Learning data analysis skills is, of course, the first step for anyone who aims to work with data in a business context. But being able to impact the company’s bottom line with your work requires more than just the ability to write code or query a SQL database.

Data Work in the Business World

Picture this: you’re working on the data team of a large retail company. You’ve been building a project to segment customers by various metrics like age bracket, location, buying tendencies, etc.

Then, your manager stops by your desk on the way to a meeting and asks you to figure out who your “best customers” are. As she walks away, you realize that what “best” means isn’t really clear. The biggest spenders? The most frequent buyers? Potential customers with a high chance of spending in the future?

This sort of issue crops up all the time in real-world data work. Learning the technical skills required for data analysis can be challenging. But it can also be difficult to know how to apply those effectively in business contexts.

5 Tips for Making an Impact with Your Data Analysis at Work

Once you’ve got the skills to do great data work, here are five tips that’ll help you make sure people actually listen to what you have to say!

1. Visualize, visualize, visualize

A picture is worth a thousand words. That old cliché rings true when it comes to data. Many people have trouble gleaning insight from a spreadsheet, or a written report full of statistics. But everybody understands a bar graph.

Consider, for example, the bar chart below. It lacks clear axis labels and has no title. But even with a chart this vague and context-less, we could show anyone this chart and tell them to point to the month where spending was highest. Ten out of ten people would get it right.

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