How storytelling can supercharge your research findings

Photo by Nong V on Unsplash

Think about the last time you read a book you couldn’t put down — a story so captivating it’s all you could think about, immune to any distractions.

As researchers, there’s no reason we shouldn’t be striving to have this kind of impact on our audience when sharing research findings. Even the most groundbreaking insights lose impact if they aren’t shared in an engaging and digestible way.

Here I outline six principles for bringing research to life:

Take inspiration from fiction

The concept of a narrative structure might take you back to creative writing at school, but the same steps can be applied to research reports:

• Orientation: setting the scene, including the context of the research and your approach
• Presenting the dilemma: in this case the ‘dilemma’ is the user problem we’re trying to solve
• Series of events: the key insights identified through your research
• Resolution: what this means for your audience, including recommendations and next steps

Ultimately, you want to take the listener or reader on a journey. This storytelling canvas can help with planning what you want to cover before you start writing the report itself.

Be a guide for your audience

Consider your audience when crafting your story — how much do they know about research, and what do they need from your report? Consider a fictional book series, where a reader might pick up a book midway through the series. They still need to be able to understand what’s going on, even if they don’t know the backstory. The same concept applies here — remember you’ve been immersed in the raw data and analysis, but your audience hasn’t.

• Use signposting to help your audience stay on track. For example, labels on slides to indicate what you’re covering now and what’s coming up next
• Don’t be afraid of repetition. For example, if you’re introducing some user needs, set them up at the beginning of your report, cover them in turn, and summarise them again in your conclusion

Photo by Jamie Templeton on Unsplash

…but avoid the temptation to include everything

There’s a fine balance to strike when it comes to clearly explaining your insights, whilst ensuring you don’t dilute the key message you’re trying to convey. Much like an author works to subtly build a sense of backstory rather than throwing everything at the reader at once, it’s important to be mindful of your audience’s cognitive load.

• If you’re presenting your report, consider what can be voiced over rather than included on slides. What isn’t necessary to support the story you’re trying to tell? This can involve reviewing your slides multiple times and cutting excess content and words each time
• Consider the one thing that you want stakeholders to take from each slide, and ensure this is reflected in your heading. Go through your report reading only the slide headings — this should convey the whole story (with the content of each slide serving as supporting evidence)

Use visuals or bullet points to avoid large chunks of text — remember the human brain processes images 60,000 times faster than text.

Keep up the energy

This applies more for presentations, but consider ways to keep things engaging and maintain your audience's interest. Remember that people engage with information in different ways — reading, listening, or active participation. A presentation is likely to be more engaging and successful if you use a combination of these techniques, rather than a one-sided monologue. Add some fun and make it interactive via polls, true or false questions (you can do this within Google Meet or Slido), and allow plenty of time for discussion and questions.

Slido is a great tool for encouraging audience participation during a presentation

Bring it back to your users

Remember our job is to empower stakeholders to put user needs at the heart of everyday decision making. Humanising your findings can help your audience build empathy and remember specific anecdotes long after the project concludes. Use case studies and video clips to bring users to life, or follow a specific user’s experience across your report. The strongest characters in stories are often the ones we can relate to — the ones who are most human, with flaws and all.

Think beyond PowerPoint

It’s also worth considering the format of your report — are there any other creative ways you can share your insights beyond slides? The way we consume stories is changing in the world of Reels and TikTok, but the vital bones of storytelling remain the same — using a narrative structure to take your reader on a journey, striking the balance between clarity vs. overwhelm, engaging your audience, and ultimately ensuring everything comes back to the user.

Let me know if you try any of these tips when writing your next research report, and share in the comments other ways you work to avoid ‘death by PowerPoint’!

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