Deciding with imperfect data

At a nonprofit, you do not get the dashboards a large company has. Tracking is partial, tools are limited, and the question still needs an answer by Friday.

Working in digital media at the YMCA of Metropolitan Dallas, I have settled on three habits.

Trust what you can verify. Before a number goes into a report, I check where it came from. A smaller number I can stand behind beats a bigger one I can’t explain.

Compare like with like. One post outperforming another means little if they went out on different days to different audiences. I look for the fairest comparison available and say plainly when there isn’t one.

Say what you don’t know. A recommendation that names its own gaps is more useful than one that pretends to certainty. Leaders can work with “this is our best read, and here is what would change it.”

Perfect data is a luxury. Good judgment about imperfect data is the actual job.