Tali doesn't always get a question exactly right first time, and that's normal. Natural language is often ambiguous, and Tali has to make a judgement call about what you mean. This guide covers the quickest ways to put that right, plus what a few common error messages actually mean.

If a report is close but not quite right, you don't need to throw the question away and start again. Just tell Tali what to change in your next message. For example, if a report on applications by team is missing a team you expected to see, follow up with "include the London team as well" rather than rewriting the whole question from scratch.

You can nudge Tali to use a different field, value or calculation the same way, by simply stating the correction as your next message.

Tali's answers are interactive. You can click into a specific point on a chart, for example one bar in a bar chart, to explore that part of the data further without asking a whole new question.

If a report is close but you'd rather adjust it directly than describe the change in words, use the Edit option on the answer to open it for manual adjustment. From there you can add or remove what it's grouping by, change the measure, or adjust the filters yourself.

This is often the fastest fix when you already know exactly which field or filter needs to change.

Tali generally treats your next message as a follow-up to the previous answer, keeping the same context. Occasionally a follow-up is worded in a way that reads as an unrelated new question instead, and Tali loses the context you wanted it to keep.

If this happens, make the connection to the previous answer explicit. Refer back to it directly, for example "using the same result as above, now break it down by month" or "for this report, exclude anyone who withdrew", rather than giving a short instruction on its own.

If a question needs several things worked out at once, for example a ranking and then a percentage based on that ranking, Tali can sometimes only manage part of it in one go. Rather than packing everything into a single question, ask for the first part, then follow up for the next.

For example, instead of asking for "the contribution of each source to total hires, ranked from highest to lowest" all in one go, ask "What are our top sources by number of hires?" first, then follow up with "Now show each of those as a percentage of total hires."

"There was a problem generating this answer"

This usually means the request timed out, often because the system is under heavy load. Use Try Again. If it keeps happening, try breaking your question into smaller steps as above.

No results, or an empty report

This means your filters didn't match any records, rather than something being broken. It often happens when a team name doesn't quite match how it's recorded. Use Edit on the answer to check and correct the filter conditions being applied.

A vague answer with no real figures in it

If Tali responds in general terms without giving you a specific number, that's usually a sign your question was too broad for it to find a solid match in the data, rather than a genuine result.

Try rephrasing with more detail. See Getting the Most Out of Reporting Intelligence for how to structure a clearer question.