Data Storytelling for Beginners

As the saying goes, data is the new oil. When a team puts together a deck, they have to cite at least one piece of data to make the whole presentation more convincing. Data has become the most powerful resource, not only to look at new findings but also to prove your argument. Be it for proposal or report writing, data contributes as the deciding-factor of the success of your presentation.

However, data on its own is useless for the audience, it needs presenters to pick apart which information is the most relevant and dive straight into the main points. Not only that, presenters are also responsible for interpreting data in a meaningful way so the audience gets it right away. At this point, you might wonder, “What skill do I have to acquire to deliver a killer presentation?” The answer is data storytelling.

Why data storytelling?

As data becomes increasingly ubiquitous, companies are desperately searching for talents who are able to summarize information for a specific audience, with a compelling narrative. A good data summary can help organizations win over a tender and funds. It can also deliver meaningful insights that will become the foundation of a company’s strategy of any importance. 

Data storytelling is the perfect methodology for meeting such purposes. LinkedIn reported “analytical reasoning” as one of the hottest skill categories. As data is pivotal to drive any business forward, companies are in a dire need for talents who can make sense of a bunch of words and numbers and turn them into insights that drive the best decisions.

Humans have used storytelling since the earliest time, we create stories to pass down knowledge across large groups of people. These stories, nowadays have come to be known as cultures, are the single factor that allowed evolutionary success across generations. It is almost natural for us to share stories as a means of sharing information.

What makes good data storytelling?

The goal of data storytelling should be for the audience to successfully extract information from the data being presented. Good data storytelling will command a focus from its audience by creating an easy-to-understand presentation with relevant data, engaging narrative, and compelling visuals.

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Although the practice of data storytelling differs to people, place and occasion, the general rule of thumb to follow are:

1. Never present a single number
   Always provide additional data to provide your audience with contexts. For example, if you are presenting data on Q3 sales, do compare them to sales from previous Qs. It is also important to not compare apples to oranges. So, never, let’s say, present a year-to-date sales to quartal since the time frame difference prevents that information from creating meaningful insights.
2. Use colors
   Our brain recognizes colours better than shapes, thus presenting data with colours helps your audience make sense of the information easier. It also provides contrast which is a great help to emphasize certain points. For example, if you are presenting Q4 sales, you can fill Q1 and Q2 charts with grey color, Q3 with black and Q4 with another bright color. This way, your audience can easily differentiate the degree of importance between the four bar charts, assuming that gray coloured charts are less important to the bright coloured one.
3. Waterfall charts
   A waterfall chart (also known as a cascade chart or a bridge chart) is a form of data visualization that helps in understanding the cumulative effect from a set of sequential information. For example, you are to deliver yearly quartal sales. With basic bar charts, each bar of quartal sales stands alone without any connection to the previous or next chart. However, with waterfall charts, you can show a starting value, the positive and negative changes made to that value, and the resulting end value, hence giving the proper explanation behind the increase or decrease of value over the time.

Picking up the storytelling skill requires time as you sharpen your writing and presenting skills. The best way to rapidly enhance your skill is to always ask for feedback from your managers and colleagues. Since the goal in data storytelling is to relay information, you can evaluate your own efficiency with how much your colleague gets your information right. After some time, you can develop your own style of presenting which works the best for you.

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