The Numbers Don’t Lie, Do They?

Many businesses boast about their stats, proving this, that or the other. Some boast of customer retention, profitability or annualized growth. Others choose to showcase statistics of response time, number of staff, or even customer satisfaction ratings.

Perspective:

We want to believe statistics. Numbers don’t lie, do they?

The answer is, sadly, it depends. Depends on what? Aren’t mathematics binary? Either they are or are not. After all, if we can’t trust “the numbers” what can we trust in this crazy world?

It depends on perspective. It depends on population, sample size and even mood in situations of subjective surveys about such things as satisfaction.

Relation:

Another often forgotten facet of statistics is that of relation. We live in a three-dimensional world, don’t we? When we are purchasing something, do we only consider one aspect of it? Of course not. We weight many different aspects of it, consider the impact and then buy it.

Much like buying something based only on a single factor, using only one statistic, or number, to justify a position, direction or decision is usually rather foolish. We need context.

A great example is that of response time, which is thrown around in just about any service-based industry. Well, what completion time and whether the problem reoccurs? If you have to take your car back to the mechanic to have the brakes checked more than once, wouldn’t you begin to have concern about the effectiveness of your mechanic? I mean, we are only talking about your life here.

The truth is out there:

Some truths are absolute. However, some truths are relative to where you stand. The numbers themselves are true, but how we massage and maneuver them can lead an unwary observer down a very dangerous path.

Agreeing upon clear definitions and best practices can greatly help, but there are those who wish to create mystery to preserve advantage. Just be careful of announcing your pride in the recent shareholder’s report, service rankings, or customer satisfaction results. Unless you fully understand the context of what you are looking at, chances are the numbers might be lulling you into a false sense of security.

Image courtesy of lrargerich.

Ken Stewart’s website, ChangeForge, focuses on the collision between the constantly changing worlds of business and technology in an information-centric world. Ken serves on the board of the new Managed Print Services Association, an international industry organization seeking worldwide best practices for the managed print services industry. He is also the founder of Seeking the Son. He is always interested in connecting with you.