The Big R-Book

♣35♣Writing and Communication Skills

Writing up conclusions is often an essential part of the work of the data scientist. Indeed, the best analysis is of no use if it does not convince decision makers. In order to be effective, the data-scientist needs also to be a skilled communicator.

The exact style and the attention to things such as abstract, summary, conclusions, executive summary, and many more aspects will depend on the tradition in your company. However, some things are bound to be universal. For example, we live in an age where information is abundant and it is not abnormal to communicate on different social platforms and still receive hundreds of mails every day while the normal pattern is meetings back-to-back. The average manager will hence have little time to read your document. While you want of course the document to be readable (avoid slang and acronyms for example), you also will want to keep the message as short and clear as possible. Indeed, in this time and age of information overload, concise communication is of paramount importance.

A first thing to do is re-read your text and make sure it is logical, clear, and that every word really has to be there. If something can be written shorter then that is usually the way to go.

However, even before we start writing it is worth to check some basic rules. When asked to look into a problem, make sure to ask yourself the following ideas.

1. Identify the main question or task at hand. Usually, there is a situation ...