When A Picture Paints 1000 Words
And the pictures aren't worth much and there are too many words
There’s nothing wrong with photography and graphics in corporate reports. Unless they divert attention from the real issues. Then there is something very wrong.
I’ll illustrate three ways this happens, and how to avoid all three.
The first way is using images that are not representative of reality. They may even suggest the opposite of what’s going on. I call this using “unreal photos”.
The second way is using a confusing blend of images, graphs, and tables that obscure the truth. I call this “pretend visualizations.”
The third way is a twist on the second: not using images, while burying important data in overly dense, complex text, when an image or graphic would catch the reader’s eye and explain better. I call this “under-imaging”.
The fix for all three is simple:
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