Years ago, when I was running my company, I often found myself in a challenging decision-making situation. I would listen to a vendor, partner, or team member tell me not to worry about a particular issue. They were on top of it, and everything was OK or improving. I’d be relieved. Then I’d look at the data, and it would tell me a different story. The exact opposite was true: the situation was worse than I thought and not getting better.

When people are telling you one thing and data is telling you another, it can be difficult to know which to believe. Ideally, you want them to be telling you the same thing. But when they differ materially, you have to pick which one you’ll listen to and base your decisions on.

In the end, neither is 100% right all the time. But in my experience, the probabilities are higher that the data is right. So, when I have to pick between basing a decision on what a person is telling me and basing it on what the data is showing me, I’ve learned the hard way to go with the data.