Everyone talks about how hard it is to get companies to evolve into data-informed cultures.

There’s one simple reason they don’t:

Fear.

Executives say they want data.

Reality: Many people are really uncomfortable with the change data will bring.

When people say they want data they often mean they want data that supports what they already know and already do.

Good data cultures have no such restrictions.

Data means accountability. It may change jobs, people, responsibilities.

The longer an exec is in a company in my experience, the more resistance they can put up to new data.

Cognitive bias is a helluva drug.

Especially in a pandemic

No one likes to hear they are doing it wrong....

....and that’s the risk of data.

If you want to have data inform more decisions you must have a culture of emotional safety.

Show me an emotionally unsafe environment and I can guarantee you data isn’t being used well

If your execs are balking at obvious decisions, it’s a sure sign a deeper emotion is in play.

It’s nearly always around fear and its inverse, trust.

You will never get through until you make the person feel safe.

Isn’t that a kick in the pants? That to use data well, you have to deal with people’s emotions?