Telling Stories with Data

when i was eight years old

my grandma would tell me stories every

single sunday

she had this big grimm brothers fairy

tale book where she will tell me stories

like little red riding hood

and hensel and gretel out of those are

stories

that were popular when she was a kid

during world war ii

and long before that when her grandma

was a kid

those are stories that will remain

popular when i have kids someday

when i would go over there every single

sunday

i would never get bored of these stories

and i’d want to hear the same ones over

and over

and over again but why is that

that is because the concept of a story

is appealing to us humans

with a story we managed to transform

information

into a message a message that can convey

emotions like awe

passion or sadness a message

that can enable us to inform and to

educate

sometimes a message that can teach a

lesson

for example that you should never trust

the wolf

storytelling is an art that has been

practiced for millennia

to inform and to educate and to teach

over thousands of years humans have

perfected this art

to make information more universally

accessible

to seniors adults and eight-year-old

kids

alike

the concept of storytelling however is

not just limited to literary genres

fairy tales and bedtime stories and that

is

because in a way the only requirement

for a good story

is the availability of information or

data

what a story in the literary genre does

is it takes

letters structures those into words

into sentences into paragraphs into

chapters

and so on we use that to make

a message understandable from

information

and the concept of data is not too

similar of that

only now we don’t have 26 letters that

we can take

and craft a message from we have nine

numbers that we can use

now when we deal with data it is

mathematics

that serves as the grammar in the syntax

to make our

information more universally

understandable

telling the story with data describes

the transformation

of raw information into a purpose

and in a nutshell there’s two major

elements to telling a story with data

first and foremost there’s the area of

statistics

and math now i know that is commonly

equated to magic

but it really is not that bad we use

statistics

to extract aggregate and to clean data

to basically make it understandable to

us

statistics and math serve like a

dictionary to us

that we can use to make information

understandable

secondly is a notion of creativity

and that is the part that is often

forgotten when we tell a story with data

data science and data analytics have

become a buzzword

however seldom the notion of creativity

is mentioned

creativity means that you understand who

you are

crafting your message towards and you

take a unique approach

to structure your message and your story

in a nutshell that was telling that is

what telling a story with data is about

for me

in a way telling a story with data is

like painting a picture with words

only instead of words we use numbers

let me give you an example according to

the u.s census bureau

in 2018 over 50

of the people who live below the poverty

line in cincinnati

or black in that same year only 40

percent

of the population are black

you do not need to be a data scientist

to see that this number is

disproportionate

and that there is a disproportionate

amount of black people living in poverty

data can be our cue that can enable us

to tell a story

and to enable us to tell the story of

400 years of exclusion

and systemic racism it can enable us

to tell a story to chart a more

inclusive path forward

in the united states of america

with data like this becoming more

universally

available becoming ubiquitous almost

i’m going to make the bold statement

that numbers

are becoming the new words as

storytellers

we can use data like this to inform

to educate and most importantly

to empower it is this very notion of

empowerment

that led me to found the neo initiative

last summer

we are a student organization at the

university of cincinnati

that provides pro bono data analytics

consulting

to minority-owned small businesses in

our community

now i know that sounds like quite a

mouthful but our work

is really straightforward one we do data

research

we try to aggregate data that will help

our clients make the next big decision

in their business number two data

analysis

we analyze the data we try to uncover

patterns within that data within that

information and most importantly number

three

we are problem solvers we use data to

solve

a bigger problem step by step

we are hoping to empower small

businesses

and do our part to a more inclusive

cincinnati

economy

we are storytellers for those who have

been marginalized

and excluded for those who do not enjoy

the privilege of fair competition

in our economy and although

we may only have the resources to do our

work in cincinnati

i can guarantee you that does not make

it any less powerful

that is why i want to illustrate that

with you with our largest client

they are cincinnati’s leading

entrepreneurship

accelerator and they focus their work on

black and brown

aspiring entrepreneurs their work is

truly incredible

and founded upon the notion of

empowerment

and when they approached us not too long

ago

wanting our help with measuring their

impact we were all in

impact can look many different ways

so although this question of let’s

measure our impact

may sound easy at first i guarantee you

it is pretty complicated

so we have divided this project up into

three simple steps

that will take us from identifying the

information to helping them

tell their story in our community

step one finding the data defining the

scope

we want to define impact not only as

profit but also as people

as clients as

the support that they contribute to our

economy

we are constructing surveys that will

help them get data from their clients

and that will enable us to take it to

step two

analyzing the data with statistics we

use statistics as a tool to uncover

patterns

and to find meaning behind that

information and that leads us to step

three

telling a story using that data

we are helping them tell a story of

community empowerment

and hopefully we will be able to be a

part of their plans moving forward

maybe expanding their services all over

the united states

who knows telling the story with data

can have that power

i have committed to help small business

owners

tell their story because of a history

of exclusion and racism because they

have been

denied fair competition in our economy

because black and brown entrepreneurs

have struggled

for way too long

telling a story with data is my way

to transform information into insight

and my passion into real tangible

impact

as somebody who works with data on a

pretty regular basis

the one thing i appreciate about it most

is its versatility

now we just talked about the community

applications but there are also

organizational applications

as well as individual applications

community applications for me it is my

activism outlet

it is my possibility to combine my

passion for my academics

with my activism and my desire for

social change

on the organizational level i can think

of a single large company

that doesn’t use a data science division

to make decisions nowadays

it has become so vastly popular that

people often equate data science

to magic and then lastly the individual

applications of telling a story with

data

each and every one of us has a little

thing up here called the brain

and all this brain does all day is

taking the information

that we have available around us and

make decisions based upon that

in a way that makes each and every one

of us somewhat of a mini data scientist

really that’s what data scientists do

all day

so seeing that we are all somewhat of a

data scientist

we need to know you need to know how to

tell a story

using data so today

i want to leave you with a simple

three-step game plan

on how you can tell a story using data

step one identify your data

identify what you’re passionate about

but also

identify what fulfills you in the long

run

this is a process of introspection that

takes many people

years but it is important to find out

what you care about

deep down step two

find a pattern within those things you

care about

maybe family or faith or you work

research activism all these things

try to convey a message to you they’re

coming from your principal center

and try to convey a message about who

you really are

step 3 let your past become your

identity

tell your story and let your future

actions be guided by who you are

deep down by your principle center

by your virtues at the core of your

existence

data for me is the abstraction of

information

into numbers and if you understand that

simple concept

it can open doors for you in all areas

of life

it will enable you to tell a story to

tell your story

that can last for centuries and will not

be forgotten

so let me ask you how will you choose

to tell it

you