PwC - Gut & gigabytes: The art and science of big decisions

The February 2015 PwC booklet called Gut & gigabytes: The art and science of big decisions observes that: “Right now, intuition still prevails, with the majority of corporate decision-makers finding that listening to their gut is preferable to “paralysis by analysis.” More and more, however, executives will be pressed to defend their choices against contrary outcomes that were plainly visible in the data tea leaves. The key isn’t to favor one approach over the other — art versus science — but rather to cultivate and hone the role that instinct plays in our increasingly data-driven world (or, conversely, hone the role that data plays in our intuition-prone decision-making).

The booklet is supported by the 40-page report called Gut & gigabytes: Capitalising on the art & science in decision making. That report was prepared by the Economist Intelligence Unit, sponsored by PwC. It is intended to explore the agenda for big decisions and the process that business leaders will go through in making these decisions.

Big decisions are the most significant decisions about the strategic direction of the business (i.e., not concerned with day-to-day operations). Big data are the recent wave of electronic information produced in greater volume by a growing number of sources (i.e., not just data collected by a particular organisation in the course of normal business). Data analysis is the use of analytical techniques to generate new insights from data.

Executives know the right questions to ask. Now they need to know how to get the right answers from the data (and have the desire to do so). Those who do not should consider learning how. Those who resist doing so will gradually be replaced, as the next generation of data-savvy executives and future senior managers come through. By the time this happens, most executives should be using big data to make strategic decisions – rather than the other way around.

PwC - 10 Minutes on making big decisions

In PwC’s report called 10 Minutes on making big decisions (released in May 2015), it suggests that: “When it comes to making your most important business decisions, there are a plethora of factors to consider. Company leaders often rely on gut instinct to guide them — what we think of as the ‘art’ of strategic decision making. But, what about the ‘science’ side of the equation: data and analytics?"  

Consider that 85% of CEOs maintain that data and analytics creates value for their organizations. But, where and how are they realizing that value? One area ripe for the picking is strategic decision making. According to this report, superior decision making — done with confidence, clarity, and agility — is only possible through a combination of art and science.

"And most businesses have only begun to achieve this delicate balance: While 94% of respondents in PwC's Global Data & Analytics Survey 2014: Big Decisions said that senior management believe they are prepared to make their next big decision, just 38% relied on data

and analytics to do so.”