Optimism Bias

These explanations are all irrational for preferring the status quo:

• Loss Aversion: When we make decisions, we weigh the potential for loss more heavily than the potential for gain.
• Sunk Costs: We continue to invest resources like time, money, or effort into a specific endeavor just because we are already invested, not because it is the best choice.
• Cognitive Dissonance: In decision-making, we an option as more valuable once we have chosen it. Considering an alternative can cause cognitive dissonance.
• Mere Exposure Effect: It states that people prefer something they've been exposed to before.
• Rationality vs. Irrationality: We may choose to keep our current situation because of the potential transition cost of switching to an alternative. It becomes irrational when we ignore choices that can improve a situation because we want to maintain the status quo.

• When offered several sandwich options, individuals often choose a sandwich they have eaten before.
• In 1985, Coca Cola reformulated the original Coke flavor and started selling a "New Coke." Although blind taste tests found many consumers preferred New Coke, consumers continued to buy Coke Classic. New Coke was discontinued in 1992.
• In political elections, the current candidate is more likely to win than the challenger.

If you already have an opinion about something before you've even tried to figure it out, chances are you'll over-value information that confirms that opinion.

Think about what kinds of information you would expect to find to support alternative outcomes.

The “fundamental attribution error,” is when we excuse our own mistakes but blame other people for theirs.

Give other people the chance to explain themselves before judging their behavior.

Our brain likes to take shortcuts to solve a problem when normal methods are too slow to find a solution. 

The problem with this approach is that frightening events are easier to recall than every-day events. We should be aware that alarmist news broadcasts don't help in an accurate sense of events.

We have a tendency to stubbornly hold on to a number once we hear it and gauge all other numbers based on the initial number, even if the information is not that relevant.

For example, if customers are limited to 'four per customer' they are more likely to buy four, even if they did not initially intend to do so.

It's a tendency to heavily weigh the moment which is closer to the present, as compared to something in the near or distant future.

Example: If you are offered a choice of $150 right now or $180 after 30 days, you would be more inclined to choose the money you are offered right now. However, if we take the present moment out of the equation, and put this offer in the distant future, where you are offered $150 in 12 months or $180 in 13 months, your choice is likely to be the latter one.

• Actor-Observer Bias: the way the explanation of other people’s behaviour tends to focus on the influence of their personality while being less focused on the situation while being just the opposite while explaining one’s own behaviour.
• Zeigarnik Effect: when something unfinished and incomplete tends to linger in the mind and memory.
• The IKEA Effect: when our own assembling of an object is placed at a higher value than the other objects.
• Optimism Bias: makes us underestimate the cost and duration for every project we try to undertake or plan.
• Availability Bias: makes us believe whatever is more easily available to our consciousness, and is more vivid (or entrenched) in our memory.

The brain creates shortcuts in order to make fast decisions when it hits information or inspiration overload. 

These shortcuts form unconscious biases so it’s easier for your brain to categorize information and make quick judgments over and over again.

This means that when something good happens, you take the credit, but when something bad happens, you blame it on external factors.

Self-serving bias may manifest at work when you receive critical feedback. Instead of keeping an open mind, you may put up a defense when your manager or team member is sharing feedback or constructive criticism.

Unconscious bias refers to unconscious forms of discrimination and stereotyping. Unconscious bias often leads to discrimination, be it deliberate or unintentional.

Unconscious bias is different from cognitive biases. Cognitive biases relate to our brains' particular wiring, while unconscious bias refers to perceptions between different groups and are specific to different societies.

• Recognise that the unconscious bias is a systemic issue. Internal cultures need to be checked and addressed first.
• There is no shame or guilt in unconscious bias. Unconscious bias stems from our tendency to categorise people into social groups and often doesn't match our conscious values.
• It takes a series of conversations and interventions to prevent and protect against unconscious bias.

• Don’t compare options side by side: In comparison mode, we end up spending too much time playing “spot the difference.” Instead, evaluate each choice individually and on their own merit.
• Know your “Must-Haves” before you look for something to buy: that way, you won't get suckered into features you don’t really need.
• Optimize for things you can’t get used to: your happiness will adjust back to anything that is stable and certain like your income, the size of your house, or the quality of your TV.

It's a thinking mistake and it occurs when we confuse selection factors with results. 

Professional swimmers don't have perfect bodies because they train extensively. Rather, they are good swimmers because of their physiques.

It plays on this tendency of ours to emphasize loss over gain.

The term sunk cost refers to any cost that has been paid already and cannot be recovered. The reason we can't ignore the cost, even though it's already been paid, is that we're wired to feel loss far more strongly than gain.

• Appoint an executive sponsor to work with a project lead to frame important decisions for senior leaders to weigh in on;
• Break things down (with decision meetings at each stage), and connect them up.
• Focuses on debating the solution (instead of endlessly elaborating the problem) and gather the right people.
• Move faster without losing commitment: get comfortable living with imperfect data and being clear about what “good enough” looks like.

• Identify decisions that involve a cross-cutting group of leaders, and work with the stakeholders of each to agree on what the main steps in the process entail.
• Work through a set of real-life scenarios to pressure-test the system in collaboration with the people who will be running the process.
• Limit the number of decision-making bodies, and clarify for each its mandate, standing membership, roles etc.
• Create shared objectives, metrics, and collaboration targets.

• We get upset when someone doesn't fulfill a promise. However, if they do more than promised, we're not grateful enough for it.
• People learn more and faster from punishment and reward. If you have to pick one, negative feedback stimulates learning faster than positive feedback.

Do not do unto others what you do not want to be done unto you.

It is about focusing on eliminating the negative more than encouraging the positive. Because there’s abundant evidence from multiple sources that relationships are far more strongly affected by negative things than positive things.