42 Insights and Anecdotes in Data Storytelling with Lea Pica

Charlie and Charlie welcome  Leah Pica, author of "Present Beyond Measure" and Charlie Apigian's graduate class.   Their conversation zigzags from the personal to the professional, diving into the heart of narrative techniques that can turn even the driest data into a compelling saga. 

The dialogue saunters through the daily avenues where data becomes our silent partner—from tracking sleep patterns with biometric wizardry to the ritual of financial foresight. They revel in the tactile joy of journaling, be it through keystrokes or pen swipes, contemplating how artificial intelligence might one day offer insights into our stress patterns through our own written words. As the conversation winds down, they discuss the fine art of making sure your message sticks long after the lights dim on your presentation. Join Charlei and Charlie and the class  for a hearty dose of enlightenment, laughter, and the occasional 'aha' moment on the rollercoaster ride of data storytelling.

Who is Lea Pica?

Lea Pica is a data analyst turned Data Storytelling Advocate, international speaker, and workshop facilitator who teaches how to present data and inspire action to thousands of data and marketing practitioners around the world. 

Her mission is to transform data meeting snoozefests into vehicles for change using the power of neuroscience, storytelling, emotion, and effective communication.

Lea is a seasoned data analytics practitioner and digital marketer with over 13 years of experience building search and analytics practices for agencies, publishers, and top brands. She hosts the industry-acclaimed Present Beyond Measure® Show podcast and is authoring her first data presentation book, Present Beyond Measure.

She's had the privilege of training the talented staff of both Fortune 500 brands and analytics/marketing agencies including Microsoft, Deloitte, Intuit, Search Discovery, Ayzenberg Group, Constellation Brands, CVS, and many more.

Lea is a frequent headliner at global live and virtual conferences such as Digital Summit, MeasureSummit, ConversionXL Live, DigiMarCon, Marketing Analytics Summit, Virtual Analytics Summit, Digital Analytics Hub, DAA Symposia, and Web Analytics Wednesday.

She is available for training workshops and conference events, and may be reached for both at LeaPica.com/Contact.

Lea Pica's links:

• https://leapica.com/
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/leapica/
• Lea's book - Present Beyond Measure

Data 4 All Social Media Links

• @data4allpodcast
• linkedin.com/company/data4allpodcast/
• instagram.com/data4allpodcast/

Charlie Yielding Social Media Links 

•  @charlieyielding  
• linkedin.com/in/char

For more information please visit us at www.data4all.io or email us at charlie@data4all.io.

Transcript

Charlie Apigian: 0:00

As we get started here, we are doing something, Charlie, for the first time, and that is go live with a real audience.

Charlie Yielding: 0:07

Yes, a totally volunteer audience that is not captive in any way, shape or form.

Charlie Apigian: 0:19

Because captive would mean that they are required by their professor to be here, as if they were compelled. Yes, and I'm not going to say what this is in place of. Please don't say that, because I might get myself in trouble.

Student 01: 0:34

No.

Charlie Apigian: 0:34

I'm kidding. I'm kidding. This is a voluntary thing. Everybody Shake your heads for the crowd. There we go. Do it 100% voluntary and you're here because, as you all know, we didn't see you shake your head.

Charlie Yielding: 0:50

We don't just have evidence.

Charlie Apigian: 0:52

All right, leave poor jake alone. Um, this isn't just us doing an interview, this is also meeting the person that we are using for our class. Her book called present beyond measure, and as I was reading it, first of all, we have a mutual friend, zach Gemignani. He brought me on to the book and I just noticed myself nodding over and over again, because it's exactly the way I feel I wish I could put things in writing like I can talk, because I can obviously talk. It's exactly the way I feel I wish I could put things in writing like I can talk, because I can obviously talk. It's just the writing part sometimes gets to me and so with that, we're using that as our basis Really.

Charlie Apigian: 1:33

And, leah, just to set things up, today we're just getting into the book. So this is, but the second half is when we do our project, and so we're leading into this. So you're here to inspire them for that second half of the semester and everybody, let's welcome Leah Pica. Leah, thank you again, and Charlie and I are going to both interject, but he knows that this is a true pleasure for me to have you on here today and as we get started, I would like you just to tell us a little bit about you and your I'll say data journey.

Lea Pica: 2:20

Well, the day I was born, it was stormy there you go Well the day I was born, it was stormy.

Lea Pica: 2:24

There you go, yeah. So storytelling and performance has been in my life since before I can remember anything. I started dance when I was three. I started singing on stage when I was eight, dancing ballet. You know everything, dancing ballet. You know everything. So stories at movies, books I always were so captivated by a well-told story and I have a very vivid imagination so I loved being having my emotions triggered and feeling moved and transformed and inspired and ignited, all these drama words.

Lea Pica: 3:03

And you know, when I graduated college I realized I didn't really have the fortitude to make a musical theater career, work and maybe make no money. I kind of wanted to have a normal lifestyle. So I went into marketing and kind of fell into marketing and digital analytics, kind of almost out of the gate. But it was a far cry from performance until I noticed that we were asked to go into business meetings with very intimidating looking people named stakeholders and decision makers and managers and bosses and they had a sort of like stern, focused, you know, intensity to them and they were busy and easily distracted and we would go in and we would present information.

Lea Pica: 4:00

And I took one PowerPoint class in college. I learned all of the animations and like laser beaming in letters, one at a time, and the sound effects and like checkerboard transitions. You know, I was like a pro I was a pro at PowerPoint at this point so I did all of that and I could not figure out why people were distracted and falling asleep and completely not interested or asking me challenging questions. This is kind of what could be waiting for you in the business world, just so you know.

Lea Pica: 4:36

And it doesn't happen to professors in a class at all, everybody's engaged the whole time, I'm sure you have their rapt attention and they're not at all doom scrolling Right right. That's right Like right now.

Charlie Yielding: 4:52

This is well, just interject real quick. This is one of the most important things, not even from a stakeholder perspective.

Lea Pica: 4:58

But just to get your way in business, you've got to be able to data storytell versus tell stories with data yeah for sure One of the hottest skill sets that is being looked for in the skill set, if you looked on LinkedIn. So I was like what the heck is going on here? Like why does no one? They keep telling me to come present but no one seems to care about what I have to say and it doesn't do anything. No one does anything about it and it doesn't do anything. No one does anything about it, and it was really frustrating.

Lea Pica: 5:28

And then I was invited to deliver a sort of capstone presentation at my MBA graduation and I didn't want the same thing to happen and I stumbled upon a book called Presentation Zen by a man named Gar Reynolds. The book changed my life. He's now a friend of mine, which is so cool. But that book turned everything I thought I knew about PowerPoint and slides and design on its head and I realized, oh my God, this is what we're all getting wrong. We're all doing this completely wrong. So I started changing everything about the way I was presenting data and I started incorporating some of the storytelling mechanics and elements of drama and suspense and anticipation that I love about Hollywood and cinema into the conference room and people started staying awake and leaning forward and nodding their heads and asking questions that showed that they were understanding what was happening. But they were really engaged.

Lea Pica: 6:29

And then people started taking action on information. They started doing things after the meeting and I was drunk with power, you know, um, and I had so much fun with it that people started coming to me for help. You know like big shots at my company were coming to me to consult for their executive board meeting presentations. And then one day I was talking to a vendor and I've wanted for years to present at their summit. It was my big, hairy dream, but I didn't know what I would talk about.

Lea Pica: 7:02

And then I pitched this topic present about presenting and they said yes, and I did it, and it was one of their top three rated keynotes of all time in their in the history of their client summits. And I had never presented at a conference before. So what that told me and I wasn't that I don't think it was that great. It just told me that the message landed like an anvil for people that they knew what it was like to sit in really boring presentations and feel like that's an hour I'm never going to get back in my life, and instead they wanted to know how to do things differently and they wanted to experience as an audience member differently. And it really took off from there and 10 years later I made a baby.

Charlie Apigian: 7:52

Oh, there it is.

Lea Pica: 7:53

It's been. You don't even know. It's been a dream of mine to help college students learn this information before they spend 10 years spinning their wheels making the same mistakes that I did. So this book was the antidote to all the mistakes I've ever made, and I'm just so like. This is the moment right here.

Charlie Apigian: 8:14

So proud of you guys. Wow, we were getting our friend to take some pictures for us, and so we'll make sure that we let you know. And this book has not been out long, so we're probably the first group because, literally, I mean, when was the published date? September 26th, september 26th. So you all are definitely the first ones that are using it for that. And I've got I want to talk about some of the different aspects I've got one of our students that's going to ask some questions about storytelling. But I'll be nice, charlie, and I'll let you ask any questions at this point before I start diving into some of the other areas. Not yet, oh, he's not ready yet. Can I prompt any questions?

Charlie Apigian: 9:00

Well yes, go ahead.

Charlie Yielding: 9:02

I've got a. I mean ahead. You seem to be into telling stories, so what's a good example for the folks here of a hard lesson that you learned?

Charlie Apigian: 9:12

Oh and how, what you did to make it better, like a story go wrong kind of thing, or just.

Charlie Yielding: 9:18

I mean, we inevitably learn some things the hard way.

Lea Pica: 9:22

I have the perfect, we'll go for it.

Charlie Yielding: 9:24

I have the perfect.

Lea Pica: 9:25

I have the perfect one because I wanted to tell this story anyway. But first I wanted to check have you guys reviewed the narrative arc chapter? Have you gone through? And?

Charlie Apigian: 9:35

learned the steps of the narrative.

Charlie Yielding: 9:36

They just started it.

Charlie Apigian: 9:38

We're through about chapter 7. And that's all we've required at this point.

Lea Pica: 9:43

Okay. So does anyone remember, does it sound familiar, the narrative arc with the five steps that take you up in the? Okay, great, all right. So this is what we're going to do. We're going to play a game, I'm going to tell you, I'm going to answer charlie's question and I'm going to tell you a story with a hard lesson learned. But I'd love for people to try to pick out the different stages of the narrative arc in the story. How does that work? Does that sound?

Charlie Apigian: 10:12

It sounds All right, Sounds fun. They're thinking did you just say I have to do?

Charlie Yielding: 10:16

math. That's on page 35 and 36, if you have, yeah, yeah, yeah, so it might be useful to actually pick out the arc.

Lea Pica: 10:24

By the way, if no one gets it this isn't being graded. No one can get this wrong. This is an experiment.

Charlie Apigian: 10:30

All right, it looks like we have enough books out so that you all can at least see it, and we have people that actually bought the real book, not just the Kindle version. Look at that the real book. Oh hello. You know I bought the Kindle version because I'm like I don't ever want paper. Then I'm like you know some of those you just got to feel when it's figures and that stuff. All right, go ahead. Yeah, we're ready to play that game.

Lea Pica: 10:57

So this is the story of why I could not join last time.

Lea Pica: 11:02

Oh why I could not join last time. All right, so about four weeks ago I woke up and I was so excited for the last session I had that day, which was guest starring in my friend's class, college class. So I was excited. But I had a few things I had to take care of that day. One of them included my semi-annual dentist checkup. So I went to the dentist and all was well, but I happened to mention that the last time that I was there I was supposed to have two fillings, so they were supposed to check to see if I needed them and they never called me back. So they went away, they scurried away and then they came back and moved me to a different room and they said, okay, here we go and immediately started injecting my face with anesthetic and numbing agents and things.

Lea Pica: 12:04

And I kind of didn't realize what was happening until it was happening and I thought, okay, you know, I have something tonight. So what happens? What happens now? And, as I'm asking, my face starts going like this. I'm like what happens? Does anything happen to me? Oh, geez. And the dentist is like don't worry, your face is just going to look a little bit different for about an hour, you'll be fine. So 22 minutes of screeching intensity later I go home and I am prepared to allow my face, which is literally sagging Like. It was like a terrible makeup job for a horror movie. It was horrible. And after that I waited and an hour passed and then another hour and a half passed and we were closing in to about three hours to the talk and my face had not changed one bit. And now I was starting to get very concerned. So I emailed the professor and let him know that okay, this is what's happening. I'm hoping it'll be fine by the time I log on.

Lea Pica: 13:23

Another two hours passed, no change. And then, finally, I had to send the note that I wasn't able to do it. And when I sent the note, literally my face was completely frozen on one side and I was so devastated, I was so sad and I emailed and I waited. I waited for the answer and I thought, oh God, am I fired? Did I lose my chance? Is it going to be so upset? Am I going to lose my career? And then he emailed me back saying Don't worry about it, I totally understand, because he's such a cool guy. We'll reschedule. And I felt a huge wave of relief. And then a little bit later I got another email saying you guys had an amazing chat that night that was totally unscripted and flowy.

Lea Pica: 14:16

It was definitely unscripted, that's for sure, and you had a blast. And I felt this additional wave of relief that it actually turned out for the best and we rescheduled. And now here we are, together and my face is not on the floor.

Charlie Apigian: 14:32

The end the end, great job, yeah. Now a little bit of other stuff. You were not only emailing, you were texting frantically as well.

Lea Pica: 14:44

I did, I used every channel making sure that I saw it.

Charlie Apigian: 14:47

And when I got in the classroom, I think was when I first realized that you weren't going to be able to be there. And I'm looking at what my next week's agenda was and it was data and to do like things in data. You know you have to have data and I wasn't ready for that yet. Okay, and and I was just I was. I was at a point where I had just done these, like I went through this exercise with a branding and marketing guy and he goes what do you want to be? And I'm like I just want to be authentic and I walked in. And I just want to be authentic and I walked in and I just tried to be myself and Charlie's laughing you authenticated all. I authenticated like crazy. But here was the best part. They played along and we just had a two-hour conversation and it was by far. It would have been better if you were there, but it was the best class I have ever been part of.

Charlie Apigian: 15:47

I don't know if they can say that for me you don't have to say that, but for me, because you know it's rare when you know it's good to have a textbook and stuff, but when you can actually get to what is real help, right, and you know that it's so hard teaching these type of skills more than anything else. And so how do you convey that, how do you talk about audience if you don't talk about yourself? And that's really what we did. It was a great, great experience, and so we're better today, because now we're at this beautiful place and I even brought Charlie along and they've been gracious enough to allow me to pivot and do different things in this class.

Charlie Yielding: 16:40

But what was the hard lesson though?

Charlie Apigian: 16:43

We got to go to the narrative right and he's been reading up on it.

Lea Pica: 16:50

Can someone pick out what the lesson?

Charlie Apigian: 16:52

What is the hard lesson?

Lea Pica: 16:53

Don't go to the dentist the day that you're going to be a drug addict. Yes, that's the hard lesson.

Charlie Yielding: 16:58

When they pull the needles out. That's the time to say like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, let's talk about this.

Lea Pica: 17:04

That feels like the lesson learned no, I I'm pretty sure I'll never be getting dental work or any cleaning whatsoever on this, on the day I have a speaking gig. That's pretty much gotcha.

Charlie Apigian: 17:17

So we're talking next week, I think, and uh should I cancel my uh root canal for that morning I I would.

Lea Pica: 17:23

It is a video show, so I would yeah that's probably a good idea, for sure.

Charlie Apigian: 17:28

All right, anybody else want to add something to that, and I can even bring a mic to you if you'd like.

Lea Pica: 17:34

Yeah, could anyone pick out the steps?

Charlie Apigian: 17:38

I see you looking shiny. I see you looking at the book. So any spots.

Charlie Yielding: 17:41

Man you guys are just you can't go anywhere. Like he can just keep on poking you guys and messing with you guys. That's right, you're in trouble, right? No? No, no, no no, well, it is Belmont, though Belmont might care Care about what Students getting up and walking out of class.

Charlie Apigian: 17:58

Well, they would never do that, these are the good kind?

Charlie Yielding: 18:00

I don't know. These are the good kind? I don't know. I'm not used to hanging out with students.

Charlie Apigian: 18:05

I can tell you poke a room full of adult patients.

Charlie Yielding: 18:08

They're going to get out of here.

Charlie Apigian: 18:10

Oh well, I think some of the things I want to were there times where you noticed like an anticipation, where you could see the buildup and you could know that the resolution was about ready to come. Think about that. She took going to the dentist and created a story out of that.

Charlie Apigian: 18:31

First of all, let's give her a hand for that, right uh I am an actor first, okay so if you can take something like going to the dentist and turning it into a story, how do we then do that with things like data? And I think, well, I'll tell you what, Zach, I'm going to make you come up here and you can be part of our conversation. You want to do that? Come on up, Zach. Zach, I'm about ready to get into the storytelling part. Go ahead and say hi, Zach.

Student 02: 19:07

Hello, can you hear me?

Charlie Apigian: 19:09

Yes, I can, all right. So, zach, I'm going to use you as our example, because one of the things I always like to start at the beginning and I think the hardest thing to do whether it's data or you're going to try to tell a story with data is start. How do you start the process? You know you've got to do something to help Zach, and then I'll let you take it from there. But, leah, what would be some tidbits on getting started?

Lea Pica: 19:44

Yeah, so you asked about how I took going to the dentist and created a story. So, really, the story is about picking out what happened, picking out the events and making sure you're sequencing them in the right order and that there's an element of build up as you said, anticipation but it's really about, kind of in the book, what happened. That's your starting point. So, zach, do you have an example of something that happened in the data?

Charlie Apigian: 20:20

In the data or just in. You can just use real life, you can only use data life or in your life.

Charlie Yielding: 20:25

If you want to go there, there you go. Data you can only use data Just only data.

Lea Pica: 20:27

Yeah, only data, okay.

Student 02: 20:29

Anything that has happened in real life Like I think I don't understand the question.

Charlie Apigian: 20:38

Think about our Airbnb example. Yeah, and you are going to buy an Airbnb here in the Nashville area. What would be a question that you would have if you were going to do that?

Student 02: 20:51

The location, the price Okay.

Charlie Apigian: 20:55

So if I'm the person that you have hired to analyze that data and help you successfully buy the right Airbnb which, by the way, is down my street, because everybody has an Airbnb on my street I swear what would be some of those starting points, leah.

Lea Pica: 21:16

So I want to make sure I understand the context of what you're trying to do first, so are you saying that you, charlie, are someone like you're looking to buy an Airbnb and he has to analyze the data to give me kind of the purpose?

Charlie Apigian: 21:32

Yeah, let's do it that way. So I'm the rich guy that is wanting to buy a bunch of houses.

Charlie Yielding: 21:41

What are we trying to learn here?

Charlie Apigian: 21:43

How to start a data story. So how to start a data story.

Charlie Yielding: 21:46

To start a data story. Do you just not start with a story and then attach data to it? I mean, this is assuming that we've already got that.

Charlie Apigian: 21:53

That's a great question, right? Sure, so Zach has all of the Airbnb data in Nashville Okay, 100% of it. Everyone that's been rented out. Every day he has reviews and I'm he's selling this nice little service or maybe he's my friend that just happened to have a lot of data and now he's going to help me decide the district that I should buy. There's there's 32 districts within Nashville, and, and so does that sound good. So you're going to be that guy, you're going to help me out. Where would you start, zach? Right?

Lea Pica: 22:35

So this is a little. Oh, I'm sorry, Was that for him?

Student 02: 22:38

I don't know who it's for.

Charlie Yielding: 22:39

Now we're looking at you no we don't want a podcast, I'm just kidding.

Charlie Apigian: 22:46

I'm having a hard time Go ahead.

Charlie Yielding: 22:49

So think about it like this. Frame the reference of the story around what's an ideal experience when you go to an Airbnb. So think about it like that. So, when you go to an Airbnb, what do you like to see? Do you like long like do you like, uh, do you like long ass lists? Uh, oh, my bad, that's like long lists of chores that you gotta do before you leave. Like, do you like doing all the laundry for the place and then getting charged 300 bucks for the cleaning fee? Like, just, uh, like. What do you like? What you don't like, what do you not like? Yeah, and then try to think about how to start a story off of that. Or maybe it's like I'm coming to town and I've got to find the right district based off of what interests I've got, or something like that. So what are you into? Just make sure it's clean overall. So that would mean, like, you look at ratings, ratings Okay, and so what are? Like, have you ever been to a place that has alcohol ready for you? Do you drink?

Charlie Apigian: 23:45

Hey, come on now. These are graduate students, so they should be. Well, we're a Christian school, please.

Charlie Yielding: 23:55

There are Catholics in there.

Charlie Apigian: 23:57

Yes, all right, help Zach out. He's not supposed to be creating the story.

Lea Pica: 24:16

He's going to get the help from our author here. Come on now, marketing agency and Zach is their client, is their agency analyst, and Airbnb wants to know how well they are doing in a particular market. And then you'd present results, that kind of around that. But in your specific scenario, what I would do kind of hinging off of what Charlie's talking about tell two stories. Tell a story of an Airbnb that sucked like your worst experience, and then put the things that happened. So I booked exposition.

Lea Pica: 25:03

So we booked this Airbnb in Poughkeepsie, I don't know, and right away as soon as I saw it I knew something wasn't right. The rising action, right. We opened the door and there were dead bugs everywhere I'm being dramatic, but dead bugs and things, things had not been cleaned. And then that's the action rising. But the worst of all was there was an octopus in our tub. I don't know Silly. There was an octopus waiting in our tub. How could it get worse than this? And that's the climax. And then, oh, but then you know that was the worst. But you know, I knew I would never do that again. So the next time we booked Airbnb I made sure to message the host and get pictures and da-da-da-da-da and like that's the falling action. Now you are like overcoming the climax by putting in your own solution. And then I had the most fabulous time and my next time because I felt informed and I did my homework and the blah, blah, blah, and then I had a fabulous time at that Airbnb I've got a question though.

Charlie Yielding: 26:14

Oh OK, Does one octopus in the tub make you ask every other Airbnb if they happen to have an octopus in the tub, or is it just one off?

Lea Pica: 26:22

I mean it is prudent at that point. Um, yeah, no, but the, the closing and the resolution becomes what you did to overcome the hardship, the conflict that you encountered, and then this is the solution and then that goes into. So, my friend, what I recommend is make sure to check these reviews, make sure to talk to the owner in advance, like that's what you're doing to present the plan of action, but you've couched it in a story that is interesting and funny and engaging but really kind of like takes people on the ick factor of the part of the story that's hard, and then they can feel the relief with you as you implemented the resolution. Does that make sense?

Charlie Apigian: 27:12

So go ahead with any questions. You have a theme and so I kind of derailed you a little bit by throwing you into a story. So, yeah, well, you know, hey, this is, this is midterm time. So that was that was. That was well done. Now I would also think I go into then. How does the data then reinforce that? And you can see that ratings when it comes to ratings, accuracy is by far the most important component to that, and if they would have just told us there was an octopus in the tub, then I wouldn't be surprised by that.

Charlie Yielding: 27:49

A lot of people would just be like yeah, I'm doing that.

Charlie Apigian: 27:53

Is it live? Let's not keep going on the octopus here, but I love that as the analogy. I'm having octopus regret, that's right. Go ahead, zach.

Student 02: 28:04

I think the biggest thing that stuck out to me for your chapter five, which I read and just wanted to ask a question about, was you mentioned Ryan Levesque with the ask method and he talks or he stated that people buy with emotions and then justify with logic. So I feel like that could be like a positive and then a negative, since people could use that just against one another. So I just I don't know I wanted you to touch on that a bit more and what you think Just cover that statement. Great question.

Lea Pica: 28:39

Yeah, it is. When you get to the chapter on ethical data story data communication, it will come a little bit clearer. So you don't want to start with a story, because what happened in the data should actually paint the picture of the story. If you're creating a story before the data, you're not telling the truth of the data necessarily, so you always want to tell the truth before the data. You're not telling the truth of the data necessarily, so you always want to tell the truth of the data, but you don't want to make it a boring truth. You want to bring elements of taking your audience on a journey with it. So if you know, you are taking what you're seeing in the data. Like Airbnb wants to know what's going wrong with this particular region of their sales, something is happening. So in the data, when you do the analysis, you find that the mobile site, the mobile app, is glitching out. This is simple, right, very simple, basic example. But the mobile app is glitching out for that reason, for some reason, something with that. Those States listings are going awry and they find this in the data. They haven't made up the story around it. They found that this was the reason. Well, they could go in and go your app is glitchy, like that's not an actual story, because they might not understand the real impetus for solving for it. It might be expensive to fix. They might be like, oh okay, who cares. But when you couch it in a story, which would be like you asked us to look at why, blah, blah, blah, this is happening.

Lea Pica: 30:25

We took a number of different routes. We checked over here and everything was fine. We checked the desktop and everything was fine. Check on the mobile version of this region and we found that one of the states is completely glitching out. Like that's how you're bringing that in. You are triggering their emotions intentionally so that they are engaged and actively wanting to do something about it. They're like what they're, they're wanting to know how do I solve this? Oh no, this is terrible, right, but you aren't. You aren't triggering emotions unethically. You aren't telling any truth. You aren't telling any false, false information. You're not manipulating the data. You understand and a lot of people, a lot of times, people confuse storytelling and suspense and drama for manipulation, and it's not. It's just communicating the information away. That leverages how humans interact emotionally with things and are inspired to take action, which is the point of presenting the data in the first place.

Charlie Yielding: 31:46

Yeah, because the data allows you to build trust on the first pass through In a way that you might take some convincing otherwise, and it gives whoever you're telling the tools to run that up the flagpole too. So then they can accurately retell your story from the data's perspective, instead of it just being like oh, they said this thing and so the first person you talk to you may can get them good and worked up in a frenzy, but then they go tell their boss or the buying manager or whomever, and they're like I don't care, and so you're. You're also establishing the ability for them to hand that off as well.

Charlie Apigian: 32:19

Yeah, and you know we've talked about like anecdotal stories and that's more to make it familiar to the person, versus, you know, hitting the emotional component, and you do want to hit the emotional component.

Charlie Apigian: 32:30

Well, sure, sure, but it's to get to think logically and a lot of times it's.

Charlie Apigian: 32:36

You know, we did some presentations in one of my other classes last night and I saw a lot, lot of data, but they were talking about some of the lower income levels and I'm like I didn't feel anything but numbers and I wanted to feel that they're human, there's people behind the data and I think we a lot of times make different decisions if we understand there's humans there, there's a community there, not just numbers. Um, now, some people don't want that because they want to do things, you know, from a profitable perspective, but it is amazing when you can bring out the human component and and a lot of times I think I get that streamlined throughout all of the book and and we're um, the ethical one is what we're going to hit the week before you're going to do your presentations. I want that to be very clear and it's right at the end of the book on that. Thank you, zach, for helping us out. I know we wish we had more time but we want to get to others.

Charlie Apigian: 33:35

But we are talking about ethical considerations.

Lea Pica: 33:39

And could I add something really quickly? Of course, what I wanted to add is that kind of what you're saying. Charlie like it when it lands as just numbers. It's kind of lands with a thud. But I reference the book made to stick in my book with Chip and Dan Heath, and the study that he does with his own college students shows the same results every year Whenever his students present information. The same statistics in a story versus just the statistics. The recall of that information vastly jumps if it is presented as part of the story.

Charlie Apigian: 34:20

Yeah, I think that's what caught your attention, charlie. You were talking about how it's six times or something that people will remember when they can see it, versus just hearing, or when they can visualize it. Basically, I'm not sure what you're talking about. That's okay, that's all right. Well, you were mentioning a stat to me earlier. I was talking about the learning thing.

Charlie Yielding: 34:47

Yeah, the doing it.

Charlie Apigian: 34:49

Oh, the doing part, that's right oh.

Charlie Yielding: 34:51

I see, okay, stuff like that, the cone of learning. It makes me wonder why we even bother with just me telling people what they need to learn. Wonder why we even bother with just me telling people what they need to learn.

Charlie Apigian: 35:03

Just make them do it from the start. I get you there. I want to stick a little bit on the ethical considerations and I've brought Allie Crocker up here to talk to us about that. Let's give her a round of applause, Allie, let's make sure that it's working.

Lea Pica: 35:18

Hey, leah, can you hear me? All right, you sound great that's working.

Student 01: 35:23

Hey, leah, can you hear me? All right, you sound great. Oh, that's great. I just want to say on behalf of the class I think it's awesome that you're willing to do this with us. This is such an incredible opportunity to learn directly from the author of the book that we're studying. So I think I speak on behalf of everybody when I say we're grateful for the opportunity to learn from you and to chat with you. I'm really interested in some ethical considerations when you're forming these data stories, when you're gathering the data. I guess a wonderful place to start would be and of course, it's different on every basis but how typically do you begin collecting the data first? How does that process start?

Lea Pica: 36:22

standing, what's called a readout, where we would just check on the standard numbers that we were monitoring or optimizing for. Or we would get asked a specific question like hey, we have this new project coming. We'd like to understand directionally which way we should go. Or we'd be kind of bopping around the data and actually see something off, like see some major change in one of our conversion rates or what we're spending on advertising, things like that. So the easiest is if we just catch it in the data and we decide to dig deeper. That's kind of the case study that kicked off my my presentation arc at my company when I noticed something wrong with our website site search function and collected a lot of information. That stuff was going not well with that. But when you have more of a standing readout and think you know the book offers some really good starting point questions for that.

Lea Pica: 37:24

The eight or eight or ten questions that are that to kick off the presentation, to look at the kinds of decisions.

Lea Pica: 37:32

If it's for a meeting to look at the kinds of decisions that are being made, what the objective of the meeting is is to arrive at a specific course of action, and that is a starting point.

Lea Pica: 37:46

But then that magic question like what would you like to ask the data if it were a real live person?

Lea Pica: 37:53

If you're catching up at a bar and you're like, yeah, you know I've been doing this thing and I really want to know how this is going and it's you know I've been doing this thing and I really want to know how this is going and it's you're treating it like it's a person, almost like AI, almost like think of it as your AI and you're asking it a question and it wants to spit out an answer for you. So that's how I would first go about it. But once you guys get deeper into act three, which is the peak of protocol, that's where you're really going to start engaging with the data itself and really getting into like you're going to know how to look for the data based on the kinds of questions that we ask in there, and then, as you are going through the methodology, you might go back to the data and look for more information and clarify some stuff to make sure that you're not telling, you know, like a one-sided picture of what's really happening, of a deeper story. Does that make sense?

Student 01: 38:51

It does. That last part you said about telling a one-sided story with the data is really interesting to me. How do you address biases that come up in the data sometimes, or maybe the story that you tell with the data? I'm sure that if you're presenting the data, the story, in front of executives, they may have a certain outcome that they expect from the story or a certain outcome that they, you know, want to take action from later. So how do you deal with biases? How do you deliver news that maybe your executives you're presenting to weren't prepared for?

Lea Pica: 39:31

Oh, I know the bad news bears question. So I think I mentioned this in the chapter around the through line, which you must have gotten through at this point, which is kind of like that focus theme for the entire presentation. If you haven't gotten to the presenting by boxes framework, which is the framework that ties your entire presentation together. In that chapter I talk about handling objections that are based in bias. I actually go pretty deep into confirmation bias into that chapter. It runs rampant.

Lea Pica: 40:07

No one wants to hear their baby is ugly and the thing is with a through line, if you're using the through line in conjunction with some of the objection handling that I give later, that through line can take what sounds like bad news or negative story into. We found it. You're welcome. We found it and we found a number of ways that we believe we can solve for it. So you are, instead of presenting the information that paints you as a villain, you are the hero for finding the villain in the data and then rescuing them with the solution right. So that's one way to spin that. But when you get to people's objections, it's important to remember that they are human beings and they think emotionally right. That's kind of what Brian is also trying to say by that that is, what's coming up is that they're leading with their emotions and they wanted the data to. What's the phrasing Ryan used? And we use emotions to make the decisions, and now I'm forgetting the quote.

Charlie Yielding: 41:21

Back to you on logic to justify it. I think Justify, justify we use emotions to make the decisions.

Lea Pica: 41:25

And now I'm forgetting the quote Justify, justify, so they. The word I'm looking for is substantiate. So they were looking for your data to substantiate the outcome they wanted emotionally right. So when the outcome doesn't match their biased desires, there are strategic ways. That's why this book has a lot of stuff about verbal communication, because there are verbal strategies that you can take to master the psychology of bias a little bit. So one of them, I think, is talking about setting up that you know this is going to conflict with their bias, or you know this is going to feel uncomfortable for them.

Lea Pica: 42:07

So you can actually preface that, get in front of it and say, okay, now I want to let you know this is what the data says. We're coming to you, this is exactly what we're presented with. So here it is. You kind of present it. It's not your fault, you didn't make it that way. That's one thing we kind of have to let go of, and it is what it is. That's the truth of the data, it is what it is.

Lea Pica: 42:42

If you've vetted the numbers, if you've double checked them, it is what it is and you can say now I realize that this might not have been the story you were looking for, or the happy ending, and or we realize that this is going to lead us to a potential decision that we didn't ultimately want. But this is what we're suggesting, based on the data, to have an unbiased course of action. And if this doesn't work, we have a backup plan. We can always go back. You are addressing the emotional components of their objection and their bias by strategically naming that. You know there's a bias. It's a commonly held belief that X, y, z and yet our data is saying otherwise. In this particular case, you're not absorbing any kind of blame for it case. You're not absorbing any kind of blame for it. You're simply setting them up to create a twist that the data is conflicting with a previously held belief, and there's nothing wrong with that.

Charlie Yielding: 43:53

One thing to also keep in mind is this isn't necessarily like a one-off. It's not necessarily a one-off situation so you can tell them like hey, here's exactly what the data says, and if it costs them money, they're just like nah.

Student 01: 44:09

It's not me, it's the data.

Charlie Yielding: 44:11

Yeah Well, they don't care, but they're not going to spend money either because it's not time in the fiscal year or whatnot. And so, if it is important, because, like a tire manufacturer here, like their data science team predicted that they needed 500 more employees during a specific holiday season than what their people knew in their gut. And so there's a real war right now between the old school way of thinking and then the data-driven way of thinking. And then those clash sometimes, and in that case the executives won, but then six months later they were crying uncle because they had lost a ton of money in a very short period of time.

Charlie Apigian: 44:48

And if you could only tell better stories and get them on your side. And that's the whole point of this, allie, thank you so much. Incredible questions. Let's give her a round of applause. Yeah, I hope that helps. All right, as so much incredible questions, let's give a round of applause. All right, as Max and Avery, I'm going to ask you both to come up here at the same time. You mentioned the PICA method. I know that's.

Student 01: 45:09

I don't know, where you got that acronym from.

Charlie Apigian: 45:13

I know, but purpose, insight and aesthetics Nice and I really like. First of all, I love the phrase I think it was for insight. When you say storify the data, I thought that was well and you know, talking about the purpose and really narrowing it down to a question. We're going to probably spend an entire class on that. So I know that's not something that we can get to. All right, we've got two that have come up here because they had kind of the same question.

Charlie Apigian: 45:51

Max and Avery. First of all, I'm going to actually ask them a couple of questions. So I can't get into your whole life story, Max, because you've got an incredible story and we would need another hour for that. But where are you from?

Student 03: 46:08

I'm originally from Austin, texas. I came to Nashville about five years ago and here we are.

Charlie Apigian: 46:13

All right, and what about you, Avery?

Student 04: 46:14

I'm from central Illinois, a couple hours south of Chicago, so I always tell people it's nothing like Chicago, it's just a small little farm town in Illinois.

Charlie Apigian: 46:24

And the reason I ask them those questions is because you all had questions about how to use data in your daily lives. So they were going a little off script and, like you know, we just want to know how we can use data better, and so I'll let them ask Avery, why don't you go first?

Student 04: 46:40

Yeah, yeah, sure, my questions are very vague and very broad, so take them in whatever direction you want to, but for me, I feel like data helps me be aware of where I'm at right now and then helps me stay accountable for where I want to go. So what are some things that you keep track of in your daily life, maybe with data, quantitative or qualitative, that maybe keeps you accountable, helps you stay in a routine, things along that nature.

Lea Pica: 47:11

So how does?

Student 04: 47:11

it help you just overall.

Lea Pica: 47:14

Yeah Well, I mean, I'm kind of a health nut and biohacker, so the very first thing I do in the morning is I check my quality of sleep Me too.

Student 04: 47:26

What do you use to track your sleep?

Charlie Apigian: 47:27

I see you have one.

Lea Pica: 47:28

I have the Aura Ring, okay, which I love, and I love how Aura is really starting to innovate and starting to like like one of the places I'd love to see or ago is I I've learned a lot about the nervous system in terms of managing nerves for public speaking and everything, and I'm, like I said, I'm sort of a health nut. So one of the things, like one thing I love about aura is it tracks how much of a couch potato I'm being and it'll pop up on the phone and go hey, maybe it's time to stretch your legs, you big blob I mean it doesn't call me a big blob, but that's what I hear. Um, so you know, I I love that Like it's keeping an eye on me a little bit, or it detected a workout which I think is so cool and the kind of workout I'm I. I it's also starting to measure stress, so it will say like I'd love to see a notification where it would be like hey, looking like some unusual stress right now, could you take a breather or would you like to do five minute meditation? That's where I think we're going to get into like next level biometric tracking, where it's really going to interface and help with the quality and well-being of your daily life.

Lea Pica: 48:39

And then the other major area I would say is just with money. You know like I track my budget really carefully. I make a game out of it, I make a ritual out of it and I like to make sure I know like, ooh, what's my spend rate? Am I spending higher than you know what I've budgeted this month? Where do I need to pull back? Um, so that's just another way I've enjoyed kind of like keeping a pulse on things for data in life.

Student 04: 49:06

Yeah, that's very interesting. Yeah, I, um, I feel like I do a lot of this, this, a lot of the same things, um, just cause it's so helpful. You know, I feel like sometimes you can start to drift in whatever area of life, whether it's fitness or your budgeting, anything like that. So without the data, you know, it's very hard to stay on track.

Charlie Apigian: 49:25

Fair, isn't it? Do you journal?

Student 04: 49:27

Yeah, yeah, definitely. So I'm a very spiritual person too, so I like to journal that way, and so that was another point I wanted to talk about was qualitative versus quantitative data. You know, a lot of people are like they think of data and they're like, oh, it's just numbers, right. So I'm a finance major, by the way, leah, oh cool. So I feel like that's kind of the rap that finance people get right, they're just data people. They're like, obviously data analytics guys.

Student 04: 49:53

Right, it's a terrible thing yes, but it's very qualitative too, and so that's one area, one of the areas of my life that I like to keep track of with qualitative data, just so I can progress that way.

Charlie Apigian: 50:05

So do you journal digitally or is it by?

Student 04: 50:08

writing A little bit of both. So sometimes I like taking notes on my phone just because it's kind of easier. So sometimes I like taking notes on my phone just because it's kind of easier, you know. But other times I do like a pen and paper just because I feel like it.

Charlie Apigian: 50:20

You know, it generates more thought I like it that way too. But we've talked Charlie and I have talked before about if you were to journal like for 10 years digitally, you could now upload that to an LLM and find out things about you when you were stressed out a lot. So qualitative is actually the term. We've kind of turned on its head ever since AI has really come to the forefront.

Charlie Yielding: 50:45

But you can seriously correlate emotional states with behaviors in a much better way with that type of data too. So anything that's impacting you, so talked about it, like if you're having trouble spiritually or whatever right there could be, you know some sort of catalyst involved that you just don't pay attention to and then you can actually pull that out of the data. So because you can just ask it, like on these three dates, like what's the common?

Student 04: 51:11

yeah right the common denominator, yeah, yeah excellent.

Charlie Apigian: 51:14

I used images as my journaling. I put images into my app all the time and I can go back now, I think, 12 years of images in day one and see my kids that when they were 10 years old. Now they're buying houses and stuff like that. You don't have to brag.

Charlie Yielding: 51:32

I don't know if that's bragging because it's in.

Charlie Apigian: 51:35

Memphis, but that's all right. Even the Memphis thing. That's all right. It's you. Yes, it's supposed to be Tennessee, here Go ahead.

Student 03: 51:46

Yeah Well, first off, again, thank you so much for meeting with us here tonight. It was a real pleasure. But my main thing so I have to use data a lot in my daily life and I've been running into a problem which I really hoped that you'd be able to help me solve. See, I've learned a lot through this class and through the book about the importance of data storytelling, of course, and how we can actually apply it to our daily lives, especially, and everything from those little interactions you have every day with people to the big boardroom meetings, right. But the problem that I've always been struggling with at least more recently now than ever is altering my vocabulary so that I can actually reach the audience I'm supposed to be reaching. You see, I have been able to do okay when I know the audience, going into the actual altercation meeting.

Student 03: 52:36

But, yeah, a little bit of background. I do a little bit of agency work with musicians, and that's very literally being a business person, translating yourself to the vocabulary of a musician, and that can be very hard, especially when you have a diverse group of people. I mean, hell, there have been so many different rooms that I've had to speak to that are comprised of business people, creatives, people that have, you know, english isn't even their first language, right, and you have to really tailor yourself to that. And when you're in a situation where you don't exactly know the full scope of the audience going in, you have this whole meeting and everything, presented with a data story to tell. How exactly do you frame your vocabulary so it reaches that?

Charlie Apigian: 53:16

audience Great question.

Lea Pica: 53:18

Wow. By the way, everyone sounds like a radio star that has spoken to me, this is magical.

Charlie Apigian: 53:24

I don't know what's going on, but that's right, that's true, very impressed. I have never had a class where they're so engaged.

Lea Pica: 53:32

They love to talk in a very, very I don't know.

Charlie Apigian: 53:37

I've had a ball so far, so yeah, go ahead. I don't want to.

Student 04: 53:41

No, all I was going to add was I told you this is the best way I think we learn as a class is just having these discussions like this.

Charlie Apigian: 53:47

Absolutely, you know that happens to me in every class that I teach. I came into I'm supposed to be teaching analytics and all we're doing is having conversations.

Student 04: 53:57

And.

Charlie Apigian: 53:58

I don't know if they're learning anything, but I'm learning a ton and I think that's a great question, Because I mean even in your scenario, you had to feel us out at first.

Student 03: 54:07

Like think about it. You had to alter your vocabulary from and I can even tell from day one till right now. I mean, just the rapport alone is different. It's more relaxed. There was a mold that had to be broken through, and when you're meeting a group of people for the very first time, where you have absolutely no idea who they are and what they're like, breaking that mold, what is the most effective way to do that?

Charlie Apigian: 54:26

That's a great question, just use all the industry terms. Yeah, go ahead yeah.

Lea Pica: 54:32

So what I would do is recon in advance. Advance. I would not let the first time you learn about this audience to be the first time you interface with them directly in a presentation setting. So do you have people on the inside track or do you know people on teams that can make introductions so that you could sit down with them in advance and say hey, I'm going to be talking to this group for the first time. I'm super nervous because I I'm not familiar with their vocab yet.

Lea Pica: 55:07

Um, can you give me like a glossary, like what kinds of terms are tossed around a lot? What are sort of the acronyms or the buzzwords? Do they talk about synergies and out of the box and all that stuff? Or you know what kinds of lingo is going to help me sound like I'm in the know, so I can be more aware, and then so you do some recon and you do the best you can with that, but then you really just allow the mystery to unfold when you are there with them. You listen as they speak and you ask, oh, could someone break that? That's a new term. Could someone break that down for me? Enjoy the process. Sometimes I think we take on the energy of like oh, we should have known that. Oh, I don't, I'm scared, I don't fit in here Instead of embracing the actual fun of getting to know the new vocabulary and and showing how earnestly you want to learn how to speak in a way they recognize Does that make sense?

Student 03: 56:11

Yes, thank you. I really appreciate that.

Lea Pica: 56:13

Embrace what I should send you guys after. What I'll send you guys after is this reminds me of a series of videos called the Gen Z breakup, where it's these two actors that are breaking up, but in complete Gen Z language. So when I'm starting to coach people in that, in that generation, and had to have my 11-year-old son sit down with me and pause every five seconds to decode what the hell they just said and like bet and on God and catch these hands and whatever else, and it was hilariously funny, but I had to have him sit down I'm like you have to tell me what all these means, because my clients are saying these things and I don't. I don't have a clue what that means. Am I just old? Which yes, Sam, but but we made it fun and we made it a process and he knew every single term and I sort of 30% understand now what they were saying and I sort of 30%.

Charlie Apigian: 57:15

Understand now what they were saying. If you can't embrace that ambiguity going in, it's always going to be there, and you're right. I mean, leah, you were doing recon for this, right. You're like, okay, what is the level, how should I talk? And I just kept saying, oh, just be yourself, just be yourself, just be yourself. You're like, okay, that's not enough. But I think you've nailed it for today and go ahead. Charlie, I know you had a question.

Charlie Yielding: 57:41

I've always got stuff to say.

Charlie Apigian: 57:42

Yeah, I know.

Charlie Yielding: 57:43

I have to deal with this a lot in my industry because I deal with mobility and nobody doesn't know anything about the backside of mobility, and so I misstep a lot of times and say you know, know, use industry terms or whatever. But every like I've, I've said the the things enough to know, like what is in my industry and what's not. And so every time I I give them a piece of information that's got that in there, I'm like now explain it back to me or you understand what I'm saying about, like what exactly that is. And I always usually get some sort of confirmation back from them that they do, because if they're just like yeah, yeah, yeah, and then you just can't, you can't go off.

Charlie Apigian: 58:17

You know, I gotta say that actually is a really good follow-up into another question I had and, and mainly if you guys have the time, we'll let this one be the last, and then, uh, leah, I'm not gonna let you go without knowing what's uh, what you're up to these days and what's up next as well this is just real quick, but mainly it is about that follow-up.

Student 03: 58:33

So let's say you have just told the absolute best data story possible. It resonated with literally everyone there except for one person. What is the best way you would go about following up with them to reinstate what you just saw, because you're probably not going to send them the PowerPoint you just showed? Right, because it didn't really work the first time. Right? How would you want to go about reframing that just to really hit this one individual At least on the back end?

Lea Pica: 59:01

Well, one of the later chapters, I think in Act 4, is how to send a document version of what you presented. That is a perfect, concrete, self-driven reminder and refresher of what you presented. And I give my whole step-by-step process for taking a live presentation, which you're now. Especially when you guys get into the slide design, you're going to see that things are going to be way simpler than you might be used to, not a million things packed onto one slide, but that's not going to necessarily translate well to an offline handout that people record, that people want of that. So it's about creating two different documents, but one is really geared to how to engage people in a visual and verbal capacity at the same time. And then how do you condense all of that information into something readable and a self-driven journey?

Charlie Apigian: 1:00:00

Thank you, that is a great. I actually was saying that to my class last night. It's, I'm going to force everybody to do a one pager with every presentation. You know, first of all it forces you down to getting things onto one page so that at least you've got something for yourself. But I notice I'm doing that more because when they ask questions, they're not going to remember everything I'm saying. But if I can put that now on a one-pager or two pages afterwards, you know, because all I'm looking to do is get the next conversation and then I'm going to I know that that's when action happens and getting to that point, anything that you can do, the leave behind is very powerful. And then say act like they were when you talk to them, that they were incredibly enthused. Say, thank you so much for being there, I was so happy. You know whatever, but great, great questions. Let's give and you guys can stay up here because we're going to be wrapping up. Let's give, and you guys can stay up here because we're going to be wrapping up. But let's give Avery and Max a big hand. Great job. And Leah, thank you for your time.

Charlie Apigian: 1:01:04

Actually, I've even got friends there that came here and we're going to do a little bit more interviewing and networking with them. So we'll have some live stuff and so I'm putting them through the ringer tonight. But I know that, first of all, you're not just an author. You do so much more than that. So tell us a little bit of what you're up to now, and I think you might even be going and doing some new stuff. I heard through one of our conversations in the past and you're gonna be like what's he talking about? But I'll get to that. But you go ahead. What are you up to these days?

Lea Pica: 1:01:41

Well, for this main business. So I actually kind of run two businesses side by side, but for this main business. My next big thing is I'm going to be creating kind of a really condensed online course. I already have a master online course companion to this book, but I'll be creating a really condensed course with a company in the hopes of getting it on LinkedIn Learning, which is super, super cool. I've been wanting to get material on there for a while, trying to get the book out into more hands, and this is the year where I'm going to be talking more about how AI can be used to help enhance and facilitate the presentation process, but not replace, not replace you or any core elements of you. Know what I teach in the book. So it's a new frontier and I'm excited because, oh man, I tried to go into chat GBT and ask it to create a beautiful, simple presentation slide describing something and it just went completely awry. So I was like, okay, my job is secure.

Charlie Apigian: 1:02:52

I'm not going anywhere. Humans still need to be in the loop. Yes, yes, exactly, and I think I was referring to your separate business and you don't have to.

Lea Pica: 1:03:03

I don't know if that's in stealth mode or anything, but it's kind of, but I'm also a relationship coach and they have a lot of overlap. So one of the ways I'm trying to kind of cross is I'm seeking to see how I can expand into more interpersonal dynamics at work, you know, communication dynamics, conflict resolution. I'm interested in kind of branching out into that, because I'm all about improving the well-being of people and because people affect our well-being so much, our interactions affect that so much, that I'm seeking to sort of get a little less technical and more into the softer interpersonal things about how do we create excellent work, school, home environments where we all thrive Great.

Charlie Apigian: 1:03:54

And so where would? For students and everybody else, what's the best way to see what you're up to? Your website is just your name, correct? Yep, LeahPicacom. Leah, and that's L-E-A-P-I-C-Acom. I think I got that right. And what about the socials? Any of those that you are active on?

Lea Pica: 1:04:19

The main one I'm active on is just LinkedIn. Same Leah Pica, Gotcha X is. I don't know what's going on there. We don't either Backed away.

Charlie Apigian: 1:04:26

Yeah, I saw your comment. Charlie had a comment about threads. He goes.

Charlie Yielding: 1:04:30

I think I'm just saying it's like yelling down a hallway. Yelling down an empty hallway, yeah exactly.

Charlie Apigian: 1:04:38

That was good, Charlie. Anything else?

Charlie Yielding: 1:04:40

No, no, it's been very informative.

Charlie Apigian: 1:04:43

Yeah, thank you so much. Did we convince you to fly here and do a class live? I don't know. Come on, let's see if we can get that going here, who's flying? Well, no pressure.

Lea Pica: 1:04:57

That'd be amazing.

Charlie Apigian: 1:04:58

I wish I had funding to make you come here.

Lea Pica: 1:05:00

Maybe I can find that the networking event will make her want to come Well you know, last year I couldn't make the Nashville Analytics Summit because I had to leave for Budapest the day that I would have been able to present. I know I sound so fancy but it almost never happens, but you know if I get invited back this year and I'm free.

Charlie Apigian: 1:05:24

Oh, zach and I actually were talking this weekend and we have an idea for a track of superstars as part of the analytics data storytelling, and we've already. You will be getting a call here soon, so I know you're coming to Nashville I think it's October this year. So we hope to get you here for that for sure.

Lea Pica: 1:05:43

All right, All right. Thanks again, Leah. Thank you everyone. Good luck. I hope to hear how you all are doing.

Charlie Apigian: 1:05:52

Wish you all the best. This was an absolute pleasure. Can't thank you enough. I'm glad we waited till now to do this so that we could record it. Me too, yeah, he, every time I start the ending part. I'm just going to keep going for a second here because Charlie always interrupts me and is in the background being silly. I'm saying goodbye to somebody here and thank you again, and I might reach out to you just to make sure I have all of your contact website, all that stuff and other than that. Have a wonderful night Perfect.

Lea Pica: 1:06:33

All right, good night, everybody Leaving on a high note. See ya, there you go you.