Flip the script

In the data world, we want more “Data-driven decisions”

It’s a mantra. Slogan. Branding.

And I agree.

Our decisions should be driven by data. When business leaders are faced with key decisions they should look to support their decision by the available data.

It’s a decision-in-search-of-data model. Which makes sense when you are a decision-maker.

But most data teams and data leaders aren’t decision-makers. They are advisors or partners in decision-making.

And as we build data products, analytics, and reporting it’s useful to flip the script on the old mantra.

Decision-driven data.

Instead of decisions looking for data (which a business perspective), we are a data looking for decisions.

We caretake, massage, manage, extort, extol, and manipulate data to support decisions.

If there isn’t a decision, then we don’t need data.

If you need to ​thin out your crowded data platform​, then remove that data that doesn’t explicitly support decisions.

Try on the decision-driven data filter.

Odds are, everything else is noise. And crowding out other more valuable data insights.

Sawyer

from ​The Data Shop