Why correct and complete data is crucial in decision making?
During the Second World War air fighter pilots were at huge risk. For a certain period of the conflict, the probability of pilots surviving a tour of duty was a bit better than 50%. It was clear that the planes need a better protection for the pilots and need to be reinforced with armour.
However it wasn‘t possible to armour the whole plane‘s body because it would become to heavy. So, they decided to make a detailed study of the most frequently damaged areas of the planes. During the study, the pattern was clear — many of the planes got hit with bullets all over the wings and fuselage, but they were not hit in the cockpit or tail.
The lesson of this story is that the military command steadied only the planes which returned to the base, but not considering those which were shot down. So, those people in a leadership just neglected some key data and made a completely wrong decision. I would say it was an opposite to the right one, because only the fact that those planes were not hit to the cockpit and tail gave them a good opportunity to return from the fight.
It also shows the importance of considering all the data, including the data which may not be available for you immediately.
Be careful with your data, think what can be missing from a dataset and study it all.
However it wasn‘t possible to armour the whole plane‘s body because it would become to heavy. So, they decided to make a detailed study of the most frequently damaged areas of the planes. During the study, the pattern was clear — many of the planes got hit with bullets all over the wings and fuselage, but they were not hit in the cockpit or tail.
The lesson of this story is that the military command steadied only the planes which returned to the base, but not considering those which were shot down. So, those people in a leadership just neglected some key data and made a completely wrong decision. I would say it was an opposite to the right one, because only the fact that those planes were not hit to the cockpit and tail gave them a good opportunity to return from the fight.
It also shows the importance of considering all the data, including the data which may not be available for you immediately.
Be careful with your data, think what can be missing from a dataset and study it all.