Telling the data story

Once upon a time there was a dataset…..got your attention, haven’t I? Well, the simple reason that the line is so timelessly catchy, is because it indicates the beginning of a story. And who doesn’t love a good story? It is said that hearing and telling stories is genetically programmed into our brain, as it helps our species survive and thrive by passing on customs, traditions etc.

Data however, is different. It involves a lot of math, statistics and some other fancy sounding words (algorithms, transforms, regressions etc) that turn off people. I have encountered this in my career- seeing people switch off when the analytics slides show up. And then it is up to me to make it worth their while to listen. A few tricks that have worked for me (and these are by no means original, as you will see) :

1. Make it real: For analytics to be interesting, it has to solve a business problem. I have written about this before, but this point bears repeating. More than just a business problem, it must solve a real, tangible problem that people can grasp. Think of (one of) the world’s favorite analytics specialist: Nate Silver. What gets people excited about the work he does is not the methodologies he uses, but his application. Predicting election results, winner of the super bowl etc-these are problems that people understand. And his work to solve them with data gets people’s attention. So to tell a good story, connect your story to a real problem that the client faces, and they’ll listen to you. (If you haven't heard of Nate, check him out here)

2. Respect the audience: There is an apocryphal story about a woman who got to go to dinner with two presidential candidates,X and Y. Upon completion of both the dinner engagements, she was asked who she would vote for-she said-Mr Y. When asked why, she said “When I spoke to Mr X, I felt that he was the smartest person in the world. However, when I spoke to Mr Y, I felt like I was the smartest person in the world”. Make your audience feel smart. Give them the feeling that they ‘get’ it. Without coming across as having ‘dumbed down’ what you are saying

3. Set the back-story: Give them the context. Why did you start this particular analysis? What sent you down this path? What was the ‘bad guy’ (Low sales, high acquisition costs) that you were trying to defeat through this analysis?

4. Emphasize the resolution, not the analysis: Speak about the findings and recommendations that will allow you to beat the bad guy. As I’ve said before-those findings are the ‘good guy’ of your story. Your analysis is not. At best the analysis is the tool the good guys use. And of course, make those findings actionable

5. Spare them the details unless…: You do not need to go into details of the analysis you performed. The audience does not care. They care about the implications and what it means for their work. However, fellow analysts do care about the details, so if they’re part of the audience, engage them afterwards to talk details.