The Map Is Not the Territory
This week I had the privilege of a private conversation with a Fortune 50 CEO. Among the many insights he shared, one comment stopped me cold:
“Workplace satisfaction surveys are bullshit.”
His point wasn’t that feedback doesn’t matter — quite the opposite. He explained that those surveys often give the appearance of truth but rarely surface what’s real. The real truth comes from listening to the stories of employees actually doing the work, usually uncovered in skip-level meetings or candid, unfiltered conversations.
That blunt observation sparked a bigger reflection for me: the map is not the territory.
When Numbers Lie
Leaders love maps — spreadsheets, dashboards, survey scores. They’re neat, precise, and comforting. But precision doesn’t equal truth. When numbers say one thing and lived experience says another, the instinct is to trust the data and dismiss the story. In practice, it’s usually the opposite.
Jeff Bezos once said, “When the anecdotes and the data disagree, the anecdotes are usually right. There’s something wrong with the way you’re measuring it.” He understood that metrics are built on assumptions; if the assumptions are flawed, the data may be beautifully wrong.
Ed Stack, longtime CEO of Dick’s Sporting Goods, tells a similar story. His spreadsheets once showed overstocked stores. But when he walked the aisles and talked to customers, he realized the problem wasn’t too much inventory — it was the wrong inventory. The map said one thing; the territory told the truth.
Stories as Early Warnings
Employee engagement: A survey says satisfaction is 85%, yet skip-level conversations reveal people feel overworked and invisible.
Hospitality: Sales look stable in a POS report, but loyal guests quietly stop returning — the early signal of fading word-of-mouth.
Products: A launch hits its revenue targets, yet front-line stories show customers confused or frustrated. The metric says “win,” the territory says “fragile.”
Stories don’t always scale neatly. They’re messy, emotional, and hard to chart. But they’re often the first signal that your map is outdated.
Redrawing the Map
Great leaders don’t pit data against narrative; they use narrative to improve data. When stories and spreadsheets diverge, the question isn’t “Which is right?” but “What are we missing?” What do we need to measure differently so the map reflects reality more accurately?
That’s the real lesson from my CEO conversation: skip the false comfort of neat dashboards if they’re built on the wrong definitions of success. Listen carefully, redraw the map, and stay close to the people living the reality you’re trying to measure.
Because in the end, the map is not the territory — and when they disagree, it’s the territory that wins.
Why This Matters at The 601 Group
As we build The 601 Group, this idea shows up constantly. It’s easy to obsess over spreadsheets — class bookings, revenue targets, margin models — and miss what guests and team members are actually experiencing. The numbers help us steer, but the real insight comes when we walk the floor, talk with our chefs and bartenders, and listen to guests describe what made their evening unforgettable (or where we fell short).
Some of our most important decisions — from how we design a class to how we think about new locations — started not with a perfect metric but with a single story from a guest or team member that didn’t fit the data. Those stories challenge our assumptions and force us to draw a better map.
That’s how we’ll keep growing: by pairing the discipline of measurement with the humility to trust what people are really telling us. For everyone building with us — teammates, partners, future owners — it’s a reminder: never stop listening for the story behind the spreadsheet. That’s where the truth (and the next great decision) usually lives.
- Mike