68 slide:ology
Getting to the Point
In reality, the purpose of this chart was for HR
to draw attention to the March timeframe.
What is it you want your audience to “get” from your
data? What’s the message you want them to take away?
First impression on this chart is the enor-
mous sales growth and recovery.
To communicate your data effectively,
you first must articulate the conclusions
you want your audience to adopt.
Begin by asking yourself, “What would I like them to
remember about this data?” Usually, this will be a point
about causality, such as the conditions that led to the
results in your data, or the future conditions that the data
most likely will create. Whatever the cause, you need to
draw some kind of meaning from the data so that you
can effectively express that meaning to your audience.
Consider the example below. At first glance one might
conclude that the main point of the slide is that rev-
enue has increased. Granted, that is a major point, but
not the primary point that the presenter wanted the
audience to walk away with. In reality, this presentation
was delivered by the Human Resources department
to petition an executive leadership team to give their
department a larger budget. Just as sales had hit a
low point in March, the HR department had rolled out
a new sales training program. No other organizational
changes had happened in that timeframe and they
wanted to correlate the spike with their program. The
most important information therefore was the point in
time where their program was implemented.
Displaying Data 69
This chart highlights Q1 to emphasize that
this was the most successful quarter.
This chart emphasize that the Americas had
the lowest revenue growth.
Once you are certain about the
meaning of your data, you’ll find it
much easier to build the slide. Your
conclusions will determine the type
of graph you choose, and how (or if)
you use emphasis.
These chart samples show that dif-
ferent types of conclusions can be
drawn from the same data. Choosing
what you want the audience to focus
on is important so they process the
information quickly.
To show the total by region, it can stay in the context of the matrix or be plotted into bar chart
format. The bar chart emphasizes that India and Europe grew at the same rate.
Here the focus is on when and where the
revenue declined.
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