TL;DR - Don’t get hung up on the verbiage, focus on the intent. Product managers need to make decisions with imperfect data, but they do need to use data to help inform their intuition. Even the leaders at Apple who think they know better than the general public about what is the next best feature are using their intuition based on data from their experiences to make decisions.

There is a mountain of articles dissecting the difference between Data-Driven, Data-Infored and Data-Inspired. For example:

• Data-Driven vs. Data-Informed: Which is More Strategic?

• Data-Driven, Data-Informed & Data-Inspired — Old Ideas, New Words

• It's Time to Stop Being “Data-Driven” (And Start Being Data-Informed)

Don’t get so hung up on the terminology that you miss the point.

Product managers are constantly making decisions based on new information. Sometimes that is behavioral analytics from massive databases. Other times it comes from 5 to 10 user interviews where patterns keep repeating themselves. What ever form the data takes, the point is seek out inputs to help improve your decision-making. Don’t get lazy, but also don’t keep diving in where there is no movement.

Product cultures like Amazon, Meta and Stripe are very data-fill-in-the-blank. There are advantages and disadvantages such as:

• Indexing on the Wrong Data

• Missing a Core Metric

• Misplaced Rewards for Data over User Experience

but even with these problems, being data-driven has helped all of these companies rise above the top. It has also helped them rise from the ashes.