Decision-Driven Analytics - by Bart de Langhe & Stefano Puntoni (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Companies have more data at their fingertips than ever before. Yet, studies show that most executives and organizations fail to extract real value from it.

Challenging the conventional wisdom of data-driven decision-making, marketing professors and behavioral scientists Bart De Langhe and Stefano Puntoni argue that many analytics efforts flounder because data analyses are disconnected from the decisions to be made. In their important book, they offer a new approach they call decision-driven analytics. Counterintuitively, they argue that the key to making good decisions with data is to start by putting data in the background.

Drawing from their own research and teaching, as well as real-world business cases, De Langhe and Puntoni offer four pillars of decision-driven analytics and guide you around common mistakes that have held back many organizations from using data for impact.

In Decision-Driven Analytics, you will learn how to:

+ Avoid common pitfalls in data-driven decision-making;
+ Close the gap between managers and decision-making on one side, and data scientists and data analytics on the other;
+ Enhance the impact of data analytics on business outcomes;
+ Think without data to make better decisions;
+ Prepare for artificial intelligence's impact on data analytics; and
+ Evaluate the costs and benefits of decision-driven analytics.

A must-read for anyone who wants to harness the power of data for competitive advantage, Decision-Driven Analytics will equip you with the skills and tools you need to more effectively use data for business outcomes and to make better decisions in today's complex and data-rich world.

Review Quotes

"In an era where data is pivotal to gain a competitive advantage, Decision-Driven Analytics is the book you need to read. The authors argue in a provocative yet brilliant way that data analytics is too often seen as an end in itself--we're a data-driven company!--whereas what we learn from data should be a means to an end, with that end being the ability to make better decisions. They present a compelling case for decision-driven analytics, based on cutting-edge research and real-world examples."-- "David De Cremer, Dunton Family Dean, D'Amore-McKim School of Business, Northeastern University; Founder, Center on AI Technology for Humankind; and author, The AI-Savvy Leader"

"Decision-Driven Analytics offers a fresh take on data-driven decision-making. De Langhe and Puntoni have distilled years of valuable lessons and insights into an accessible and practical resource to navigate today's business climate - strengthening the impact of data analytics on business results, anticipating the future role of artificial intelligence in analytics, and evaluating the tradeoffs we all face in adopting decision-driven analytics."-- "Stephanie Ferguson, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft"

"Decision-Driven Analytics brings new ideas and enthusiastic energy to an area of data where complacency otherwise reigns supreme. De Langhe and Puntoni have crafted something special here: practical perspectives forged from their real-world experience. This is fuel for the curious leaders and the ambitious visionaries served straight-up without pretension."-- "Neil Hoyne, Chief Strategist, Google, and author, Converted: The Data-Driven Way to Win Customers' Hearts"

"Decision-Driven Analytics is a must-read for anyone looking to gain a competitive edge through data. Bart De Langhe and Stefano Puntoni provide a clear and concise guide to harnessing the power of data for business success."-- "Jeremy Korst, President, GBK Collective"

"Decision-Driven Analytics is an invaluable resource for anyone looking to unlock the true potential of data analytics. De Langhe and Puntoni offer a practical guide to closing the gap between managers and data scientists, and they also help us to avoid the common pitfalls in data-driven decision-making."-- "Corinne Vigreux, Co-founder of TomTom"

"By focusing on human judgment, Decision-Driven Analytics is a fantastic guide to the most important aspect of data analysis in the workplace."-- "Avi Goldfarb, Coauthor, Power and Prediction, and Rotman Chair in Artificial Intelligence and Healthcare, the Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto"

"I first came across De Langhe and Puntoni's work when I was forwarded an article they had written on decision-driven analytics. What struck me was the clarity with which they argued why starting with the decision and not the data is key. It's great to see that there is now a book full of practical advice on the topic to help your organization make better decisions."-- "Gabriel Straub, Chief Data Officer, Ocado Technology"

"In a world awash with data and powerful analytic technology including AI, the role that senior decision-makers play in framing the right decisions, questions and interpreting the analytics delivered is increasingly critical. Puntoni and De Langhe provide a framework for doing so in an eminently readable and pithy book."-- "Abhi Ingle, Chief Business Officer, Qualtrics"

About the Author

Bart De Langhe is a Professor of Marketing at KU Leuven and Vlerick Business School. He also founded Behavioral Economics and Data Analytics for Business (BEDAB), a consultancy that assists companies in using behavioral science and data analysis to make better decisions and improve performance. De Langhe's research examines how managers and consumers make judgments and decisions, with a specific emphasis on their intuitions about data, metrics, and statistics. He has published articles in leading academic journals in business and psychology, such as Journal of Marketing Research, Management Science, Journal of Consumer Research, and Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. His work has also been featured in popular outlets, such as Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Management Review, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times. In 2017, he was recognized by the Marketing Science Institute as one of the most promising young scholars in marketing.

De Langhe has taught a wide array of courses related to marketing management, consumer behavior, behavioral economics, data analytics, and managerial decision-making at various academic levels, including undergraduate, MSc, MBA, EMBA, PhD, and open/custom executive programs. He has taught at prestigious business schools in Europe, North America, and Asia. As a testament to his excellence in teaching, De Langhe was recognized by Poets and Quants in 2021 as a "best 40-under-40" business school professor. He received his PhD in Marketing from Erasmus University Rotterdam, and his bachelor and master degrees in Psychology from KU Leuven.

Stefano Puntoni is the Sebastian S. Kresge Professor of Marketing at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. He is also the co-director of AI at Wharton, an initiative to foster, coordinate, and promote research and teaching on artificial intelligence across the Wharton School.

Puntoni brings a behavioral science perspective to artificial intelligence and algorithms, to investigate how automation is changing consumption and society. His research has appeared in many leading journals, including Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Psychology, Nature Human Behavior, and Management Science. He also writes regularly for managerial outlets such as Harvard Business Review and MIT Sloan Management Review. He is a former MSI Young Scholar and MSI Scholar, and the winner of several grants and awards. Puntoni is currently an Associate Editor at the Journal of Consumer Research and at the Journal of Marketing.

At Wharton, Puntoni teaches undergraduates, MBAs, and executives in the areas of new technologies, marketing strategy, brand management, and decision making. He holds a PhD in marketing from London Business School and a degree in statistics from the University of Padova, in his native Italy. Prior to joining Penn he was a Professor of Marketing and Department Head at the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, in the Netherlands.