Here’s a short survival guide to business events and the inevitable drinks afterwards. Don’t go wild on the bar options, keep your business cards where they should be - in your pockets - and: casually drop the latest business buzzwords in the conversation.
Nowadays it’s something like blockchain technology, or automation, but not too long ago it was all about big data.
The combination of storing masses of data and the ever increasing processing speeds, the realisation sunk in that we could start to decyfer and analyze these vast amounts into valuable insights.
Insights on our world, our products, and our clients. Big data is where the big money was. And that is certainly true for the biggest players. Name any social network and it has had to explain their big data policy one time or another.
But when you talk to any other company below these data giants, the big data story doesn’t hold water.
Ask any business manager, product owner, or even the CEO about their insights into their clients based on big data and you are likely to get some evasive maneuvers. NPS scores, sure. Panel discussions, maybe. But a comprehensive approach to mining insights from our customers data? Forget about it.
We all know big data is there, but we don’t know how to wield it for our own good. As a lead product owner recently told me: “They ask me for a forecast estimation based on our customer insights. But I haven’t got a frickin’ clue!”
So how do decisions get made in the boardroom if not with big data? In my experience, more times than not: gut feel. The question is: how bad is that?
I’ve found it is really dependent on the maturity level. Meaning: early on, in the project, build, or whatever, a gut feel check might just suffice. Because your gut check is based on earlier related work experiences, discussions you might’ve had with people you value, or something else. Like entrepreneur Jason Fried answered when asked which ideas turn out to be great products, it’s mostly a feeling.
But we do need to recognize that we as humans are constantly under the influence of biases. Whether it’s a bias that shows us only the results we want to see (confirmation bias), or anchoring our insights to the first bit of information we hear (anchoring bias), we need to limit the risk of bias influence. And that is where big data can come in handy.
After your idea has passed the gut feel check, it should move along to the next stage of maturity that needs to include bias checks. Something as simple as taking your idea through an elevator pitch format can challenge your biases. Are you truly building something unlike the competitor? Or is it the same same, but different, but still the same?
As your idea progresses through these stages of maturity, big data, or let’s just start with basic data insights, can bring some great help in your go/no go moments.
What do you really know about your clients, their behavior and their needs? Or is it at the end of the day really the gut feel that reigns supreme?