I love this article; it's well written and accurate. But in my experience the bigger problem is that companies aren't using data at all.
Data-ignorant decision is a killer, too.
Data will not tell you what to do
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Re: Data will not tell you what to do
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m fairly sure there’s no legal requirement for a company to put shareholders first. I’ll sound a bit Marxist for a moment and say that we’ve just so internalized capitalist propaganda that we collectively seem to believe that now.
> I’m fairly sure there’s no legal requirement for a company to put shareholders first. You're likely correct that there is no explicit legal requirement. However (as I understand it), it stems from the implied requirement that derives from the fact that a company's directors have a fiduciary duty to act in good faith in the interests of the company. People who agree with the implied requirement argue that "in the in…
Maybe, but the business judgment rule is usually going to win if you want it to. Unsurprisingly, though, it’s rarely invoked to support doing something other than giving capital to shareholders.
Re: Data will not tell you what to do
#73I love this piece. It evokes the well-known idea that "we shape our tools, and thereafter our tools shape us," drawing attention to the concept that digitally represented information serves as an observer's or machine's recorded testimony of a physical or cognitive system.
What is the value of that?
Language alone, or in this case, information, does not dictate our actions. However, there is persuasive power inherent in language — specifically, language that exposes the subjective gains individuals aim to achieve through their actions, often influencing individual behavior.
There exists an unexplored connection between our contemporary understanding of data and praxeology.
Re: Data will not tell you what to do
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
And what does any of that have to do with finding the right services or products for the right customers? Does a customer care if you shave off 2% of the final cost or do they care about having world-class customer support? Does a customer care if a product has a higher conversion rates or if it is the product they were looking for in the first place? Does a customer care more about how long payment processing takes…
> Does a customer care if you shave off 2% of the final cost or do they care about having world-class customer support? Times and times again, they'll tell you the latter and actually choose the former. The same bargain as paying more to have no ads: people vocally push for no ads, some will ponny up the money, and the vast majority will make do with the ad supported model, while ad blocking or giving up on the servi…
I'm curious how you find the people to ask that?
Market research, talking to people in line at the post office, sending a nice personal email to an existing customer?
Re: Data will not tell you what to do
#75Maybe I’m missing something. The goal of an A/B test is to test a hypothesis. Where that hypothesis comes from is irrelevant. Sure you can waste your time testing stupid hypotheses that don’t have a lot of business impact, but that’s beside the point.
A/B testing requires you to build both A and B. Or if you already have A, B can't be so radically different that any comparison is meaningless.
If you hire engineers just to deny them to your competitors, then building B is free.