Decision-making by companies has enormous room to improve both in terms of efficiency and quality; it will have to for companies to keep pace in an increasingly competitive global business environment. This study finds two broad areas where businesses should focus in order to achieve this. The first is in obtaining, filtering and verifying the necessary data needed for decision-makers. This is where technology comes into play, and where the optimal use of dashboards, analytics and business intelligence applications can make a big difference.

The other is to understand how human beings fit into the process. The best technology in the world will not help a company if executives do not trust it, find it difficult to use or are disposed for some other reason not to use it. In the end there is an inevitable tension between formalising processes and trying to benefit from intuition, but a company which understands the uses and limits of both will gain an important competitive edge.