Deloitte published an article discussing war stories from leading Investor Relations executives about challenges faced within their groups. The article breaks each challenge down within specific descriptions, but can be summarized down to the following:
– Timely communication externally and internally
– Education amongst internal staff
– Regulations
– Corporate red tape.
Towards the end of the article, the section “What makes a leading IR Team?”, focused on what the IR executives believed is the solution for the challenges faced. The solution, Three T’s, quoted by Charles Triano: Timeliness, Transparency, and Trust.
For Data Visualization minded folks such as ourselves, we obviously are biased towards the idea of Data Visualization being the cure all. In this case, however, Data Visualization is more of the higher level starting point that needs to be narrowed down towards a specific solution.
Here’s how data visualization can be the solution for each of the Three T’s:
Timeliness: Through report automation and rapid distribution. Data Visualization software products can tap into existing data sources including ERP systems or other data sources in order to generate a branded report that can easily be distributed to investors
Compliance, data, design feedback, etc. are handled during the initial build process of the automated solution. What used to take several days/weeks/months and resources, can now be done in seconds.
Transparency: Data Visualization is the process of translating what was once not understood nor accessible into a clear visual representation. Using visualization tools such as Tableau, Pentaho, Domo, or Micro Strategy products will be a quick way to visualize your data to see for yourself
Trust: Anything can be misrepresented, especially data. Showing the truth in data starts with the story. Identifying your top 5 stories will begin the process of engaging with data you do have. Visualizing each story will validate the story/data for it’s relevancy and accuracy. The more accurate the data and its representation, the greater the trust. See also “Showing your Data Truth”.
Here’s how we applied Data Visualization as a solution for the Three T’s:
Our client needed a process to create a large quantity of reports translated in different languages within a short period of time. The context of the reports were to educate investors on changing world economics on macro and micro level. Data was collected via a series of survey’s that fed a consolidated data source. We then created an automated software solution that extracted the information from the data source, in order to, generated several reports (visualizations and narratives) dynamically in quantity and in different languages. The end result: Faster, accurate, and engaging reports generated with less overhead/resources. All of which satisfied the Three T’s.
Everyone has unique challenges and if you have something you need to talk about, or would like to see a demo, contact us.