Should I or Shouldn’t I? 2 Ways To Answer

Every day, every moment, we make decisions. Some decisions are small; some are life-altering. It’s decisions that define our lives.

Complementing this understanding with my real-life experiences wherein my decisions have made and broken me, with subsequent research on understanding the science of how to make decisions, I bring to you some things that will help you get the clarity you need to make better decisions.

The journey of making better decisions is two-dimensional. It consists:

· Gauging the Importance

· Weighing the Criticality

Gauging the Importance:

You go out for a meal. You’re discussing 50 options with your partner and getting nowhere.

On the way, you take a left turn, and boom — there’s a careless pedestrian crossing the road, that you’re about to ram into. You analyze your options instinctively and veer to the right, sensing that the road is free, and very narrowly miss another car heading your way. Congrats — you’ve saved your life and the careless pedestrian’s. You and your partner decide to go for “Awesome Beer” instead to celebrate you both being alive, problem solved.

You made two decisions in this scenario — where to go for a meal, and which path to take to either save yourself and your partner, the pedestrian, or ideally both.

You spent a lot of time discussing the trivial (in comparison) decision. Sometimes, heated discussions would ensue from these trivial decisions.

On the other hand, you spent no time discussing the very important decision. You couldn’t pause time and discuss with your partner what the best option is. If you could do that, one would assume you’d have more entertaining things to do than discuss where to go for a meal.

The point is this — importance of decisions, and the way we make them, are not magically in sync by default.

How important is a particular decision to you and others to whom it’s related? We’ll look at a couple of ways you can answer this question methodically further down.

Weighing the Criticality:

You go to the place with “Awesome Beer”, and turns out the beer is awful on that day. Luckily, you’re the managing director of the local branch of “Awesome Beer”, so you call your minions and immediately find out who’s ruined this celebration of life with your partner.

Turns out the new conveyor belt minion accidently poured a little extra salt in that batch (that’s what makes your beer awesome). You would have been livid, but by then the next beer, “Super Awesome Beer” has already arrived and you feel the beer settling you down.

You ponder over what you want to do with the new minion. To fire or not to fire, that is the question.

You decide to soak in some good karma and let him off with a stern warning to not be too salty in the future.

You again made two decisions in this scenario — Ordering a different brand of beer after the first one turned out to be awful, and to not fire the new minion.

Which decision do you think was more critical?

What is the impact of the consequences of your decision on you and the others whom the decision affects? That’s the essence of criticality. We’ll look at a couple of ways you can answer this question methodically further down.

Importance of A Decision

When considering making a decision, it’s always tempting to think that what’s ahead of you is the MOST important thing in the world. We know that it’s not the case in hindsight or foresight, but we still fall prey to thinking this at the moment. How do we reorient ourselves and consider a decision with the importance it’s due, no more and no less?

A great way to do this is to quantify the importance. When we quantify something, it becomes very concrete — there’s no room for misinterpretation anymore. This is based on at least two important factors –

1. Daniel Kahneman’s extensive research in Cognitive Psychology, amogst many other scientists as well, consistently says all humans are affected by multiple biases at all times. This means that there are several distorting patterns in our minds that change our perceptions and thoughts about situations. We cut through some of these biases when we force ourselves to quantify our thoughts by putting a concrete number to the situation or decision, as opposed to relying on an ephemeral feeling about a situation in the moment

2. When we ask ourselves how important something is, we create a psychological distance from the decision and situation. We metaphorically take a step back to examine the big picture — the same way you’d take a few steps back from a building to see it completely when you’re right in front. When you’re a centimetre from the wall, you might think it’s the tallest building in the world, but when you step back enough to see the roof, it might be a measly low-rise instead. In the same way, creating psychological distances from situations allow us some breathing room to step away from the immediacy of our emotions and thoughts and examine it from a vantage point where we have room to be more rational about what’s in front of us.

Now that we know it is imperative to rate the importance of the decision under consideration, here’s a very nifty tool to help us achieve it.

The Scale of Importance of a Decision

So, here is a simple step-by-step process that helps you rate the importance of a decision.

First, ask yourself, in these words — “how important is the decision to you?”

Define this importance on a scale of 0–10; 0 being least important and 10 the most.

If you’ve decided about a decision, and are now have to weigh different options, ask yourself — “How important is it for you to choose a particular option?”

Rule of Thumb for Scale of Importance

1. If the number is low, do not wait to figure out the perfect option. Decide to go ahead with your decision quickly, knowing it doesn’t matter much to you. You are okay with the consequences of making your choice in either case.

2. In those few cases where the scale of importance is low for making a decision but high for choosing a particular option, it’s generally better to avoid moving forward with that decision in the first place. You will spend time evaluating the perfect option X, but in the end, it doesn’t matter much in the first place, so it’s still time wasted.

3. If the number is high, spend more time evaluating options to arrive at a decision you know you will be satisfied with. Remember that the decision and outcome are very important to you, so don’t make the mistake of not giving this decision its due consideration. At the same time, don’t dally too much and get into an analysis paralysis mode — remember, any decision is better than no decision. If the number is moderately high, you’ll probably be okay being a Satisficer. If the number is extremely high, you’ll probably want to be a Maximizer.

4. Suppose you’re managing or owning a project, for example. In that case, you might face a case where you have a high importance for making the decision but a low importance for choosing any particular option. In cases like this, focus on getting things moving — know that whatever is chosen, you’re okay with it as long as the decision is made, and progress is happening. Don’t get hung up on trying to make everybody choose the option you like in this case.

Scale of Importance in Conflict Resolution –

Remember the time you got into a heated argument with the dude who cut you off while driving? The time you were looking forward to spending Sunday evening with your family, but you all ended up having a fight about what to do, and it became a gloomy evening instead?

It can actually be tricky to make decisions when another person is involved, and if there’s a group decision, may God be with you. This tends to happen because we all blow up the importance of a decision. In the heat of the moment, it’s easy to make a mountain out of a molehill.

The great thing about the Scale of Importance is that it can also be used effectively for Conflict Resolution, especially regarding partners, friends, and family. In other words, when you make decisions that can directly impact your family, gauging the importance of your decision can help you avoid conflicts.

Here’s a quick way to check in with yourself before things turn nasty:

1. Ask yourself, “how important is the decision we’re making for me?”

2. Stop, Think and Proceed. Stop and think from the other person’s perspective. How important will the decision be for them in their minds?

3. If you’re not sure about the answer, ask them.

In the case where the Scale for the other person is much higher than for you, go with their decision. If the scale of importance is much higher for you than your counterpart, then explicitly explain to them that the importance of the decision is very high for you and, therefore, you’d like to be given more consideration in this case.

The same logic applies when you are on the same page about something needed to be decided but are at odds with each other on the option to choose.

Taking a minute for yourself would help you create a space of understanding wherein you both respect and value each other’s investment in the situation, rather than arguing to win in the moment.

Criticality of Decisions

A great way to understand the criticality of your decision is by looking at its cost. The cost can be any resource you spend — monetary, time, social currency — or it can be legal, status-driven, psychological, physiological, or moral, among others.

For example, you might get away from a fine for not wearing a helmet from the cops by name-dropping and calling your friend who’s an Inspector at the local station. The cost of this decision is not your money. It’s your morals, and the social cost of you supporting a corrupt system.

There’s a simple concept we use to quantify this: Reversibility of a Decision

Reversibility of Decisions

Decisions fall somewhere on the continuum from a reversible decision to an irreversible decision. You can tell where a decision lies on this spectrum by asking how much it would cost to undo it. The higher the cost to undo, the more irreversible it is. The lower the cost, the more reversible it is. This applies to personal or professional decisions; it can be an individual or a group decision.

I imagine reversibility of decisions as a fragile rubber band stretching. Reversible decisions don’t stretch the band too much. Irreversible ones do, and once it’s stretched, the band is deformed permanently. The more irreversible a decision is, the more the band’s stretched, and the more it’s deformed after the decision.

Imagine you are preparing your tea, and for some reason, you added salt instead of sugar? Is it reversible? Yes and No. It’s reversible because you can always make another cup of tea. It’s irreversible because you cannot repair the tea you made.

Imagine you’re making tea for a dozen people at once now, and you put salt by mistake. It’s less reversible now because you’ve wasted a lot of milk and other ingredients — 12 times more than the first situation.

While reversibility is a good parameter for decision-making, a good way to make it more actionable is to link it to the cost of acquiring new information. In virtually all situations, we have incomplete information to make the perfect decision (If you do have some way to acquire perfect information in any situation, you should start investing right now, and send some money my way for the idea pls)

The time or resources spent in acquiring new information that we don’t already possess is the cost of acquiring new information. We interlink the two in the following way –

Rule of Thumb for Judging Reversibility

When decisions are reversible, make them fast. Your biggest risk is dragging your feet and not making a decision. The cost to acquire additional information isn’t worth the effort.

When decisions are irreversible, slow them down. The biggest risk is making the wrong decision. The cost to get the information we need to reduce uncertainty is worth the time and effort.

For example: You wake up one morning, you’re about to step into a steaming hot shower, and to your surprise (and outrage), your soap isn’t there. You quickly scurry to the store, and to your horror, your soap is out of stock. You decide to buy another brand because the boss is calling and you’re running late. You know you can always buy some soap; if it’s not nice, you’ll pick it up the next day. This is a classic and simple example of a Reversible decision.

Consider this: You are a team lead and are requested for one of your star players. On one hand, you don’t want to let her go — but on the other, you want the other team lead to owe you because you know you’ll need her help at some point in time soon. This decision, once taken, cannot be undone. You’ll probably take some time to figure out the consequences of letting your star go before making the decision. This is an example of irreversible decisions.

In short, make reversible decisions as soon as possible. Take sufficient time to make irreversible decisions.

In any case, remember, making a decision is more important than letting it pass by!

“Almost always, choosing something is better than choosing nothing”
Barry Schwartz, The Paradox of Choice

You may wonder why decision-making needs such a critical approach when decisions are based on the circumstances. As life seldom gives you sufficient time to make decisions, it is always better to be prepared with knowledge or the skill to make wise decisions and practising it. It’s like sharpening your sword every day, regardless of the war.

TLDR

There are two dimensions to consider with Decision Making->

1) Importance of Decisions: What level of importance a particular decision and it’s outcome hold for you and the others to whom the decision affects.

The Scale of Importance helps you ascertain the importance of a decision. You simply assign a number for the level of importance you believe a particular decision holds for you.

If it’s less important, spend less time evaluating options and be prepared to be okay with however it turns out. If it’s a high-importance decision, then spend more time evaluating different options to be sure you’re going to be satisfied with the outcome.

Use the Scale of Importance to resolve conflicts about decisions with your partners by explicitly understanding what’s important to whom.

2) Criticality of Decisions: What is the impact of the consequences of your decision on you and the others whom the decision affects?

You can understand the criticality of a decision by judging it’s reversibility. You can judge reversibility by looking at how much it would cost to undo the decision. The higher the cost to undo, the more irreversible it is. The lower the cost, the more reversible it is.

If it’s a low criticality decision, spend less time evaluating options and be prepared to be okay with however it turns out. If it’s a highly critical decision, spend more time evaluating different options to be sure you’re satisfied with the outcome.

“Almost always, choosing something is better than choosing nothing”.
-Barry Schwartz, The Paradox of Choice

Shukriya,

darpan; d.essentialist