According to a recent Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC) report, executive decision making is undergoing an overhaul. While big decisions — defined by the study as impacting “the strategic operation of the business” — are largely based on intuition and experience, data analytics is quickly becoming an integral factor in this process. Some see data as a replacement for human “gut feelings,” while others view analytics as simple scenario testers: useful to rule out worst-cases, not as high-level insight. Is there a way to meet in the middle?
Augment Reality
As noted by PWC, the volume, veracity, and velocity of data all needs to be improved if actionable insight is the end goal. It makes sense — companies now contend with an almost unlimited flood of information and need ways to effectively dam this torrent and leverage its power. As a result, many C-suite executives view analytics tools as either too simple or overly complicated. In both cases, their immediate value is suspect, and they’re often sidelined in favor of more traditional decision-making methods.
But there’s a new thought process developing, one where data-driven analytics are used to support executive intuition or warn against a course of action that experience would otherwise recommend. The big challenges here? Finding the right analytics platforms to aid in discovery of insights organization-wide, and improve the decision-making process.
Consider Collectivism
Business 2 Community, meanwhile, notes that decisions are no longer made in isolation. Tech and data-savvy employees have a role to play in company strategy, but need the right infrastructure to provide useable insight. Data driven approaches access resources Enterprise-wide, and discourage an over reliance on more subjective opinions driving decisions in a vacuum.
Big decisions are coming more frequently and with less warning. Augment intuition with data to speed the decision making process and gain collaborative insight across your enterprise.