Fay Niewiadomski explores how to recognise and pre-empt the traps of decision-making bias, and avoid recurrent patterns and poor results
Decision making is one of our most important continuous activities. At times, we make conscious and important strategic decisions. At other times, we simply go with the flow, making some conscious but also a multitude of unconscious choices.
We run on autopilot most of the time. It is a survival mechanism that can elevate or derail our chances for success. That is why it is important to raise our awareness of our decision-making process to determine whether or not we need to make changes or take more control of it. With this goal in mind, I believe you can be empowered in three ways:
- Deepen your conscious awareness and control of the decision-making process,
- Identify and neutralise the most common decision-making traps,
- Arm you with pre-emptive measures to mitigate risk.
Taking control
Recognising conscious awareness and taking control of our decision-making process is vital in order to avoid falling into the same traps. So, Let’s look at what decision making in full “conscious mode” actually means.
Become fully aware of what you are focusing on. Your mental focus determines the “reality” you experience: For example, if you are looking at your balance sheet and you don’t like what you see, and you notice that your competition is taking market share from you and some of your most talented managers are handing in their resignations. On their own, these are facts. But what is more important is the meaning they have for you, whether they represent problems to be solved or causes for despair?
What meaning are you attributing to the things and thoughts you focus on? What emotions is that meaning generating? For example, the meaning you attribute to the things you are focusing on will determine your response: Fight, Flight, Freeze or Feign. For example, do you see your problems as insurmountable obstacles or as opportunities to rethink and reinvent the way you do business, so competition is irrelevant? The way you interpret your situation and the emotions those thoughts generate will determine the decision(s) you make. If you are in a leadership role, your decisions have the power to make or break.
What decision will you make and what actions will you take? Those actions will determine the results you get and those results will determine success or failure. So, what can you do about that? Fortunately, there is a control mechanism to which you have full access when you switch to Full Conscious Mode by dissecting your T-F-A-R process. It is the ultimate control mechanism.
The T-F-A-R control mechanism
The T-F-A-R control mechanism explains how Thoughts lead to Feelings, feelings lead to Actions, and actions lead to Results.
If you don’t like the results you are getting, go back to step one and examine your thoughts. What are you focusing on – obstacles or opportunities? What meaning are you assigning to the things you are focusing on? On their own, those things are neutral and have no power besides the power you attribute to them. That means you can change your state by changing your thoughts and the meaning you attach to them. This is your control mechanism. It is how you change your state and focus on the opportunities instead of losing heart by focusing on the obstacles.
However, it is not as simple as we would like it to be. Full awareness of how we navigate our way through the world comes with experience. And also, with help of those who provide feedback and support so we can realise our full potential. Decision making is central to the outcomes we get. So, let’s look a little deeper into some of the potential decision-making traps. The traps can be perceptual, contextual or behavioral. Most of the time we are dealing with all three and may be unaware of it.
“If you are in a leadership role, your decisions can make or break”
The perceptual trap
“Confirmation Bias” is the most insidious because it is often unconscious. Our brain filters incoming perceptions to keep us consistent with the model of reality we have accepted as “true”. Our brain deletes, distorts and generalises inputs so that our perceptions conform with that model. Here are some common examples:
- Delete: If we have made up our mind that someone is incompetent, our brain will delete any data contrary to that perception or interpret it as an exception to the rule. Not True!
- Distort: If we have formed the opinion that a particular person is dishonest, whatever they say is interpreted as a manipulative strategy to deceive us. Not True!
- Generalise: If we worked with an exceptional data analyst from KabukiLand, we tend to conclude that all people from KabukiLand are good data analysts. Not True!
The contextual trap: Decisions do not occur in a vacuum
Like sailing in a particular season, decisions are made in a specific context and time frame. Our instruments provide data, but the environment is dynamic – external factors enter and force us to alter our understanding of the context. What worked in the past may not be appropriate or effective in the present context. Technology changes, circumstances change, legal and compliance requirements change, environmental, health and safety standards change. Look at the context. It matters because your supply chain, compliance, taxation or other considerations may be impacted. Nevertheless, we still have to decide how to get to our destination and with decisions come the inescapable traps of our behavioral biases.
Begin to navigate
Here are four behavioural traps and how to recognise and mitigate them:
Overconfidence: You are an expert. You have knowledge and well-established ideas. You have been there, done that and succeeded in the past. Moreover, you are the leader and may assume that you know best and should lead the way.
- Red flag: You lead the charge as your team hangs back! You feel alone.
- Investing time and effort to ensure that your team is on the same page often helps to strengthen their commitment and dilute your bias.
Information overload: You have mountains of data, multiple reports, minutes of meetings, stacks of slide decks, conflicting opinions and recommendations to review. Plus, pressure from stakeholders with different priorities and deadlines.
- Red flag: You narrow your focus, select fewer alternatives and “trust your gut”! You feel uneasy.
- Involving qualified members of your team to build clean, current, relevant and prequalified databases can help balance ‘gut feelings’ with fact checks.
Cognitive preferences: We have preferred thinking and decision-making styles. Some focus on the details and slow down. Others focus on the big picture and speed up. Internally referenced people decide based on personal principles and beliefs. Externally referenced colleagues focus on the pragmatics of cost-benefit analysis.
- Red flag: Are you stereotyped as Deliberate and Determined or Impulsive and Opportunistic? You feel misunderstood.
- Do you consult your core team and do they feel heard? Their silence may be an important message. Listening with intent broadens your perceptual field.
Risk orientation: Are you optimistic or risk-conscious about the outcome of your decisions? Is the half-empty or the half-full glass your default? Are you willing to take hard decisions and push back? Or, do you prefer to conform to corporate and social expectations?
- Red Flag: Are you seen as the Conservative Critic or the Exuberant Optimist? You feel puzzled. Why don’t they see what I see?
- Developing coaching skills may be a very useful addition to your leadership capabilities. These skills are listening, questioning and giving feedback. Mutual understanding dilutes biases.
“Confirmation bias is the most insidious because it is often unconscious”
Four pre-emptive measures to mitigate risk:
Define: Decision types as routine and recurrent, reversible and fixable, consequential and irreversible. Apply fast, medium and slow decision-speeds accordingly. Look behind you, is your team with you or not? Hubris (overconfidence) has been the downfall of many a hero.
Defend: Your non-negotiable ethical principles. Develop pre-prepared, practical, assertive responses and actions to protect your personal integrity. Consult those whose integrity you admire.
Deploy: A cognitively diverse team with whom to consult. Select one or two people who think and work differently from you and have them as your Master-Mind-Team. Remind yourself that superheroes are fictional characters.
Defy: Learn to say “No!” without guilt. Also develop ways of saying “No” without actually vocalising the words. Your non-verbal cues are a formidable way of communicating who you are. You do not want to be bullied into unjustified risks.
Conclusion
Don’t take yourself too seriously. Whatever you think you know should be checked and validated from at least three sources. None of us are omniscient. Believe half of what you see and none of what you hear. In all cases, learn to listen more intently, observe more closely and have those difficult conversations you have been postponing.
About the author
Fay Niewiadomski is a strategic leadership advisor, founder and CEO of ICTN,
a global consultancy delivering leadership and cultural transformation programmes
since 1993, and the author of Decisions That Matter.
Further reading
This article was first published in Business 5.0.