Storytelling For Data People

Never Stop Learning Opener

Jacki Lutz 0:18

I usually always learn something from the conversation. So I usually just am honest. Like this was my takeaway. So this should be yours.

Ryan Henderson 0:25

My my like pre-baked one is is just like never stop learning, is kind of like the takeaway is that you always like be like pushing your boundaries on communication front. So that's my that's what I might be going with. So don't steal it.

Jacki Lutz 0:36

I'm gonna take it just so that you freak out.

Ryan Henderson 0:38

You'll just see me look at the camera and go like an office moment zooms in my face.

Welcome And Meet The Guests

Jacki Lutz 0:50

Welcome to Auto Care on Air, a candid podcast for Curious Industry. I'm Jackie Lutz, Content Director at the Auto Care Association, and this is Carpool Conversations, where we collaborate on today's most relevant power skills. We are all headed in the same direction, so let's get there together. Hello, everybody, and welcome to another Carpool Conversation. I'm Jackie Lutz, and I am here with Ryan Henderson with CarParts.com and Brian Mathias with Dorman. Welcome, guys.

Brian Matthias 1:27

Thanks for having us.

Jacki Lutz 1:28

We are at Connect in Atlanta, and ACPN is gonna kick off later today, right? Yeah. Yep. Um, you guys both sit on the council for that for the time being. Brian, you are the incoming vice chair for ACPN.

Brian Matthias 1:40

Correct. I'm excited about that.

Jacki Lutz 1:42

Yeah, that's amazing. And then Ryan, you're rolling off.

Ryan Henderson 1:44

I am rolling off this time. Very sad, but an amazing group of people, and they're in great hands. So very excited for them.

Jacki Lutz 1:50

Yeah. Well, I'm sure that they enjoyed having you on the council. And I'm so glad that we get to make your legacy last longer with this podcast. Um, but yeah, real quick, do you guys just want to introduce yourselves before we dive into our subject today?

Ryan Henderson 2:01

Yeah, I'll I'll start. Yeah, so Ryan Henderson, I'm the VP of dating catalog at carparts.com. Uh so you know, everything fitmin. It's just kind of this is the perfect place for for me to come by here. Um I've been in the industry now for I think 10, 15 years or something like that. It's it's uh, but I originally started as a mechanic. That was like my intro into automotive, um, working on cars and then eventually installing tires. So it's like I've I've been behind the counter and it's it's there's a lot to learn from that space. Um, so it's that's like a lot of what I try to do is make sure that I keep that in mind. Is that like that's the person that we're trying to make this helpful for and happy for? Is that not just the person behind the counter, but also the customer as well?

Brian Matthias 2:42

Absolutely. I've uh I've been in the aftermarket for about 15 years now, always in this data marketing, helping people find the right part kind of area. I'm the senior content syndication manager at Dorman Products. And basically what that means is I help sell our parts. Um I want to make sure that the end user knows they're buying the right part at the right time. Yep.

Jacki Lutz 3:05

It is so wild to hear my peers in the industry say things like they've been in the industry for 15 years. Yes. Because I don't remember really a time where I didn't know you or know of you or know your face. And I have, I'm going on 13 years. What's happening?

Ryan Henderson 3:20

Yeah, yeah. No, well, and then the the great part is that we actually work together, you know, professionally as well, right? Is that that we we have some interactions with one another, and that's great to see and talk about because we can have candid conversations about our data behind the scenes, what's happening, and and say this is how this is, uh, without you know, some of the kind of fluff that sometimes comes with those interactions and conversations.

Jacki Lutz 3:40

Absolutely. It's like one of the benefits of being so involved and getting really involved. Which speaking of, I do want to mention, Brian, because by the time this comes out, it will be known. But you are an impact award winner this year.

Ryan Henderson 3:52

Congratulations. Thank you.

Jacki Lutz 3:54

It's long overdue.

Brian Matthias 3:55

Absolutely. I mean, it it's it's an honor. There's so many awesome people that have won it. And even the people also winning it this year, um, I've learned a ton from.

Jacki Lutz 4:05

It's an amazing class.

Brian Matthias 4:06

It's i I looked at the list and go, okay, maybe next year. It was an honor to be a winner this year.

Jacki Lutz 4:11

Yeah. Well, you're very humble about it because I think it was long overdue. And I was very happy to see the winners this year.

Brian Matthias 4:17

Awesome.

Why Data Needs Storytelling

Jacki Lutz 4:17

All of them very deserving. Um, so basically, what we did for this episode is I wanted to give ACPN the opportunity to kind of design their own episode, um, kind of brought to bring it to their members and what's important to them. And um, your guys' names came up, and you guys came up with the subject that we're gonna go over today, which is communication through storytelling. So, why don't you guys talk a little bit about why you guys think this is so important for your community and for professionals in the automotive app to market?

Brian Matthias 4:42

I'll let you go. Cool. Um, so this is one of the biggest things in my career. I I've needed to get out of that data person space. Um, unfortunately, sometimes you get put in the corner, you're a data person, you kind of speak in just the ones and zeros, and you don't really know how to communicate. That's unfortunately kind of a caveat that goes along with our world. I think I think most people that attend ACPN might say, eh, that's kind of the stigma that we get. Um, one of the biggest things that I'm passionate about, one of the kind of biggest growth factors in my career was figuring out how to communicate all this deep knowledge of cataloging, content, how systems work to other departments where I work or other businesses and customers.

Ryan Henderson 5:27

No, I I think all great points on that. And it's something that like has also kind of evolved in my career as well. And I saw how important that was because you you don't realize that communication is such an important piece of your day because the actual day-to-day work, like Excel spreadsheets and things like that, are relatively easy. They use your brain, but you know, working with people is the hard part. Is that it? And I mean that like in the best way possible. I don't mean to, you know, but it it's my preferred mode of working is like headphones on, no eye contact, let leave me on my computer, let me do what I I need to do, kind of thing. Um, so I I understand that communication can be difficult, but it is such an important piece because you communicate um your intentions, your ideas, your thoughts. Um, because not everyone is has the same kind of thought process in your head. So it's so important to be able to take that and share it with everyone else so they understand what you're you're trying to get to.

Jacki Lutz 6:17

Well, it's challenging on both sides. It's challenging for you to take something that's probably very complicated and simplify it into terms that someone like me, who's not a data person, can understand. But then also for me to be able to, you know, grasp what you're saying. And I think just in general, sharing a vision is like a huge skill. Yeah. And it is storytelling. Like for any leader, anywhere, any CEO, whatever, you're gonna bring your company in a different direction, or or even just like on your on your marketing team, whatever it is, you know, being able to share a vision in a way that makes sense to the group that you're talking to so that they can kind of get behind it and move forward. Yeah, like that's that's a great skill. So I'm really excited that you guys brought up this subject.

The Lego Model For Data

Jacki Lutz 6:56

And I have to say, there was an image that one of you sent, Ryan. I think it was you, who it was about with I'm not gonna try to make this audible, but I'm gonna I'm gonna throw it over to you. But it was about Legos and different ways to organize them.

Ryan Henderson 7:09

Yeah, it's a classic LinkedIn post, right? Like if you see this before, is that imagine a heap of Legos of various sizes and shapes, like just the actual raw bricks themselves. And there's different sizes and different colors and different types, things like that. And so imagine that as like your data within your database, whatever it might be. That's what a raw database looks like, it's just a heap of Legos, and it means nothing. Uh, and there's different ways to organize that to show a story, right? So the first thing would be all right, sort by color. How many of these are the same color, but they're all different shapes and sizes? All right, I want to shape by or sort it by shape and size, but different colors. So you can come to all these different, you know, things where you say, this is this, this is this, but that doesn't mean anything. You're just sorting the same pile a couple different times and you learn something. But then you can take those and build uh a house, a rocket ship, uh, an airplane out of those pieces. And now you're using those data pieces to build a story where you say these 14 pieces and these colors together make this rocket ship, and that's what this looks like. So that's that's kind of like a really high-level version of taking your raw database and then making a story out of it. It's not just sorting, you're making something out of it.

Jacki Lutz 8:12

And making it simple enough for someone like me to understand, which is why I love that

Make Acronyms Human And Clear

Jacki Lutz 8:16

so much. So let's get into just some practical tips for people and like how they can do this better. So, does anything come you know to the top of your brain about any a story you have or any instance that you have where you went at something in a certain direction and it went very well?

Brian Matthias 8:34

Yeah.

Ryan Henderson 8:35

Yep.

Brian Matthias 8:35

I agree. I I think there's a few times where I've had to overexplain things. Um, it was particularly around I work a lot with aces and pies. And one of the first things I do um to make sure someone understands the difference between aces and pies is hey, when I say aces, A, A for applications. That's your either your simple trick, make sure that you understand it. P pies, product data. Um that way that that gets them the confident understanding, gives them an easy way to understand it going forward and if it's dropped in conversation in the future. But it's fun. I pretty sure everybody is like, oh no, that's that's simple. They're they're not offended. I don't make it too simple. Um, and they they get it. And we can have those conversations, and I can say pies and aces, and they understand the difference between the two.

Ryan Henderson 9:26

See, I think that's a great point about the whole, you know, A for A for applications and P for producing is that like I don't do a good job at that. I think I just try like beating them over the head with aces and pies until they get it thing. So I mean to your point, is people probably pick it up faster because of that. And those like little tricks like that are huge. So that's that's a great one.

Jacki Lutz 9:45

Yeah, I actually just learned um that's helpful for me because it's hard for me to articulate sometimes the difference between ACEs and pies. That helps a lot. Yep. I think you just probably helped a whole community of people who are not in ACEs and pies. Yeah. Um, but you mentioned like over-explaining everything, but also not overcomplicating it. So maybe too much detail could send you in the opposite direction.

Brian Matthias 10:04

Absolutely. I think not just our industry, every industry and every department has their own set of acronyms. And when you get into these acronyms, ACES PIS, they actually stand for something aftermarket catalog exchange standard. Okay, no one really needs to know that. Um, they everybody seems like they just want to file the applications, your year make models. Um, but it goes for when I'm in conversations with supply chain um and software companies have their own level of ERP, CRM, damn, like you get lost in it. One of the things that I found that helps people is when you're explaining a system. So I say, DAM, and that's a digital asset management system. Um I always make sure to say the full context of it for anyone in the room. They don't have to ask. I it's over-explaining. There might be a room of experts. People have heard it before, but it takes a half a second to say the the longer word, not use the acronym.

Jacki Lutz 11:42

Yeah.

Ryan Henderson 11:43

Using accessible language, right? Is that you want to make sure that everyone in the room feels included in the conversation as well. Because we're all experts in our own fields, right? Is that someone in marketing could, you know, run circles around me in their field. And so you want to bring it to everyone so we have like a shared understanding of the subject. Yeah.

Jacki Lutz 11:59

I think that is such a good advice for anyone in any profession is the acronyms. Like just in marketing. I remember when SEO was kind of becoming a term we used a lot. And every time I would have to go back and explain it. And I'd always wait till someone asks because I'm like, at some point, everyone's gonna know what SEO was, but they just they weren't getting it. You have to use the whole thing. So it's like that's great advice. Um, what else?

Ryan Henderson 12:22

I'd say like passion is very important. And uh so if you have a standpoint or something that you want to get across, is being passionate about what that means to you. Because a lot of times as you're trying to explain to someone what the actual core of it is, but you have to attack it from different angles. So if you're passionate about that core idea, not necessarily how you get to that point, that's very important for me, whereas I can say to someone like, I need you to understand that this is happening to the company. But you might have to tell them in 14 different ways that sounds different, but you're getting to that core point and being persistent and making sure that you're being patient and calm with the person you're talking with, because you're not coming from the same standpoints, you're not understanding the same, you know. If you're talking once again to a salesperson, is that they have different metrics and KPIs than you do, and you say, No, no, I want to increase application count, and then they're thinking, how does this affect sales? And you might have to put that, but at the same time, as you're getting to that point, that core point you're trying to understand or you know, preach to the to the team, that's that's super important. Be passionate about that final message.

Jacki Lutz 13:20

Yeah. It's kind of like give them the why for them. Like, what does it matter to them?

Ryan Henderson 13:26

Exactly. Yes.

Jacki Lutz 13:27

Yeah,

Match Detail To The Audience

Jacki Lutz 13:27

I can totally see that. And then kind of to the earlier point about deep being detailed or not too detailed. Um, one point you guys made in our pre-meeting that I thought was really good is you have to think about the level of person that you're speaking to. So maybe a CEO doesn't want to dive so deep.

Ryan Henderson 13:46

Yeah.

Jacki Lutz 13:46

You know what I mean? But like you have to kind of pick out what details are gonna be important for that level.

Brian Matthias 13:53

Yeah, you know. I think there's a personal learning journey to understand kind of your your organization of what type of role handles what at your business. And I think learning that allows you to communicate. I may not need to explain everything to my leader. There's scenarios in the past where I've had leaders that they just want yes or no answers. I was never a yes or no person. There's always an explanation or a yes but, no, but. Um, most people um throughout the chain, if you're speaking up, they get they want your direction. They they have you there, you're the expert. They need your advice to make a decision. You need to articulate that very clearly to them. Uh sometimes they they get to know you, they know you might explain things, but the more simplified, the easier it is for them to like have to sort through your messaging.

Jacki Lutz 14:42

Yeah.

Ryan Henderson 14:43

No, I I think that's great because I imagine it as a funnel, right? Is that in the upper part of the funnel is the world, right? That's all the data, all the information. And then people sit on different parts of that funnel. Is that when you get to maybe a C-suite or something like that, they want to be at the bottom of the funnel, they want the yes or no, the the final decision. Um, because they they they're receiving, you know, that's the other thing is like understanding about why they're like that helps a lot, is because they're receiving 1500 of these a day, right? So they they don't have the time to sort through your three, four paragraphs. So you have to kind of narrow that funnel down. And so understanding where someone sits on the information funnel. Like I have people I can send four pages of data to and they love it. It's their it's their favorite thing of the day. Um it's my nightmare. Yeah, right. So you're you're just lower on the funnel, right? Like like you need you need the information a bit more compact, and that's fine. That's that's why we have the the that kind of information funnel to get to the points. And that's the that's the point of all this is to get to one singular action to come out of that data.

Brian Matthias 15:40

Yeah, and you kind of know certain audiences, whether it goes up the chain or it's different departments. So I'm gonna communicate differently to my sales team versus my marketing team. My marketing team is more interested in the pies type product information. And they want to know when all the awesome graphics work they do will make it to a customer's website. While the sales team would want to understand the application side, when do we add coverage? When would we expect higher demand? Um, so it it's knowing who cares about what from your world, who has the expectation that it's gonna help either show off their work or cause a lift in sales, knowing that the end result of everything going through you or you being an expert there changes something for someone else in the company and being able to commute communicate that is a huge win.

Jacki Lutz 16:33

Yeah, and can you I'm just if I were to flip the switch real quick and say like somebody is speaking to you and not

Use Vulnerability To Clarify

Jacki Lutz 16:40

doing all the things that you guys are saying, is there a way that people can really prompt them to be, you know, tell the story you know, a little bit differently?

Ryan Henderson 16:51

I I think what we talked about this morning actually was great was you say I don't understand or I don't know. I I think being vulnerable is as a listener is super important. And then if someone says something to that you don't understand, say it. Say I don't understand what you're talking about, or I don't understand what the point you're getting to. And I'm most of the time, people will be very happy to explain that to you in a different way. Um and just being open to the idea that you don't know everything is huge. That opens the doors for people to explain things to you infinitely.

Jacki Lutz 17:19

Yeah.

Brian Matthias 17:19

Yeah, that's honestly like uh this morning we were talking about it. Um, and it was a scenario where really comfortable had someone come in, they are really excited to be a new contributor at my company, and they are very humble. They they come to us and say, Hey, I'm not sure I don't understand this yet. And I said, It's great for learning. It's great for learning. Um like one of the great benefits out of a uh someone I'm looking to hire now would be someone that feels very comfortable with admitting they don't understand anything yet.

Jacki Lutz 17:53

I will die on that bridge forever. Like I I'm very quick to say I don't know things. I feel like being authentic in that way takes the pressure off and it makes people's expectations not be like, okay, well, she's she's the pro at this, she knows everything, and then I fall on my face. That looks way worse than me admitting that I just don't know what I'm learning. Yeah. Right. I'm doing everything I can to be the best at this, but like just you know, setting that expectation a little bit and helps people communicate with you properly.

Ryan Henderson 18:18

Yeah, and sometimes it can help, you know, make the person feel more comfortable talking to you. Because sometimes if they're nervous about the situation and you go, I don't understand that. Can you explain that to me? They're like, oh, good. Like this person's not, you know, omni they don't know everything, right? Then they're not like a all being, all seeing kind of thing.

Jacki Lutz 18:33

So it's like evens the playing field a little bit.

Ryan Henderson 18:35

They're like, oh, good. Like they they don't they're they're not, you know, crazy above and beyond is that okay, you're down the level with me, we can talk about this guy now.

Jacki Lutz 18:42

So they're not gonna correct everything that I say. Yeah. So what about like managing up then? Like, what if it's your manager that is a little weak in this?

Ryan Henderson 18:50

Yeah, I struggle

Manage Up With Cleaner Messages

Ryan Henderson 18:51

the most with this, so it's really difficult for me because I am like I'm on the upper side of the funnel where I love to have more data, more information. So um just narrowing it down is is this isn't for every person organization, but you're generally, if you're um speaking upwards, you're gonna have to narrow your scope a little bit more and finding out what is important in there. And so I've a lot of times will go back and just read my email and and say what can be deleted from this, what what is not necessary in this? So the filler words like if you're you know, hey, good morning, how's everything going? How's your weekend? Um, my weekend was great. And then you and then you get to the ask, it's like, well, you can probably get rid of some of that. We're all you know, be it's nice to be, you know, courteous and professional, but at a certain point you you're you're trying to get the point across. So you can you just narrow down the email the scope a bit more, and so you're you're wandering a bit less. And that that seems to help me a lot is just to to to focus your your ask in there a lot more while still being nice and courteous.

Jacki Lutz 19:43

I just had such an aha moment with you just now because I used to in my previous life, in my previous career, I used to work a lot with engineers. And my I didn't know that I was doing this, but my emails were very much like what you're saying. No, no niceties. Yeah. Just like, hey, this is what I found out. Here's the details that you needed. Let me know if you need anything else. Boom, yeah, done. Where like now working with the Auto Care Association, it's a lot less of that. It's more like, hey, I hope you had a good weekend with your mom, you know, it's just like more niceties. And I guess I didn't even realize that I made that adjustment.

Ryan Henderson 20:15

Yeah. That's a great uh example of how you speak to so it's like that's I'm definitely coming from a lot more technical standpoint where I work with the engineers and they they prefer those emails and things like that. But there are some people who though those niceties open the door to um, you know, more conversations as well. And that's how you get to the point that you want to talk about. So it's it's huge that you adjust to that, and that's a great way to look at it.

Jacki Lutz 20:36

Yeah.

Brian Matthias 20:37

Yeah. I think the niceties are needed in an introduction phase. You can't just uh kind of give them go straight to the facts right away when it's you don't really know the person. I think that you can switch to that over time once they understand what your role is, where you work, what team you're on, that type of thing.

Ryan Henderson 20:56

I'm very passionate about um the no hello. I'm not sure you've heard this before. No on Teams or any of the instant messaging things, um, is that people they'll they'll come in and say um hello or hi, right? Um it's very important that you just kind of get you're not you're not waiting for that, right? So someone says hi, and then they wait for you to respond back to give you the ask. You can say hi, but then have the ask in the same thing as well, right? Because you if you're you're delaying based on just a hello. So there's a even a website, I think, called like nohello.com or something like that, where it's based on like like telling people how to not do that. So you can still be nice and still put your criticism, but but always your ask goes along with that as well.

Jacki Lutz 21:31

It's actually probably just really good advice to be prioritized because if I have three people contacting me on Teams and one of them just said hi, yeah, and the other three gave me what they need, yeah. I'm probably gonna address those three for me. Okay.

Ryan Henderson 21:42

And say hi and then the ask. Like it's okay to have that. But then if it's just hi and you need me to come back and say hi for the ask, it you're it's just you know.

Jacki Lutz 21:50

I mean, are gifts still okay on TV? Gifts are great. Because that's basically how me and Stacey communicate.

Ryan Henderson 21:54

No, that's I mean, that's gifts are actually encouraged. That's the best way to go.

Jacki Lutz 21:57

I just I feel like it just is more all encompassing of the spirit of what you're trying to say.

Ryan Henderson 22:00

100%. So gif and the ask.

Jacki Lutz 22:02

Okay.

Ryan Henderson 22:04

Don't bury the ask.

Jacki Lutz 22:06

Yeah. Um, so believe it or not, time flies. Um, but I would love to just go around the room really quick

Takeaways Plus AI As A Tool

Jacki Lutz 22:14

and just kind of get everybody's takeaway. If everybody was gonna take one thing away from this entire conversation, we have very short capacities these days. What do each of you hope that that is?

Ryan Henderson 22:26

I'd say never stop learning is huge. And that that goes across a lot of things and it's very broad, but you know, um, every conversation you have, you obviously don't have to, you know, psychoanalyze every person, but it's great to understand people's, you know, where they're good or where they're bad. So, you know, I know at at work, I know everyone uh who prefers phone calls, who prefers Teams or Outlook or whatever it might be. They have a preferred communication style, and and just being a student of that is it will take you so far because you you you make people comfortable in their own space and they're gonna want to work with you more and do things with you because you make it comfortable for them as well.

Brian Matthias 23:01

Yeah, I think there's a few simple ones. Primarily, just you can use AI, some sort of chatbot, to uh uh put in a response and ask it what level do you think this is appropriate for? Yeah. So hey, I need to send this. Is this a summary good enough for a senior vice president? It'll give you that honest feedback, and that's a great tool that everybody should be using now.

Jacki Lutz 23:24

Yeah, that's a great, that's a great practical takeaway. Um and mine, honestly, I think I'm gonna go with sometimes we I have never tackled a skill on this podcast that I didn't think people could learn. Okay. And I think a lot of times people think like, well, this is just the way I am. You know, I'm introverted or I'm a data guy. So like I'm not a good storyteller, I'm not a good communicator that way. But these are skills that you can learn, absolutely, by listening to podcasts like this, by listening to more that are out there about this kind of stuff, and then about practicing it and doing reps, right? And just trying it. So um, I would encourage everybody, give it a try, see how it goes. Um, there's really nowhere but up in a lot of cases.

Ryan Henderson 24:08

So yeah, because that's the thing is that if someone's uncomfortable with the way things are going and you make a minute improvement to that, you've already won at that point.

Jacki Lutz 24:16

Yeah, one percent better, right? That's all you thank you so much for this conversation. Really appreciate your guys' insights.

Brian Matthias 24:24

Thank you for having us.

Jacki Lutz 24:25

Thanks for tuning in to another episode of Auto Care on Air. Make sure to subscribe to our podcast so that you never miss an episode. And don't forget

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Jacki Lutz 24:32

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