Final answer:
Experts are crucial in data-driven decision-making in a business, offering significant insights and helping to identify possible mistakes during analyses. They leverage their substantial knowledge and intuition to guide the decision-making process and are highly valued for their expertise, especially in uncertain situations.
Step-by-step explanation:
The people very familiar with a business problem, playing a crucial role in data-driven decision-making, are known as experts. Experts bring valuable insights into the decision-making process because they have a significant understanding of the subject matter, often having a strong sense of the potential answer even before a detailed analysis is conducted. This expert intuition can help to quickly identify possible mistakes and prompt a more thorough investigation into the issue. In the context of a business problem, the role of expertise is crucial when gathering information and conducting a root cause analysis. These individuals are not only sources of specialized knowledge, but they could also be stakeholders who have a direct interest in the effective resolution of the problem. Additionally, informational social influence is more likely when the group has expertise or when the answer is unclear, demonstrating the value placed on expert opinions in uncertain situations.