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Decisions we make are essential parts of our lives. Each time we make the right choice, it brings us a better life – it could be deciding which coffee you take, or choosing your romantic partner. In this book, Decisive, Chip and Dan Heath put in plain words that we mostly don’t take the rightest decisions, because we don’t consider all the possibilities; we’re under the influence of our previous decisions, subjective values, and current emotional states; also we have no doubts about our decisions. In the book, the authors also explain the potential negative effects of bad decision-making – or avoiding making decisions, as was the case with Kodak, one of the predominant producers of photographic film. Kodak realized that analog photography would be seized by digital photography soon, in the early 1980s. However, they didn’t make ideal decision making, so the company couldn’t take proper action. Ultimately, by 2002, the sales of the digital cameras went beyond the sales of analog cameras, as a result, Kodak felt behind. Chapter 1 - Even if you feel puzzled when making a decision, don’t falsely set limits to your possibilities. Generally speaking, our perception of decision-making suggests that we have to choose one of two available options. That could be right, we mostly get obligated to decide on doing or not doing a given thing. But limiting the decision-making process into a simple, two-fold choice makes us ignorant about the alternatives. Whenever you feel stuck in such a situation, remember that you don’t have to be limited by only two predetermined options, instead, there might be many other alternative ways. Take teenagers as examples. They often find themselves in a situation where they have to make a decision. It could be about whether they should smoke or go to a party. As easily realized, these decision-makings don’t include assessment of all the available alternatives, the teens make them by voting for or against a particular option. However, deciding to go to that party or not, would be much easier if the teen reckoned another alternative. For example, he could also watch a football game at home instead of attending the party. Considering the probable “Opportunity cost” of your choice is another method to achieve stressful decision making. This is simply asking yourself what this choice will cost to you, to put it differently, what you will sacrifice for it. Let’s think, you cannot decide which sound system you buy, either an elegant stereo for $1000 or a simpler model for $700. To calculate the opportunity cost, imagine if you bought the simpler one and saved $300, what would you do with that money? After this consideration, would you be willing to have the expensive one and greater quality, or the just useable one and extra $300? Astonishingly, we hardly remember the opportunity costs. Research has shown that when people were asked to buy a video that cost nearly $14.99 or not has it at all, the percentage of people who didn’t buy it was 25%. However, when the statement “ Keep the $14.99 for other purchases,” was added to the previous choice, 45% decided not to buy it. So, the results of that study demonstrate that even if the options remained the same, just a slight alerting about the possibility of other alternatives could bring better decision making Chapter 2 - When you try to decide something, don’t get stuck only with a particular idea, review various options till you find the best solution. Generally speaking, when we want to solve a problem, we remain stick to one single option. However, if we checked out more ways, the results could be more beneficial. This method is called multitracking – it means assessing various options at the same time- and its positive effects on decision-making can be enormous. For example, in a study, researchers appointed graphic designers that were divided into two groups to prepare a poster advertisement for an online magazine. The first group was received feedback after each time they designed one. On the other hand, the other group offered three options before receiving their first feedback. Then they reduced their option into two and was received another feedback. After this step, they decided on the final design. Guess what? Magazine editors, professional ad execs, and testers liked more the ads created by the second group. Maybe, that’s because you become less inclined to each option if you have more alternatives to consider, and thanks to that you might feel more flexible in your decision. Another possible reason might be that when assessing several alternatives, you always create a Plan B. So if Plan A collapses, you have still another solution to implement. However, keep alerted about the risk of choice surplus, because too many alternatives can ruin your decision-making process. For instance, studies have demonstrated that people who tasted 6 kinds of jam on one day were ten times more inclined to decide to buy a jar rather than the people who were offered 24 kinds of jams on one day. All in all, do not add 24 extra options into your decision-making, just a few more would be enough. Chapter 3 - Check out the answers found by someone else to solve the same problem. Sometimes, we mistakenly believe that we’re the first to deal with a particular problem. However, the problem you face for the first time in your life might have already solved by someone else. You just don’t recognize it because of some subtle differences. Whenever you search for a way to get over a certain problem, it would be wise to delve into how other people are handling it. For example, if you have a business-related concern, take a look at how your fellow businessmen handled it. This led you to find the ideal solution. Let’s think of Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart. In 1954, he traveled for 12 hours just to see a new model of sales counter at Ben Franklin variety stores, which was the alternative to the old system that separate counter according to the type of the products like kitchen supplies, groceries, etc. Inspired by what he had seen, Walton began to use that new invention in his stores. Throughout his business life, Walton observed what his competitors were doing and got inspired by them. He never hesitated to admit that almost every idea of him was originally someone else’s. In addition to the previously mentioned method, making analogies also helps us to deal with certain problems with a wider approach, so it leads us to solutions. Let’s think, the establishment of Speedo’s Fastskin Swimsuit. Its creator, Fiona Fairhurst, designed this suit after examining “anything that moves fast” - for example, sharks, torpedoes, space shuttles, etc. She made particular researches about the quality of sharkskin, and the pattern of the torpedoes, and finally concluded that he needed a fabric that includes pivotal aspects of both -an unevenness to prevent getting dragged and a large coverage capacity to get the swimmer’s body to a torpedo-like form. She focused on the general idea, the speed rather than limiting her imagination only with inventing a fast swimsuit. This thinking led her to brilliant success and made her highly advantageous in the market, so the authorities banned using that material in 2010. As the example shows, being ready to get inspired by different domains could provide you with brilliant solutions that you normally wouldn’t be able to think of. Chapter 4 - Pretend to be the devil’s advocate and produce some anti-thesis of your decision to get rid of any bias. There’s nothing weird to invest in the options that we find desirable the most when we make a decision. However, it doesn’t mean that they are the best. Even though our inclinations create partiality during our decision-making process, it is possible to reduce the negative influence of our likes and dislikes by implementing some methods. As the first step, always be agree to disagree with someone else. Evaluate all the possible reasons that would transform the options you eliminated before into the best choices. This doesn’t mean contradicting your preferences or taking a position on their sides, instead, by doing this you assess reasonable restraints of each option and make it easy to disagree without any resentment. If you’re bad at playing the devil’s advocate, then let someone else do it for you. Most importantly allow him or her to come with the most convincing contra-argument of the option that you consider as the best. Furthermore, raise undesirable questions to let the opposing information show up. For example, imagine that you receive a job offer from a prestigious law firm. You’ll be paid very well, have a good working atmosphere; all in all, it’s a desirable position in a reputable company. When you meet the lawyers, don’t waste your time with useless questions, for example with asking whether they are satisfied with the company. Instead, ask your future co-workers whether they can often have dinner at home, whether they work until late, etc. Or, learn how many lawyers they have employed recently, and how many of them still stay? Has the CEO changed so many secretaries in the last five years? So, we have examined some effective methods to interrogate our decisions. There is also another way. It is to check how our choices have resulted in other people. Chapter 5 - Take a look at your situation from the outside, think how it looks like. We usually assume that the situations we’re going through are unique for us, however, looking at how others living a similar problem have coped. Our problems are more identical than we’d believe.