Sales manager Stephen Edmonson has just finished reading a printout of some statistics showing how his company's sales performance compares to that of competing firms. The statistics summarize a mass of raw figures into a few meaningful measures that Stephen will use to determine whether he needs to change his sales strategy. The statistics in the printout are:
A) information, while the raw figures used to compute the statistics are data.
B) data, while the raw figures used to compute the statistics are information.
C) less useful to Stephen than the raw figures would have been, since summarizing the figures necessarily reduces their accuracy.
D) an example of how managers have a tendency to oversimplify by reducing complex issues into a few simple numbers.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The statistics in the printout are information because they summarize the raw figures and give them meaning. The raw figures themselves are data, which need to be processed and analyzed to become useful information for decision-making.

Sales Manager Stephen Edmonson Has Just Finished Reading a Printout