Thursday, September 13, 2007

Is Intuition losing ground to data mining?

I am still reading Tom Davenport's "Competing with Analytics". Now comes this book mentioned in last week's Newsweek: Ian Ayres' "Supercrunchers". Add this book to my reading list.

Ayres' thesis is that increasingly, expertise and intuition will be replaced by objective, data-based decision making, made possible by virtually inexhaustible supply of inexpensive information.

Do Amazon's computer's know what we'll like even before we figure it out for ourselves. A couple of examples in the Newsweek article are intriguing: - Are some auto dealers already using data to calculate just how far they can push their customers on price and loan rates? - Are airlines using an algorithm to predict which customers are most vulnerable to being lured away by a competitor and give them, not the airline's own customers, priority in rebooking?

Think of examples in your own business? Your thoughts?

Newsweek also provides a book review

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