Data and opinion

I read a book titled “Built” by Tony Fadell. Tony is an engineer, designer and entrepreneur and was senior vice president of the iPod division at Apple Inc. He also founded and served as CEO of Nest Labs. In his book, he talked about data and opinion, and this is his take on the subject matter. Inspired by his writings, I have taken the liberty to add some more personal comments.

You make hundreds of tiny daily decisions that may use up many resources. Decisions that are based on data are easier to manage. You can acquire and debate facts and numbers that will allow you to be reasonably confident in your choice. These decisions are relatively easy to make and defend. And most people on the team can agree with the answer.

But what if decisions require opinions because there is not enough data available for you to analyze and criticize? This means you must follow your gut and vision for what you want to do without sufficient data to back you up. These decisions are always hard and always questioned. After all, everyone has an opinion. Every decision has elements of data and opinion, but they are ultimately driven by one or the other. Sometimes, you have to double down on the data. Other times, you must look at all the data and trust your gut. And trusting your gut is incredibly scary.

Many people don’t have a good gut instinct or the faith in themselves to follow it. It takes time to develop that trust. Then, they try to turn an opinion-driven business decision into a data-driven one, and the business succeeds; we admire them for their creativity.

Here are the facts of business life. Data cannot solve an opinion-based problem. You cannot input a good question, prompt it, and get a conclusive answer because no matter how much data you get, it will always be inconclusive. This leads to analysis paralysis or death by overthinking. Suppose this is the case, and you know that all the money spent on technology that promises excellent analytics still needs to provide more data to make a decision. In that case, you will need insights to inform your opinions.

The question now is, where are you going to get those insights?

Insights can be critical learnings about your customers, market, or product space. Something substantial that gives you an intuitive feeling for what you should do. You can also get outside input, talk to the experts, and confer with your team. You may not be able to reach a consensus, but hopefully, you can form a gut instinct. Tony is so right, isn’t he?

When I was a newbie in the corporate world, I was an individual contributor, and I foolishly thought that leadership always knew what they were doing. Over time, I found out they did not. A few years later, I was in leadership. I had to face the excruciating pain of realizing I did not have the answers. Technology-driven data was unavailable then; the pricey subscription to famous industry consumer reports and insights could only help so much. But I need more sources to help me make the right decisions.

Being in leadership, I have to admit and confess to making wrong decisions that were costly for the company. I was sure that the data was correct, and perhaps it was, but it was insufficient. However, the longer I handled business, the cumulative mistakes, failures, and lessons learned from them have sharpened my intuition to the degree that I no longer trust data alone. Still, the matter has to be input into the decision-making process. Similarly, experience and maturity dictated that I could not make decisions based on pure intuition and “gut feeling” alone. My team and I had to double down and understand what our customers wanted.

One thing to watch out for in organizations is that everyone wants data so they wouldn’t have to make decisions themselves. Instead of moving forward with a design, a product, or even a presentation, many want to avoid taking responsibility for what they are making. If something goes wrong, they will blame the data. I am unsure and may be wrong but making decisions based on data alone without gut feeling or “opinions” leads to a bland and lackluster product or service.

People have to feel safe in voicing their ideas and opinions. Ideas are the currencies of the future. And it may involve a lot of opinions based on available data. Writing this piece is a combination of both.

(Francis Kong’s “Inspiring Excellence” podcast is now available on Spotify, Apple, Google, or other podcast streaming platforms).