Gut Feel vs. Data-Driven Decision-Making

How Many Business Decisions Are Based On Gut Feel Rather Than Data?

Lately, there has been a lot of buzz around the idea of data-driven decision-making in businesses, with many organizations apparently striving towards the ideal of basing all business decisions on data. We wanted to find out if this is just an ideal, or whether companies are actually fully committing to this data-driven decision-making approach.

To find out, we asked our research panel what proportion of their business decisions are more based on gut feel or experience than on data or information. The following chart reveals the findings:

58% of our respondents say their companies base at least half of their regular business decisions on gut feel or experience, rather than on data and information. The reasons for not using data as the basis for business decisions are manifold and range from not having the necessary information available to thinking that instinctive decision-making is good enough.

Digging a bit deeper, we found that “best-in-class” companies base their decisions more on information (60%) while “laggard” companies base a worryingly high 70% of their decisions on gut feel.

This illustrates a clear link between using data and information for decision-making and being able to achieve a strategic advantage over the competition.