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Consider Opportunity Costs

Consider Opportunity Costs

  • Consider the "opportunity cost" of a decision by evaluating what will be given up by choosing a particular option.
  • It is not just about monetary costs but also includes time and other resources.

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Multi-Track for Better Solutions

Multi-Track for Better Solutions

  • We tend to oversimplify decisions into binary options.
  • Explore multiple options simultaneously, leading to higher-quality work by allowing for a broader exploration of possibilities and reducing attachment to any single option.
  • Enhanced Creativity: Exploring different paths can spark creative solutions.
  • Risk Mitigation: If one track fails, others might still succeed.
  • However, be wary of choice overload, as having too many options can paralyze decision-making.

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Leverage Existing Solutions

Leverage Existing Solutions

  • Explore solutions others have found for similar problems to gain insights and ideas.
  • Look into different disciplines to discover solutions that may not be obvious initially.
  • Gain external perspective by asking indicative questions to understand how others in similar situations have navigated challenges.

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Look out for Biases in your Decision-Making

Look out for Biases in your Decision-Making

  • Consider allowing someone else to play devil's advocate to challenge your choices.
  • Encourage disagreement by building a case against your decision to analyze logical constraints.
  • Take an observer perspective by stepping outside of your immediate viewpoint to analyze the situation as an impartial outsider. 

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Conduct Small Experiments

Conduct Small Experiments

  • Utilize "ooching" by testing ideas on a small scale before committing fully.
  • For instance, tech startups release beta versions of their apps to a select group of users to identify bugs and collect feedback.

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Consider Future Consequences

Consider Future Consequences

  • Many of our choices are hijacked by what we believe is important in the moment that we’re faced with them.
  • Shift focus to long-term consequences by imagining outcomes from a future perspective.

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Embrace Uncertainty in Decision Outcomes

Embrace Uncertainty in Decision Outcomes

  • Consider a range of possible outcomes each with an associated probability of success.
  • Pre-mortems: Imagine that your decision has already failed and work backward to identify what could have caused the failure. Use this information to adjust probabilities and mitigate overconfidence.
  • Add margins of safety to timelines to account for uncertainties. Allocate additional resources where uncertainties are high.

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Implement Decision-Making Triggers by Establishing Tripwires

Implement Decision-Making Triggers by Establishing Tripwires

  • When we do a certain thing every day we often don’t notice the gradual changes that, over time, can amount to a drastic situation.
  • Tripwires are predefined conditions or thresholds that, when met, prompt a specific action or decision - such as setting budget limits or deadlines.
  • This approach enables responding proactively rather than reactively - by creating signals to interrupt autopilot behaviour and prompt corrective actions.

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Summary: WRAP Process

Summary: WRAP Process

  1. Widen Your Options: multi-tracking, learning from others
  2. Reality-Test Your Assumptions: seek disconfirming evidence, conduct small experiments
  3. Attain Distance Before Deciding:  10/10/10 rule, seek outsider perspective
  4. Prepare to Be Wrong: conduct premortems, set tripwires and make contingency plans

 

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CURATOR'S NOTE

How to make better choices in life and work.

Different Perspectives Curated by Others from Decisive

Curious about different takes? Check out our book page to explore multiple unique summaries written by Deepstash curators:

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