Asked in February 2022 about the advice that shaped him, Alejandro Betancourt López talked about the advice he ignored.

“I have many people that have told me many things that I think have given me a lot of guidance, and many people that have gave me the right advice that I wish I had followed in the past and I didn’t, but I have learned,” he said.

Taking Advice Without Taking All of It

“Well, I try to value everyone’s advice,” Alejandro Betancourt said. Colleagues, employees and people he meets while traveling all count as sources. “I can name many names, but I think it’s from the interaction with everyone that you get good guidance and good feedback.”

“I think it’s within your ability to really filter and try to take the good and just leave behind what is not constructive,” he said.

Good guidance helps, he said, but knowing the people with the right ideas is “quite different than advice,” and picking the winning idea out of thousands is harder still. “Picking the right one is an ability that is really hard to have. Most people think it’s luck,” Alejandro Betancourt López added. What counts over time is the average. “If you have a good batting average and you’re above zero, which means you’re not losing and you are on the positive side, that’s what matters,” he said.

What Executive Surveys Show

A 2014 survey of 1,135 executives by PwC and the Economist Intelligence Unit found that more big decisions were made on intuition, experience or the advice and experience of others than on data, FM Magazine reported.

Sixty-four percent of the executives said data had changed the way their companies make decisions. PwC’s data and analytics leader, Dan DiFilippo, said that while executives “continue to rely on experience, advice, or their own gut instinct,” they also saw investment in analytics as critical.

Alejandro Betancourt López’s Lesson From Missed Advice

Asked which advice he wished he had known earlier, Alejandro Betancourt López answered, “You don’t win all the time.”

Overconfidence after a good run, he added, “happens to everyone, it happens most a lot when you’re young.” His fix is to stop and check whether a plan still makes sense before the next bet, because markets rarely hold still long enough to reward the same move twice.