Organizations don't lack experimentation driven insights & knowledge—it's that they've made it inaccessible, incomprehensible, and therefore irrelevant to the people who need it most.
The experimentation industry has a truth problem. The dirty secret of modern experimentation is that we've optimized for theatrical success rather than strategic truth, and the language we use perpetuates this dangerous charade.
Make experimentation fun and accessible! This is the standard "democratize experimentation" playbook but enthusiasm alone cannot sustain or scale experimentation in an organization.
Experimentation programs lack a fundamental governance tool: an objective experiment scorecard that measures quality and reliability, not just statistical outcomes. Without such a scorecard, your experimentation program is flying blind, mistaking statistical significance for strategic value.
Most organizations approach hiring experimentation leaders the same way they'd hire senior practitioners—looking for deeper technical skills, more testing experience, and better optimization results. This approach virtually guarantees you'll hire someone who will build a bigger testing factory when what you need is strategic decision-making infrastructure.
The way most companies approach experimentation documentation isn't just inefficient—it's a governance crisis that undermines the entire value of your experimentation program.
Vanity metrics create a dangerous illusion of progress while masking the fundamental question: Is your experimentation program actually driving better business decisions, or is it just generating activity?
Your board expects results, your teams need direction, and most critically, you need to prove that experimentation deserves a seat at the strategic planning table. The difference between programs that influence strategy and those that merely execute tests comes down to one crucial element: governance.
If you're running an experimentation program, you probably have your own system for tracking tests, documenting results, and managing implementation. Maybe it's a collection of Airtable bases connected to Jira tickets, with results in Google Sheets and insights captured in Notion. Perhaps you've created impressive dashboards in Tableau pulling from multiple sources, or built custom workflows connecting various tools. Congratulations! You have created what we call a "Frankenstack."
Organizations have invested heavily in testing tools, built dedicated teams, and run hundreds of experiments annually. Yet despite this significant investment, many still struggle to connect promising test results to reliable business outcomes. This disconnect is what we call the "Trust Gap" - the critical space between experimental findings and strategic decision confidence.
Recent posts
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Why Experimentation Specialists Keep Solving the Wrong Problem -
The Experimentation Maturity Myths: Why Your “Advanced” Programme Might Be Fooling You -
The Decision Dilemma: Why Great Experiments Die in Committee -
Why Playbooks Fail at Scale: The Missing Link in Experimentation Programs -
From Cost Center to Strategic Asset: Reimagining Experimentation’s Role in the Enterprise