We’re All Great Decision Makers, Right?

                    by Peter A. Arthur-Smith, Leadership Solutions, Inc.®

Like most other people, you have every reason to believe you’re a capable decision-maker. You were coached by your parents, taught by your teachers, and have plenty of good role models around you. However, there are two key scenarios which might give you pause for thought:

1) Our mind plays tricks, which leads us to suspect decisions.

2)With complex strategic, organizational, professional or life decisions, our traditional decision modes just don’t cut it.

  Tricks Our Mind Plays – According to Alessandro Acquisiti, a behavioral economist at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh – see NY Times article, “Letting Down our Guard,” April 2013 – when we’re under hurried and distracted circumstances, we can make bizarre decisions. Such as, the disclosure of key personal and private information that we otherwise wouldn’t disclose. He carried out many experiments, which revealed:

» When presented with store value-offers: We turn a blind-eye to our privacy and merchant tracking cards. We’re dazzled by the potential financial gain…great for Big Data.

» When offered participation in social media sites, we are liable to reveal things about ourselves that we otherwise wouldn’t… just for the privilege of using that site…Great for unwanted, third party trackers.

These are but two blind spots and there are many others. If we were well practiced in the option solving technique – see later – we would allow ourselves to take a deep breath and consider our options before taking such a leap.

  Dealing With Complexity – The reality is that our rational mind does not have the natural range or power to fathom complex situations, whereas our intuitive mind does. Our academics and economists have worked mightily hard to reduce most things to formulas, numbers or simple solutions to put our rational mind in charge.

With such professional influence, not only do we make short-sighted decisions, but we draw conclusions based upon “math or logic” rather than “human dimensions or conceptual judgment.” This short-sightedness drove us into the Great Recession. For example, we:

» Indulged in gas-guzzling vehicles at the expense of a likely gas crisis.

» Indulged in fanciful mortgages at the expense of creating a housing bubble.

» Indulged in cheap credit at the expense of creating a debt crisis.

On the other hand, if we were well-practiced in option solving, an intuitive-focused decision approach, we would be so much better equipped to deal with complexity, introduce creative possibilities, and draw upon our full range of life’s comparative experiences.

So, what is the option solving technique? It is the mode of leveraging our remarkable intuitive decision-making capabilities. Without OS, our intuitive mind works in rather random ways based upon what it “sees” at any particular moment. Our intuitive mind is built for sizing-up pictures. It was trained to do that since the day we were born – viewing faces, surveying surroundings, and scanning picture books. It can determine whether someone is friendly or hostile, whether it will rain or shine, or whether a person is happy or sad.

On the other hand, it’s been proven that our rational mind cannot judge between truth and fiction, black or white, or right or wrong. With such limitations, it is unable to make judgments about dilemmas such as: who should we marry, what career to pursue, should we trust someone. However, our intuitive senses have been built to handle such issues, especially if we can present the scenario through pictures.

Option solving draws upon our rational mind’s ability to frame the right question and considerations and start creating a picture for our intuitive mind to comprehend and handle. It starts a seven step process:

» Right question with key considerations

» Creation of yin and yang “bookends,” for framing and clarifying unlikely, extreme options.

» Producing five or more intervening, plausible options.

» Allowing for emotional distancing either by injecting a reasonable time interval or “sleeping on it.”

» Scanning the overall option solving “pictogram” to make an optimum intuitive choice.

» Deciding whether to reiterate the process through peeling the onion; for figuring out finer sub-options.

» Otherwise, then move straight to an action initiative.

So, by all means feel good about your decision-making capabilities, although, at the same time, reflect on when a decision didn’t turn out as well as you expected and whether greater use of your intuitive powers would have served you better. Did you create the right pictogram?

The one downside with the OS mode is, that when done properly, it makes complex decisions seem relatively easy. Now we hit a trick of our mind, in that, it prefers a high degree of difficulty in order to value something. Option solving unfortunately reduces that degree of difficulty and therefore ultimate decision credibility. So much for wanting our lives to be easier!

When you next find yourself confronted with a complex issue or dilemma, that requires more than a couple of straightforward choices, make use of option solving. You can go to Website www.optionsolving.com and find many more examples to help put you on track. Once you get the hang of it, you will find optimum business or personal solutions come forward so much easier…which doesn’t mean it’s that less valuable.

To make more of your decision-making capabilities, why not talk to: