5 best practices for building a data-driven company culture

Without having the proper data in place, organizations are more susceptible to making poor decisions for their business. This has been symptomatic across even some of the top organizations in the world, but times are changing, and having a data-driven culture has become a necessity. Gone are the days of making decisions based off of a gut feeling and simply hoping a right decision is made.

There’s no need to look at a competitor’s site to see how to keep up in the industry. I firmly believe that you can do anything when you have the right data in your hands. However, building a data-driven company culture is no easy task, and many organizations struggle to create one.

Leading with data takes a lot of work. It goes way beyond just coming up with a plan, but actually executing that plan with the patience, stamina, and the determination needed to see it through. A big problem I’ve seen a lot of organizations face is the idea that the latest and greatest tool will help them become more data driven. It’s not as simple as installing a program and creating a document that shows how to use it. The process is more complicated than that.

I’ve also seen organizations lack the expertise on what they need to do to create this change. Building a data-driven company culture is not a one-person job. It involves a team that is unified in gaining the insights they need and putting that data in the hands of people who fully understand the power that data can have to transform a business.

To help get you started on this invaluable journey, I’ve listed below five elements needed to build a data-driven company culture, and some actionable tips to get you moving in the right direction.

When starting the process of building a data-driven culture, I’ve discovered this first step to be crucial: make sure you actually trust your data. Too many people in organizations today, no matter if they are at a C-suite level, a designer, or an analyst, simply don’t trust their data. This mistrust can happen at various scales, and be extremely debilitating for companies because it can prevent them from moving forward.

To counter this issue, audit the data you already have and fix any data integrity issues. Put a data collection plan in place, or consult with the right people who can help. The last thing you need is diving into building a data-driven culture with missing or bad data.

Once your data is accurate, clean, and trustworthy, you can move on to the next step, which is to generate insights from that data. I strongly believe that in order to change your organization, insights will have to lead the way. It is not enough to invest in data, build data products, or have your CEO cast a vision of a data-driven future.

All these things will have little results unless you arm your decision makers with insights. I recommend you start small by working with folks in your organization who are on the hook for delivering results. Give your product manager insights on how to improve the user experience, share data with your marketing manager on what channels provide the best ROAS, or deliver an analysis to your engineering team on how crash rates are impacting revenue.