-on sessions

After the keynote the hardest part: which sessions to attend? Split in two timeslots 7 sessions were available, and it was really hard to choose:

  • Trust an Extension for That – Jessica Bautista Gauna 
  • Co-Designing with AI: Staying Human in a Prompted World – Pablo Gomez
  • Tremendous Tableau Tips and Tricks – Heidi Kalbe
  • Drive Action with Proactive Insights and Dashboard Narratives – Shreya Arya
  • A Decade of Dinner Dates: A Parameter-Driven Journey through Edinburgh – Chris Westlake
  • Beyond the Boundaries of Tableau – Tristan Guillevin
  • MCP to MVP: Get Hands-On with AI + Tableau MCP – Will Sutton
The eight presenters of Datafam Day Amsterdam 2026

I attended Will’s (The Information Lab UK) MCP session, which provided a solid introduction to connecting Claude.ai with Tableau Server via an MCP server. As is often the case in short sessions, there wasn’t enough time to really go deep into the details, but it sparked a lot of ideas.
Over the past few days, that inspiration turned into experimentation as I started exploring the concept further and building on what was shown.
(more info at https://github.com/TheInformationLab/tableau_mcp_starter_kit)

I dropped into Shreya’s session partway through, but even so it was a strong talk on proactive insights and data storytelling in action at Virgin Media O2.

We were luckily able to catch up on what happened in the other sessions during the reception: AI, extensions, practical tips, security, and more. It turned into a lively exchange of ideas, made even better by the great food and drinks provided by our host Salesforce, who really set the tone for an easy, social wrap-up of the day.

The group who stayed until the end 😉

Datafam Day – Next?

Datafam Day felt less like a traditional event and more like a high-end Tableau User Group meetup. It gave a diverse snapshot of where the Tableau ecosystem is heading: AI-assisted workflows, more proactive analytics, and (still, or even more) a strong emphasis on human creativity in data.

The format works well and deserves to become a recurring event – it strikes a strong balance between practical value, community exchange, and forward-looking ideas.
If anything, the intent of the day could be communicated more clearly up front, as the sessions themselves formed a much more cohesive and compelling story once you were there. The diversity of topics was a clear strength: from hands-on tips and tricks for day-to-day Tableau use, to deeper explorations of AI and future capabilities, all grounded in a consistent focus on the human role in data work (loved that part).

Overall, it offered a valuable perspective on the future of Tableau, data visualisation, and data analysis. One that feels both pragmatic for today and ambitious for what comes next.