Show Notes
Asking good questions can help improve our own and others’ work: both when exploring and explaining data. In this rebroadcast of episode 19, Cole covers five smart queries to pose and answer during the analytical process and five more to consider when getting ready to explain that data to others. We’re sharing this popular episode again as we look ahead to what’s next: Before and After, the fifth book from storytelling with data, comes out September 23, 2025 — pre-order now wherever you buy books! If you want to put these strategies into practice, join one of our upcoming 2025 sessions: Virtual half-day workshops: August 21 and November 6
8-week online course: September 15–November 9
In-person workshop in NYC: October 14
Links: Register for upcoming workshops and courses
Pre-order Before and After
Questions? email [email protected]
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Cole recently appeared on the Analytics Power Hour, and this was such a great conversation, we're rebroadcasting it here! ———— There’s a version of this episode where AI replaces the data visualization expert entirely, and there’s a version where it’s useless without one. Neither is quite right, according to Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic of Storytelling with Data, who joined Tim, Moe, and Julie to sort out where AI genuinely earns its keep in data storytelling and where it’s just producing a shinier first draft of the same shitty slide. Cole—admittedly a skeptic-turned-convert who once joked she’d retire before having to deal with any of this—walks through why the humans who benefit most from AI are the ones who already have the foundation to know when to ignore it, why “let me look at some options” beats “give me the final chart” as a prompt, and why the analog, pencil-and-paper parts of the process might be the most valuable friction in the whole workflow. Bring your own opinions on whether Claude should ever be handed “the rules” and told to just go.
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