Holly Munn: Cutting through big data confusion with better storytelling
Canadians are some of the most educated people in the world. However, when it comes to their understanding of numbers, confusion is often the common denominator.
This conundrum is the experience of Holly Munn, Principal at BrandFreek Communications. Munn sat down with Municipal World CEO Susan Gardner at the Ontario Municipal Administrators’ Association 2019 spring workshop to discuss the need for municipalities to tell better stories with big data.
Struggling with Big Data
“Fifty-five percent of Canadians have real problems with numeracy. That means things like pie charts, fractions, big numbers, people can’t hold on to them, can’t relate to them,” Munn said. “That causes real challenges when we have big numbers and we’re communicating them to other staff, when we’re communicating them to councils, when we’re communicating them to the wider stakeholders. People don’t necessarily have a grasp to what those things mean.”
This is particularly problematic when trying to explain to the public why a municipality has taken something from being a third of its budget to a quarter, for example. All too often, people think the numbers are increasing instead of the amount actually decreasing.
So, what can a municipality do?
“With people not understanding numbers, what they do understand is stories and storytelling. It’s about making it relatable,” she said. “We have to be careful when releasing numbers that we are releasing them in a way people can understand, almost as part of a story. That’s by giving context.”
Always Put Numbers in Proper Context
For example telling people a new sports field will cost the municipality about $2 per person for the next two years puts the number into a context they can understand.
Another somewhat celebrated example stems around a glass of orange juice. If you tell someone a glass of orange juice at the local fast food restaurant is $3.50, they likely won’t have a problem. If, however, you tell them a government minister spent $16 on a glass of orange juice at Savoy Hotel in London, their reaction would likely be quite different. MW
✯ Municipal World Insider and Executive Members: You might also be interested in Jessica Linthorne’s article: Communicating outside the box. Note that you can now access the complete collection of past articles (and more) from your membership dashboard.
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