How do you use EDA to generate and validate research questions or business problems?

2 Explore the data

Once you have some research questions or business problems in mind, you need to explore the data to see if they are feasible and meaningful. You can use various tools and methods to perform EDA, such as descriptive statistics, data visualization, data cleaning, data transformation, and feature engineering. The goal of EDA is to gain a comprehensive understanding of the data, such as its structure, distribution, quality, relationships, and outliers. You can also use EDA to test some assumptions, hypotheses, or correlations that relate to your research questions or business problems.

3 Refine the questions or problems

As you explore the data, you may find that some of your research questions or business problems are too broad, too narrow, too vague, or too complex. You may also discover new questions or problems that emerge from the data. Therefore, you need to refine your research questions or business problems based on the insights and evidence that you obtain from EDA. You can use the SMART criteria to evaluate and improve your research questions or business problems. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound.

4 Validate the questions or problems

After you refine your research questions or business problems, you need to validate them to ensure that they are meaningful, relevant, and actionable. You can use various techniques to validate your research questions or business problems, such as feedback, benchmarking, literature review, and experimentation. Feedback involves soliciting opinions and suggestions from experts, stakeholders, or peers. Benchmarking involves comparing your research questions or business problems with existing solutions or best practices. Literature review involves reviewing previous studies or publications that relate to your research questions or business problems. Experimentation involves testing your research questions or business problems with real or simulated data.

5 Communicate the results

The final step of using EDA to generate and validate research questions or business problems is to communicate the results to your target audience. You need to present your findings, insights, and recommendations in a clear, concise, and compelling way. You can use various formats and channels to communicate your results, such as reports, dashboards, slides, blogs, or podcasts. You should also use appropriate data visualization techniques to illustrate your results and highlight the key points. You should also explain the limitations, assumptions, and implications of your results and invite feedback and questions from your audience.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?