Data storytelling is an emerging area across a wide array of fields, including both new approaches to data analysis as well as new application of long-established ideas. However, advice to “tell the story” rarely indicates how to move from data to story. Based on the professional tradition of storytelling in library and information science (LIS), this talk presents a three-part road map for thinking playfully about data in story form. Three conceptual approaches are presented: 1) narrative strategies for understanding story in data, 2) narrative structures for building story from data, and 3) a six-part model for troubleshooting data storytelling dynamics. This webinar was presented by Kate McDowell. Ms. McDowell is an Associate Professor at School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

To tell memorable stories, you have to think like a storyteller. Great storytellers can find, develop, and tell well-evidenced stories about organizational challenges and successes that build trust and communicate effectively to stakeholders. This presentation covered what storytelling is (and is not) and the importance of trust, how to find stories to tell, and what’s easier and harder to tell effectively in the form of a story, ways to involve stakeholders in sharing stories, and how storytelling thinking helps support skillful listening.

iSchool Faculty Research Profiles: Associate Professor Kate McDowell discusses the importance of utilizing storytelling strategies when presenting data. Learn more at: ischool.illinois.edu

Pecha Kucha Night Champaign - Urbana Volume 23 at the Virginia Theater