There’s a version of the data work where you compile the numbers, put them in a deck, present them to the room, and your job ends there.
That was not the version I wanted to stay in.
The transition from data analyst to brand strategist, in my experience of it, wasn’t a title change. It was a shift in what I was trying to do with information. Reporting says: here is what happened. Strategy says: here is what it means, and here is what we should do about it.
Getting from one to the other required a kind of confidence I had to build deliberately.
Early on, I would compile a report and present the numbers and wait to see how the room responded to them. I didn’t interpret them out loud. I didn’t make a recommendation. I told myself this was appropriate deference — these decisions were for people senior to me. I was just providing information.
What I realised, over time, was that this framing was partly true and partly a way of avoiding the risk of being wrong. If I interpreted the data and my interpretation turned out to be incorrect, that was visible. If I just reported the numbers, I couldn’t be wrong.
But I also couldn’t grow.
The shift started when I began forming views before the meetings. Not as a performance but as practice. Looking at the data, deciding what I thought it meant, and being prepared to say so when it was relevant. Sometimes my interpretation aligned with what the room concluded independently. Sometimes it didn’t. Both were useful.
What I found is that having a view — even if it got revised in the room — was received better than not having one. People who present numbers and also have a perspective on those numbers are participating in the decision. People who present numbers and wait are doing a different job.
I wanted to do the former. That required me to be willing to be wrong out loud, which is not as comfortable as it sounds.
What helped you get more comfortable having a view and saying it?