Articles Categorised with "Decision Making"

• 21-04-2024

  170 - Essence of strategy, rationalization, and a question on processing emotions

  For anyone who has worked in Business Development or in Ops, they would be familiar with a tension that simmers all through the year. ...

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• 03-02-2024

  152 The “even more” strategy

  One year, at our annual offsite, the company leadership shared the mantra for the year: the Genius of the AND. ...

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• 11-12-2023

  135 - Second-Order Thinking: The Seen and Oh, the Unseen (Part 3 of 3)

  Part 3 of 3 in series on Visualization Techniques in Decision-Making ...

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• 08-12-2023

  134 - Visualization Techniques in Decision-Making (Part 2 of 3)

  Right then, on to a new week and a new year. Two weeks ago, in issue #132, I wrote about a trait that’s unique to us humans among all animal species: mental time travel. We can move back and forth in time, imagine possibilities, and...

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• 29-11-2023

  129 - Why should we believe in the wisdom of the crowd? And when should we not?

  1906. Plymouth, England. Country fair. Some livestock and poultry show, actually. A fat ox. A Joe-Biden-old statistician has an itchy idea that he wishes to scratch. But it’s not easy to pull off what he has in mind. So he comes up with a...

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• 23-11-2023

  126 - The Stories We Tell Ourselves

  Recording of last weekend’s session on decision frames ...

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• 08-11-2023

  120 - Two Kinds of Risk, Four Kinds of Luck and _That_ Worst Outcome

  Managing your odds for career success ...

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• 05-11-2023

  118 - Risk and Expected Value and the Mistakes We Make with Them

  When making a decision, people tend to think too much of risk and not enough about the expected value. ...

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• 27-10-2023

  115 - The Status Quo Trap

  How to reduce the lingering power of the status quo ...

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• 21-10-2023

  113 - Is this a success or a failure—the value of reference points in framing decisions

  This is a now-famous example from a [1984 paper](http://courses.washington.edu/pbafhall/514/514%20Readings/choices%20values%20and%20frames.pdf) by psychologists...

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• 18-10-2023

  112 - Bargains and Rip-offs

  LI promo: We buy things we may not have use for just because they’re available at a price lower than we expect. We reject perfectly useful things we need simply because we believe their correct price in our judgment should be lower....

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• 27-09-2023

  104 - Odds and ends

  What happens in groups happens to individuals as well ...

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• 15-09-2023

  100 - Opportunity Costs: Have you thought of what you’re giving up?

  Intrinsic motivation in a species is said to be correlated to the size of the brain relative to the body. Bigger the brain relative to the body, more driven is the species to exercise it for fun or for challenging things. That explains...

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• 12-09-2023

  99 - ‘Real options’ thinking: Win the right, lose the obligation

  (why firms are better off thinking like venture capitalists) ...

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• 09-09-2023

  98 - How to build better decision frames

  No frame is complete. So, don’t stop at just one. Mix and match. This essay shows you 5 ways to build new frames: ...

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• 06-09-2023

  97 - Do your thinking frames serve you well?

  Some ways of looking at the world are unhelpful. One of them is imagining the world as opposing forces in a competing frame. I win, you lose. Locked forever in perfect competition....

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• 03-09-2023

  96 - How to move from frame blindness to frame control

  Imagine you’re one of the best at what you do. You get paid in millions. And suddenly you get dumped. You’re not fired but your services are no longer integral to the success of your team. If you haven’t guessed already, this happens in...

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• 28-08-2023

  94 - Looking beyond dead ends

  More than a decade ago I was at a company offsite where I was introduced to the phrase ‘The Genius of the AND and the Tyranny of the OR.’ I believe it was from Jim Collins’ Built to Last....

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• 25-08-2023

  93 - How to resolve the stickiest conflicts

  Every business leader, executive, senior manager, and founder has faced this question at some point, yet coverage of the topic is full of tropes. At least, I couldn’t find much beyond that in popular literature. So I looked deeper....

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• 22-08-2023

  92 - How did Iceland get its teenagers to swap the high of drugs and alcohol for the high of sports?

  Plus: Why do organizations stop learning? ...

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• 19-08-2023

  91 - The future is uncertain but in us we have a key

  The paradox ...

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• 13-08-2023

  89 - Decision categorization

  The beauty of having a sound framework for decision-making is that it can clarify your approach to work both at a day-to-day and long-term level....

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• 23-06-2023

  72 - Tilt in decision-making and 3 ways to avoid it

  Imagine a day where you open your inbox to a stinker. It’s the last one in, but there’s no doubt it has to be the first one out. You respond with a suitably charged email to refute the hideous allegations made against you. Thankfully though, from that point on, your day goes on to break even. ...

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• 20-06-2023

  71 - Three practices to become a better decision-maker

  Here are three simple practices to get you started on the path to better decisions. I’ve distilled them from a wonderful interview of neuroscientist and author Lisa Barrett on The Knowledge Project podcast. ...

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• 17-06-2023

  70 - Deal with success or have it eat you up.

  It may seem odd to worry about a positive outcome, but that’s exactly what we need to do to avoid being snowed under. ...

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• 14-06-2023

  69 - Do you have a ‘local foreigner’ in your life?

  I want to tell you about something that you understand but underestimate the value of in making your life better. And it’s not just you. I’m the same. That something is the idea of a ‘local foreigner’. ...

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• 11-06-2023

  68 - Second-order thinking: carefully count what you see and find out what you don’t

  Second-order thinking makes us imagine the unseen problems and opportunities created by every action we take. ...

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• 08-06-2023

  67 - Introducing pause in rash decisions - the 10/10/10 method

  If you find yourself making rash decisions or agonizing over decisions, this is for you. ...

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• 05-06-2023

  66 - Mental models are keyboard shortcuts

  What is different about how technophiles and power users use computers? ...

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• 02-06-2023

  65 - Second-order thinking for organizational decision-making

  When we think of a decision we look at the effect it may have. And then we stop. But the effect has an effect too. Second-order thinking is thinking about the effect of the effect. The need for it becomes clear when you look at how organizations design incentives. ...

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• 30-05-2023

  64 - The very powerful decision-hygiene habit of time travel

  There’s a basic but powerful decision hygiene habit that few of us practice: time travel. It may sound outlandish, something you thought only happened in sci-fi dramas. It’s anything but. ...

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• 27-05-2023

  63 - The power of thought experiments in making decisions in uncertainty

  The difference between humans and other species on earth is that we can shift both back and ahead in time, while the rest can only go back. ...

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• 24-05-2023

  62 - Premortems: why you should kill your dream project to save it

  We agree that talking about failure is healthy, but we forget to think about failing ahead of time. ...

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• 21-05-2023

  61 - Mental contrasting and the practice of WOOP

  You’re brushing your teeth in the morning and imagining an important presentation later in the day. You picture yourself setting the table for the problem, laying out the options, and winning the audience’s vote for a desired solution. You’ve quick answers and there’s not a moment you go off script. What may actually transpire, the reality of it is something that you don’t consider. ...

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• 18-05-2023

  60 - The Barbell Strategy for personal decision-making

  Taking a number of small but extreme non-consensus risks means you’ll be wrong and pay a penalty for most of these risky bets. It’ll also mean two other things: ...

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• 15-05-2023

  59 - The Forbidden Fruit Theory for org decision-making

  Anyone who has had to hire someone will know this. You’ve a shortlist of candidates for a position. You’re undecided. Until you receive word from one of the candidates (let’s call him Dilbert) that he has received another offer. Suddenly, Dilbert’s value shoots up. Why? ...

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• 12-05-2023

  58 - The young professional’s guide to persuasion

  You’re probably going to scroll past this but if you ever have found getting alignment at work challenging, my Persuasion framework is just for you. ...

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• 09-05-2023

  57 - Reverse-engineering the present from the future through backcasting

  The problem’s that we plan looking forward but we can see more looking back. ...

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• 06-05-2023

  56 - Using the Area Under the Curve Framework to categorize risk

  All day, every day, you’re being bombarded with problems that need solving. Here’s a simple framework that’ll help put things in perspective so that you don’t lose sleep over an ant bite or sleep through a snake bite. ...

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• 03-05-2023

  55 - Changing uncertainty to a risk range

  You’re at the airport. You see a DELAYED against your flight on the display board. What would you think: Should I call and cancel the meeting I’m traveling for OR I’m sure this is nothing? ...

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• 27-04-2023

  53 - What’s missing in how we hire?

  Conversations around workplace diversity are often hot potatoes. But they miss a crucial ingredient: the potato. ...

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• 24-04-2023

  52 - Deciding on normal

  When moving between projects, teams, jobs, careers, have you ever thought about how what is acceptable often changes with the environment. ...

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• 21-04-2023

  51 - The pain of sticking to commitments: inside and outside views

  I was twenty-five and I was reporting to one of the co-founders. We were launching a new global website and my job was to collate/write news stories and populate the news section. I think it came to around 25 news pieces. I did some math, banking mostly on my writing speed, and committed to a date by which I would be ready with the content for the news section. Let’s just say I fell comfortably short and for a long time after I was worried I had made a fool of myself. ...

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• 18-04-2023

  50 - The more people I talk to, the more confused I get. Help!

  Ever wondered why this happens? ...

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• 15-04-2023

  49 - How to earn the freedom to make decisions

  Early career can be a hard time. You’re hungry to create impact. But you get bogged down by ‘micromanagement’, or by having to influence without authority, or even burn yourself out in the process of trying to prove your worth. ...

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• 12-04-2023

  48 - How to run strategy meetings without authority (aka how to spark disconfirming analysis for better decisions)

  When you’re running any consequential discussion among business leaders, as a young professional you may find yourself in one of two situations: the discussion converges too quickly OR it moves around in circles. The best way for you to drive the discussion is to steer it in the right direction. And that direction is away from preconceived position-taking AND toward open exploration. ...

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• 09-04-2023

  47 - Better decision-making by asking better questions

  If you had to improve your decision-making and you had 24 hours to do it in, you could do a lot worse than learning to ask better questions. Why? ...

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• 06-04-2023

  46 - Decision-making with less: constraint is the seed for creativity

  What does decision-making with constraints look like? Here are three high-stakes examples. ...

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• 03-04-2023

  45 - How to help your team decide in your absence

  Being a new manager shouldn’t stop you from being a good leader. ...

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• 31-03-2023

  44 - How to identify the most important thing

  Some years ago, when my wife and I were beginning to think about homeownership, we spoke with recent homeowner friends. On one such visit, we marveled at the surrounding greenery (Sanjay Gandhi National Park in Mumbai). Our friend said that their decision to buy that place was based on a specific need. He said, “We knew what’s outside the walls was outside our control, and what’s inside we could fix. So we picked a location that was going to stay green.” ...

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• 28-03-2023

  43 - How to change your spotlight to a floodlight

  A common decision-making mistake is that we sincerely believe what we see is all there is. This happens nonconsciously. Before we know it, we’ve turned on our internal spotlight and are looking hard at what it has lit up. ...

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• 25-03-2023

  42 - Why pros and cons won’t work for me (or you)

  We all have unusual friends. I had a friend who was obsessed with flossing his teeth. No matter what, at the end of the day, he would pull out a piece of thread and run it between his teeth. The thing that didn’t make as much sense was that he was flexible with brushing. There would be days he would forget to brush, or just skip. ...

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• 22-03-2023

  41 - The perils of problem solving

  There’s an idea that is 10X as effective but only acknowledged a tenth of the time as it should be. I’m talking about avoiding problems–a far better approach to decision-making than solving problems. ...

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• 19-03-2023

  40 - How to keep options open when waiting to decide

  At the height of the dot-com bubble in the late 90s, Warren Buffett stayed out of the craze and looked like an idiot for a few years until the bubble burst and he was the one sitting on a piggy bank. ...

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• 16-03-2023

  39 - How to know when to stop gathering evidence

  By now you would know that the 2X2 decision matrix is really a prioritization tool. Its point is to help you strip down what’s on your mind to the most essential. ...

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• 13-03-2023

  38 - How to know when to take a decision

  As a leader, how do you know how much time you have to make decisions? Should you be quick or should you wait? Could you miss out on opportunities if you’re slow? Or will waiting out bring vital information that could decide the course for you? ...

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• 10-03-2023

  37 - The secret to solving the right problem? Identify it first.

  If you have a habit of jumping at a problem the moment it is presented to you, if you take pride in being action-oriented, you may want to read on. ...

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• 07-03-2023

  36 - How we define a problem dictates the solutions we see

  We don’t build cars that are sent to the museum after a trip, but we have always built rockets for single use. ...

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• 04-03-2023

  35: How to break down a Lead Domino into smaller decisions

  So you have identified what matters most to you and you’ve taken most other things off your plate. You have this (one or more) big consequential-irreversible decision to make. Think of it as your Netflix special. How would you approach it? There are two ways: ...

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• 01-03-2023

  34 - How to differentiate between decisions using a decision matrix

  I went from being stressed by too many daily decisions to having time for the truly important and big decisions with a simple change. You can learn the basics in two minutes. And like any good system it works everywhere–work and life. ...

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