As business professionals we make a variety of important decisions every day – from what markets and customers to serve, to what products to offer, from how to improve customer loyalty, to which people to hire and what infrastructure we should buy, and so on. Some of us make these decisions based on experience, others more intuitively. In today’s dynamic environment, we’re learning that companies that make fact-based decisions experience better performance. Making fact-based business decisions takes data and analytics.  Analytics facilitate the decision making process because they enable us to achieve new insights about customers, markets, products, channels, and marketing strategy, programs and mix.  Analytics enable organizations to improve performance, competitiveness, and growth. If guessing or gut-instinct has been working well, that’s one thing. But if not, now may be the time to hone your analytical capabilities. How can you improve your analytical acumen? Take a class in data management or modeling or one in industry and competitive analysis, attend a conference, read a book such Davenport’s book Competing on Analytics, bring in experts you can learn from.