Data Storytelling for Beginners

How to make better business decisions with data stories

Working with data can thus be incredibly creative. Data is, of course, primarily something rational and sober. But if we put them in the right context and prepare them so that we can read them like a story, we breathe life into them and give them a concrete meaning. This method is often referred to as data storytelling. That sounds interesting, but also a bit lyrical. What is behind it?

For starters, facts are best understood and interpreted when they are placed in context. Because context relates to a specific situation and resolves previously asked questions. We create this framework by telling stories, simply put. Data storytelling gives us a way to generate comprehensive and quick information from our data.

By visually processing data, we make a lot of work easier for our brains (and the brains of everyone else who is with us in search of meaningful information). If we combine dry information with interesting images, we are able to translate this content more quickly (or at all) into meaningful added value for us. Only the interplay of reason and emotion leads to sustainable decisions.

Data storytelling as a creative controlling method

Now you might think that telling stories isn't really your thing. You lack the creative streak for that. Maybe you don't like stories that much and have always preferred working with figures and statistics. And what is it supposed to look like to use the one-time IT War approach for data anyway? The term data storytelling smells a bit like a buzzword, doesn't it? As if someone here had tried to use a reputable and factual method in the data analysis to create a story.

We come up with stories that our target group can easily consume.

Well, I think so too. And I like that. Because when things have a name that generates attention, we can start understanding and adapting them with interest. One thing is clear: With exciting stories, we pick up our listeners much faster than with dry facts. That's why PowerPoint was invented at some point. How much more pleasant is it to listen to interesting and well-founded lectures when they are accompanied by illustrated and interactive slides, sound and video? I say that each of us has presented something with PowerPoint and has incorporated a common thread that has given our audience an interesting story. Data storytelling is not about anything else. We come up with stories that our target group can easily consume in order to interpret them with their own needs. This form of creativity also works, and particularly, with data.

“I'm not creative.”

What does this sentence mean? Understatement? Everyone is creative. You and me If only because we deal with new technologies and methods every day in our job. Creativity refers to the ability to generate new ideas, concepts, connections, or solutions that are original, useful, and of value. It is a cognitive process that allows a person to combine existing knowledge, experience, skills, and imagination to create something new or use existing things in an innovative way.

Creativity is a multi-faceted quality and can be expressed in various areas, whether in art, design, science, writing, technology, or other areas of human creation. It can take place on an individual level or as part of collaboration and teamwork. So do you recognize yourself in this description? Creativity is certainly something you use every day in your work. By working with data, you can express your creativity even further.

Create the foundations: What data can do for your company

Let's just jump to the basics. Data is information that exists in a structured or unstructured form. They can include figures, facts, texts, images, videos, or any kind of symbolic representation. Data is used to collect, store, organize, analyze, and communicate information.

Data can be created and collected in various contexts. For example, they can come from measurements, observations, surveys, experiments, business activities, or social media. Data is often collected and stored in electronic form, but it can also exist in physical form, such as printed documents or records.

Data is critical because it provides the basis for information and insights. Through the Analyzing data Patterns, trends, relationships or dependencies can be discovered that make it possible to make well-founded decisions, solve problems or gain new insights. Data alone does not yet mean anything. Only when they are interpreted and placed in context can they provide information and create added value. And this is where we already have the crux of the matter. In addition to creativity, we need context.

Relevance through business questions and a clear focus

Before we can even do anything with our data, we need to think about what we actually want to find out from it. We therefore formulate our requirements. The best way to do this is to think of so-called business questions. These are questions that are asked in a business context to obtain information, support decisions, or improve business processes. These questions can concern various areas of a company, such as strategy, marketing, sales, finance, human resources or operational processes. For example, they can relate to the market, customers, finances, processes, people, or technologies. At the same time, they form the context in which the data is placed. We need it to create compelling stories from them. That's when the data becomes relevant.

Context makes data relevant.

Data context helps determine the relevance of data. By defining the context, data can be selected that is relevant to a specific question or decision. It makes it possible to define data sources, parameters, or variables that are relevant to the specific context and exclude irrelevant information. It also ensures that data is interpreted in relation to the underlying question or problem. For example, the context can explain whether a particular data value is good or bad, whether it represents a positive or negative result, or whether it falls within a specific norm or benchmark.

Context also helps to establish connections between different data points. It makes it possible to identify and understand patterns, trends or dependencies. Data without context could lead to inaccurate or misleading conclusions because important connections or cause-and-effect relationships are not considered.

In addition, the context enables clear and effective communication of data. By adding the context information, data can be presented in an understandable way. We can share data much more easily with others to create a common basis for discussion, analysis, or decisions. With context, we create a framework that is summarized and convincingly conveyed through a good story.

What is a story?

Here is a very dry definition: A story is a narrated presentation of events, characters or actions that have a specific structure and narrative course. It is used to convey information, provide entertainment, evoke emotions or pass on knowledge. For a good story, you usually need one or more protagonists (identification!) , an action, conflicts (suspense!) , the resolution and an overarching theme with a message.

And then there are various ways to present a story, including books, movies, plays, fairy tales, legends, poems, songs. They serve to stimulate the imagination, awaken emotions, make connections and impart knowledge. Stories have a long tradition in all cultures and are an essential part of human communication. Why You may remember: because the human brain is excellent at absorbing and processing information when facts are linked to images.

Now, of course, it makes no sense to present your data in poetry form. (Unless you or your recipients have a strong lyrical streak.) The questions on which the data storytelling method is based are these:

• How do I get people who are not so data-savvy closer to the topic of data?
• How do I turn my business questions and KPI into understandable answers?
• How do I design measurable content?
• How do I convince stakeholders of the value of the information I've discovered with data?

The answer to all four questions is: Through visualization, for example in Power BI or tableau. Because pictures say more than a thousand words. We can turn our data into images to tell a kind of story. Data storytelling is the art of turning data into a compelling and meaningful story. It is a way to present complex data and information visually and narratively so that it is understandable and appealing to a wide audience.

Strategic data storytelling: dashboards as a communication tool

Data storytelling is about embedding data into a narrative structure and providing it with context and meaning. Instead of just presenting numbers, charts, or tables, data storytelling tries to grab the audience's attention and connect to the data by telling a story.

With the help of data storytelling, you formulate the individual story of your daily business, which you communicate via meaningful dashboards.

A good data story usually comprises several elements. First, there is an introduction that sparks interest and provides the context of the data. This is followed by the actual action, in which the data is presented and interpreted. Visual elements such as charts, infographics, or interactive visualizations are often used to make the information easier to understand. Finally, there is a degree that summarizes the most important findings and may offer recommendations for action or implications.

With the help of data storytelling, you formulate the individual story of your daily business, which you communicate via meaningful dashboards. Use these dashboards to answer your business questions using graphics that summarize your KPIs and make them interpretable. You compare areas, time periods, results, or forecasts. You're doing everything you used to do in Excel—just a lot more efficiently, easier, and more impressive.

The perfect dashboard: functionality meets design

Data is sober for now (some would say boring), which is why a convincing presentation is so important. It can also be a bit more playful for once in a while. What informs and inspires is allowed. In fact, artistic and playful aspects, such as those offered by some tools for data visualization, such as Tableau Power BI, have less space in everyday corporate life. Here, data analysts can easily trust themselves more and get the data artist out of themselves.

Initially, however, the focus in companies is mostly on the pure presentation of the previously defined KPIs. The calculation is based on clear guidelines and visualizations are used, which are used continuously in the same way. In this way, all relevant information is consolidated and visually communicated, is understandable at first glance and also permanently. It also makes no sense here to distract the data consumer from the actual content through excessive visualization or unusual effects.

At the Designing a dashboard It must be considered which questions the target group has. The questions brought along must be answered without exception. Every person should be able to get their added value from the dashboard and also enjoy viewing it. Ideally, the information is visualized in such a way that viewers have the feeling that their company has arrived in the new era. That is why a modern look, personalized functions and intuitive use are essential for dashboards. Dashboards should always be self-explanatory.

Good dashboards tell your story at a glance. This is where you knit the common thread for the content, this is where your story is created. Because your dashboard makes logical sense in the sequence of key figures, tables and charts, illustrates them, provides an immediate overview of the data situation and enables a deeper introduction to complex data layers.

Conclusion: Establish data storytelling in daily business

I think we now agree that data is really exciting — if we give it an exciting background, package it nicely and relate it to each other. Anyone who looks at our data on a dashboard will immediately understand what messages it conveys and what lessons we can learn from it. That is our data story.

You may even be able to present your data in a particularly situational way. Then you dive deeper and deeper into the information situation, jump from macro level to micro level and at the end tell you in the smallest detail why this one number on your dashboard is the most important figure for the overall business success of your company. Or you can prove with a number why a single person in your company has achieved exceptional sales success, which could be rolled out to all areas as an example. Or imagine that: Every single person who works with your dashboards no longer just reads consolidated columns of numbers, but recognizes the context relevant to them and tells their own compelling story based on a single number. That would make a nice story.

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