Big data, or B.S.?
April 12, 2016
Consulting firm claims to have created an "analytics platform to "measure, evaluate and dramatically improve" leadership communication.
We got wind of it last week, through a splashy article on Stanford Business Schoolโs website titled excitingly, โA Big Data Approach to Public Speaking.โ
An Austin, Tex.-based consultancy called Quantified Communications โanalyzed more than 100,000 presentations from corporate executives, politicians and keynote speakers,โ according to the Stanford piece. โThey examined behaviors ranging from word choices and vocal cues to facial expressions and gesture frequency. They then used this data to rate and rank important communication variables such as persuasiveness, confidence, warmth, and clarity.โ
Letโs set aside the fact that the above paragraph reads like a suicide note.
The insights the โbig dataโ yielded are atย once completely commonplaceโstrong and clear language matters, vocal qualities matter, gestures matter, authenticity is goodโandย comically specific.
For instance, the company claims that โthe language used in corporate earnings calls affects up to 2.5% of stock price improvement,โ according to the Stanford piece. โUp toโ 2.5%? How on earth could they come up with that?
We also learn that โa 10% increase in vocal variety can have a highly significant impact on your audience's attention to and retention of your message.โ How do you measure a 10% increase in variety, and how do you NOT measure the size of the impact beyond saying, โhighly significant.โ
And finallyโget your mind ready for this oneโwe learn that โthe top 10% of authentic speakers were considered to be 1.3 times more trustworthy and 1.3 times more persuasive than the average communicator.โ The Stanford piece adds, โAuthenticity is made up of the passion and warmth that people have when presenting.โ
The folks at Quantified Communications have some explaining to do, to natively skeptical speechwriters everywhere: About how they actually โanalyzedโ 100,000 presentations, how they came to the figures they came to, and most importantly, to what imaginable use might this big data be put by working leadership communicators who already know that compelling communication is the combined result of what the speaker says and how the speaker says it.
They have explaining to do, and they should have a platform to do it.
So weโre sending this article to Quantified Communicationsโ executive communications practice lead Briar Goldberg, and weโll publish her response. โDM