Sponsor Telling a story Were all competing to get people to focus on the things that we think matter. Throwing more data at that problem is never going to convince people, so we need to be much smarter about the engagement process, says Caroline Florence, founder of Insight Narrator. One way in which the mind can definitely complement machines is that researchers can find a narrative in data that helps the business act on insight a skill with which the data-driven side of the business often struggles. In 2012, Florence set up Insight Narrator to coach anyone who focuses on data to creatively communicate the insights that data is providing. Its not just about making a better PowerPoint, she says: It is the opportunity to inject a little bit of good thinking into the process without slowing it down. The common problem among her clients is that many of them are in fast-paced or agile environments, and have little time (or confidence) to convey context and narrative that leads to action. For example, Florence recently spent three days working with 60 data specialists from the government of Jersey. One of them was responsible for reporting costs in the health service. She gets consistently asked by politicians and lobby groups how much a hospital bed in Jersey costs, Florence says, but she couldnt answer because the models underneath are so complicated. The team eventually hit on the very human idea to mock up the price of the hospital bed as if it was an Airbnb room. In that way, the people who needed to know could intuitively understand the variation in price according to what was being delivered, without having to know the details of the data science behind those costs. It also made discussions about where to invest or how to cut costs possible, without misrepresenting or oversimplifying the data. Sometimes big data is not the answer, it just creates more noise, and we need to be more sympathetic to the end audience think about their expectations, Florence says. 32 The machine can do as much as it can, but then you need human coders to come in. The company has purposely downplayed the promise of technology, because Brandwood has witnessed fully automated coding applications that produce low-level insight from free text a sentiment score, for example but not the fresh information about the business that clients value. What we can say is that the machine will double your speed by doing the 50% that it can do. But coding is nuanced, detailed and fine-grained I want to free people from doing the grunt work, to spend the time doing the valuable work. Ultimately, he says, the value might