| There I was, sitting on the patio of my favourite bistro, | | | | developmentto help your users to have a better |
| in my home country, Barbados, indulging in the fabulous, | | | | understanding of the issues. |
| to-die-for dessert, Coconut Cream Pie and discussing | | | | By the way, do you know the difference between |
| my current hottest topic, report writing with my | | | | data and information? Data is the raw facts that you |
| girlfriend. | | | | collect while information is what that data becomes |
| All of a sudden, out of the clear blue sky, my girlfriend | | | | when you process or analyse it in some way so that it |
| asked "...so why do you have to analyse and interpret | | | | has meaning for the user. Hence the need to analyse |
| the data?" Excuse me? Is this woman mad? The | | | | the data. |
| answer to that is a no-brainer! | | | | Here are some approaches you can use to analyse |
| At first I was incredulous but I remembered that her | | | | data: |
| sometimes obvious question on many occasions have | | | | 1. Identify and discuss causes and effects or influences |
| caused me to realise that I might need to explain | | | | 2. Discuss important connections in order to clarify |
| something just to make sure my readers or audiences | | | | something |
| understand. This was clearly such an occasion. | | | | 3. Investigate a problem, helping readers to understand |
| So! You have used one (or more) of the six common | | | | the nature of the problem and suggesting ideas on |
| methods of data collection to gather the data you | | | | how to solve it. |
| want to write your report. Even though you have | | | | 4. Present and interpret particular evidence to support |
| concentrated your efforts on the purpose of the | | | | a conclusion, projection or position. |
| report, based on your interpretation of the needs of | | | | 5. Investigate conditions and present recommendations |
| the user, you still have lots of data. | | | | to meet goals, change the conditions, etc. |
| What is a poor report writer supposed to do? | | | | 6. Discuss data/information gained from a needed |
| This is the point at which you begin to analyse the | | | | investigation and draw conclusions. |
| data so that you transform it into something that has | | | | Whatever approach you use, please make sure that |
| meaning for your user, i.e. information. In other words, | | | | you take the mountains of data that you collect, |
| you're engaging in a mental process to understand the | | | | understand it yourself and then analyse it so that it has |
| data yourself and then you will use a method of | | | | meaning for your users. |