Every company has messy data, and even the best of AI companies

Hear now the words of Andrew Ng, a teacher of machines and of men, who declared: “Every company has messy data, and even the best of AI companies are not fully satisfied with their data. If you have data, it is probably a good idea to get an AI team to have a look at it and give feedback. This can develop into a positive feedback loop for both the IT and AI teams in any company.” At first these words seem technical, bound to the realm of numbers and machines. But within them lies a wisdom much older: that imperfection is not a barrier to progress, but the very seed from which growth springs. For messy data, like life itself, is raw, unrefined, and yet filled with possibility.

The origin of this saying rests in Ng’s long experience at the forefront of artificial intelligence. He has seen the grand laboratories of industry, the best-equipped research groups, and he knows their secret: none are ever fully satisfied with the purity of their data. There is always error, always noise, always incompleteness. Yet this is no cause for despair. For in these imperfections, AI can still learn, adapt, and reveal truths. His counsel is simple: do not wait for perfection before beginning, but let collaboration and feedback between IT and AI transform weakness into strength, disorder into positive loops of improvement.

History offers us a mirror of this truth. Consider the great voyages of discovery: when Columbus set sail, his maps were incomplete, his knowledge flawed, and his understanding of the world deeply imperfect. Yet he embarked, and through his voyages new continents were revealed to the world. The maps were messy data, filled with gaps and errors, but in using them, explorers refined them, and the maps grew ever more accurate. In the same way, Ng teaches us that waiting for perfect data is folly; it is through use, feedback, and continual refinement that knowledge matures.

The meaning of his words is also a lesson in humility. No company, no matter how advanced, can say its data is flawless. This confession strips away the illusion of perfection and calls us instead to the discipline of iteration. To bring IT and AI together, to allow one to critique and improve the other, is to enter into a cycle where imperfection breeds progress. It is the same cycle seen in all great endeavors—science, art, philosophy—where error and correction, failure and feedback, forge paths toward mastery.

But beyond humility lies hope. For Ng speaks of the positive feedback loop, a phrase of immense power. It means that improvement breeds further improvement, that small gains can cascade into great transformations. Just as a seed grows into a tree and a tree into a forest, so the sharing of feedback between human teams and artificial minds can create growth beyond what either could achieve alone. The messiness of data becomes not a curse but the soil in which innovation takes root.

The lesson for us, whether we build companies or live ordinary lives, is this: do not fear imperfection. Do not delay action while waiting for perfect conditions. Begin with what you have, let others give feedback, and allow improvement to grow step by step. Your “messy data” may be your incomplete plans, your flawed beginnings, your uncertain efforts—but if you share them, refine them, and return again with courage, they will become the foundation of greatness.

Practically, this means inviting collaboration into all things. Do not hoard your work in silence, but let others examine it, critique it, and shape it with you. Whether in business, in art, in family, or in learning, welcome feedback. See mistakes not as shame but as teachers. Just as AI thrives not on perfect data but on iterative refinement, so too does the human spirit thrive when it chooses humility, openness, and persistence.

So let us take to heart the wisdom of Andrew Ng: “Every company has messy data… but through feedback, it can become a positive loop.” Let this truth remind us that greatness does not rise from perfection but from persistence, not from flawless beginnings but from constant growth. And let us live in such a way that our messiness is not hidden, but transformed—into wisdom, into progress, into enduring light for generations to come.