Assume ignorance

I recently wrote an article about common problems you encounter when rolling out an internal data initiative.

One approach people take is to avoid problems by focusing on groups of people who don’t exhibit these problems - focusing only on people who already know their way around data.

That is called a staged rollout for data initiatives.

As a general strategy, however, it’s called dumb.

The goal of any data initiative inside a company should be to democratize data to everyone inside the company. If you don’t have that end goal in mind, you won’t get there.

So, instead of assuming problems away, assume ignorance—ignorance in data. Don’t build for experts; build and plan for ignorance.