Common Sense in Data
Bill Shander
Author of "Stakeholder Whispering: Uncover What People Need Before Doing What They Ask", keynote speaker, workshop leader, LinkedIn Learning Instructor. Information design, data storytelling & visualization, creativity.
Later today (12pm ET), I'm joining my friends Robin Hunt and Gini von Courter for our monthly LinkedIn Live sessions we call "Data Fundamentals Unpacked". Today's topic is "Common Sense". And it got me thinking...
"Common" means shared by most, nearly all, people. "Sense", in this case, is about?judgement, understanding, basic principles. But here's the thing, there really is no "common" sense in data communications. The fact is, aside from 1 + 1 = 2, which pretty much everyone does know, just about everything else in data understanding is on a HUGE spectrum.
So if you're working with data, you can't assume that literally everyone in your audience will understand what you mean when you say "the correlation between these two variables is strong", for example. What does correlation mean, exactly? And define "strong". Depending on your audience's data literacy
Audiences can be very diverse. And you need to know how diverse they are, what is "common" to them, and what might require more explanation and hand-holding for your content to be successful with them.
So how do you figure this out? You need to talk to your audience and discover their level of data literacy so you know how much explanation and context to provide when you speak to them about data.
To be safe, if you're not absolutely certain they're as data literate as you need them to be to understand every single little detail in whatever it is you've prepared for them, create a nice rich deep appendix for your content that includes all of that information so they can learn what they need to learn right within your content, rather than hoping they'll go somewhere else to learn it and then come back to your information later.
And most importantly, do not suffer from the curse of knowledge
Just remember "common" sense really isn't so "common", after all. And remember that you have "uncommon" sense when it comes to data. Be extra considerate of your audience, try to understand what they know and what they need from you, and do your best to provide it in as helpful and unobtrusive a way as possible. This will help them make "sense" of what you are sharing with them and lead to a "common" understanding of your data, which is your goal, after all!
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Senior Lead, Global Strategic Growth and Alliances - Digital Technologies & AI Strategy
2 年So well said, Bill Shander! Understanding your data “customer” is such an important first step. As any new (data related) joiner, especially from a different function or industry, it’s critical to comprehend the business context. In my personal experience, it’s such a foundational quality that impacts your ability and potential for business problem solving exponentially.
Data Enthusiast | University of Iceland | International Committee of the Red Cross, Iceland
2 年Great article sir Bill Shander....gained additional knowledge, sir. Thank you