Don’t trust your gut: Using data to get what you want in life By Seth Stephens-Davidovitz.
Published in May 2022.
Do not trust your gut Stephens-Davidovitz follow-up to his excellent 2017 book Everyone lies.
Where Everyone lies Google Search was a great data research tool, Do not trust your gut About using big data for personal growth.
Stephens-Davidovitz, a trained economist and former Google data scientist, wants readers to understand that data (especially big data) is a better guide to insight or intelligent behavior than conventional wisdom.
Examples from Do not trust your gut Everyone believes that but everyone has the wrong range from entrepreneur to relationship.
The myth of the young (often college dropout) startup founder survives. When we think of the technology companies that made it big, our minds are fixed on Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates or Michael Dale. However, the data of successful entrepreneurs opposes the archetype of young, socially awkward (usually white men) founders.
Described in studies based on Big Data Don’t believe your gut, the most successful entrepreneurs are experienced professionals in their forties, fifties or more. The people who start and run businesses that make money are demographically diverse and have worked year after year (often decades) in the industry in which their business is located.
Towards relationships, Do not trust your gut Describes various studies that demonstrate how poorly we understand how couples get together or what keeps them together. Analyzing the data in the dating app, Stephens-Davidovitz shared that judging as handsome is great for getting many dates but sub-optimal for building long lasting relationships.
Starting as a larger proportion (probably the majority) of new relationships in dating apps and sites, these platforms offer great opportunities for data research. Some results are described Do not trust your gut Dating includes:
A: If you want a lot of dates, your dating profile should place extreme emphasis on behavior, appearance or predestination. What you want is for some people to really want to date you, rather than to warm up to an average set of features.
B: It’s a myth that traditionally less attractive people (whatever that means) can’t get a date with traditionally interesting people (whatever that means). According to the information, the main thing is to message as many people as possible. Dating success, like other endeavors in life, is mostly about maximizing opportunities.
Do not trust your gut Full of data-driven stories designed to help self-improvement. What is a higher ad connection? (And you know, I always have to find one).
Lessons Do not trust your gutI keep thinking that the goal of data-driven decision-making in how we run our colleges and universities always seems to be “around the corner”.
Over the years, we have recognized the existence of the need to have data guides for the design and activities of our organization. This goal is not controversial. Higher EDs will rarely argue against the desire to use data for institutional decision making.
And yet.
One of the challenges of data driven decision making Do not trust your gut Illumination is moving from person to organization. It is easier to base our personal decisions on data than to use data to make organizational choices.
Do not trust your gut A fun read, but we need a book that integrates a big data perspective with the literature on how institutions (and universities) change.
Perhaps the higher ed world is enough for us to read and talk about Do not trust your gutWe can discover alternative paths to data-driven universities.
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