“Do you know what you want?” Those six, dreaded words haunt my otherwise happy memory of a meal my friends and I enjoyed to celebrate graduating from university. It seemed such an important occasion: I wanted to get my menu selection exactly right. You can imagine the groans around the table after the third or fourth postponement of what should have been a trivial decision.
Even after years of studying and teaching decision-making and behavioral economics, I still occasionally stress out over even little decisions. So, I had high hopes for Decisive: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work by Chip and Dan Heath. Would it make me more decisive? That is, more able to make decisions quickly and confidently, without second-guessing, regrets or anxiety?
My answer: Maybe a little, under some circumstances. The Heath brothers offer a bunch of reasonable and evidence-based ideas for making decision-making more “rational.” Here are a few of them, with my take on each.
Widen your options.
If you want to make better decisions, first make sure you’re considering enough alternatives. If a decision is framed as “Whether or not to do X,” it’s is likely a sign that you haven’t considered all the options. To come up with alternatives, think about the second-best use of the money (or time or other resources) or pretend the option(s) you’re considering aren’t feasible: what would you do otherwise? Explore what others have done in similar or analogous situations.
If your goal is to optimize your decision (and not just satisfice i.e., get to “good enough”), then widening options makes a lot of sense. I suggest brainstorming with diverse participants to come up with different options.
On the other hand, there are many circumstances, like the restaurant ordering experience I mentioned above, where optimizing is clearly not the right strategy. The author does not discuss when and how to use rules of thumb (heuristics) and intuition to decide quickly. I have written before about how these techniques can be better when time and information are limited, or when we’ve had a lot of relevant experience.
Reality-test your assumptions.
The Heaths argue that you can’t make a good decision if you begin with false assumptions. My decision to start a business would surely be doomed if it were based on a mistaken view that there would be little competition. To test assumptions, you should “spark constructive disagreement” by making it easier for people to disagree with you, asking questions designed to surface contrary information and checking yourself by considering the opposite decision. When I was considering the startup, I asked for candid advice from people I knew would give it to me straight. The feedback I got helped me set (slightly) more realistic expectations and improve my planning.
Who could argue against reality-testing? What better way to fight confirmation bias and the planning and sunk cost fallacies? However, reality testing can be time-consuming, subject to diminishing returns, and contrary to the goal of deciding quickly.
Attain distance before deciding.
The authors advise us to view the decision as objectively, dispassionately and from as broad of a perspective as possible. It is natural to make decisions based on our personal experience, the “inside view.” To avoid suffering from “What We See is All There Is (WYSIATI),” it’s better to consider the ‘outside view’, such as the historical experience or the typical characteristics of the factors in the decision. I could have asked which dish diners order or compliment the most, which may be better than trying to predict what I’ll like best.
Ideally, if we have lots of time and reliable information, we can update our beliefs according to a mathematical formula, such as Bayes theorem. We can also consider the decision from other points of view, especially those of people affected by the decision, but who don’t have a say in it. For example, I may avoid the swordfish and tuna since they may be environmentally unsustainable.
Reduce emotion.
The Health brothers also suggest we attain emotional distance from our decisions. They note that immediate emotions and knee-jerk reactions can be misleading. Attaining distance by making the decision more abstract should make it less emotional and perhaps more rational. Other related tactics include:
- Consider the impact 10 minutes, 10 months and 10 years in the future (10/10/100 technique)
- Consider what you would advise your best friend to do
- Get clear on core values and beliefs
There’s no question that taking a distant perspective can be helpful. It certainly helps you to slow down and think through a decision. However, emotions and intuitions can be helpful, especially when there is a moral, social or aesthetic component to the decision. For example, when composing a photograph, I’m relying almost purely on intuition and emotion to frame the image, set exposure etc. In my experience, most decisions have at least one of these qualitative components.
Prepare to be wrong.
The authors recommend improving your planning by considering the best and worst case scenarios to bookend the potential outcomes of a decision. Assign someone the role of devil’s advocate or create a pre-mortem to identify scenarios where the decision fails spectacularly. This will help illuminate hurdles and so you can proactively address them. At the same time, consider a “pre-parade,” i.e., the possibility that you succeed beyond expectations, and how you’ll handle that scenario. At Decision Fish, we consider both the possibility that companies are not interested in the product at all, or that instead there’s too much demand for us to meet with our current technology. An especially interesting idea to reduce risk is a tripwire. This is a pre-commitment to cut losses and change course if a decision turns out badly. They help reduce inertia, avoid sunk-cost fallacy, use objective measurements of success, and paradoxically, encourage risk-taking by reducing risk. In our case, we have given ourselves until the end of 2018 to get our first customer. If we don’t, then we are committed to changing our strategy.
Overall, I recommend “decisive.”
Will it really make you more decisive? Perhaps, if you have the luxury of time, money and other resources to research and widen your options; reality test your assumptions; attain distance and objectivity; reduce your emotionality and prepare to be wrong (and right)! These tactics will give you confidence that you considered all the options objectively and came to a “rational” decision. However, many real-world decisions must be made quickly and with limited information. Also, virtually all decisions have a moral, ethical, socio-emotional, or aesthetic component. The book offers little to illuminate these two features of quality decision-making. In short, if the situation demands decision-making a la Mr. Spock, this book may well make you “bolder” and “more confident.” However, every Spock needs his Bones (and Kirk) to make the highest-quality decisions, even if its just about what to order for dinner.
This article originally published at Forbes.com here.