37 Early Decisions and Bias
b"Business Leaders Make Sound Business Decisions\\n\\nThanks for joining me today.\\xa0 My topic is EARLY DECISIONS AND BIAS.\\xa0 We\\u2019ll discuss what happens when we get too ingrained in what we thought or believed.\\xa0 The bottom line is this:\\xa0 DON\\u2019T MAKE DECISIONS EARLY!\\xa0 Make decisions and form opinions when they are necessary, but only after all relevant information has been gathered.\\n\\nTo illustrate my point, look at it this way--- we acquire information all the time related to various decisions.\\xa0 It could be about a marketing decision, which direction to go, which school to attend, which course of study or major to pursue, or which path to take inside a company.\\xa0 As we gather information and learn, we are pointed to a simple \\u201cyes\\u201d or \\u201cno\\u201d decision.\\xa0 We may \\u201ccount\\u201d the votes and have 34 for yes and 26 for no.\\xa0 That sounds simple, right?\\xa0 We may follow the votes because we KNOW which way to go and what we believe.\\xa0 But, what happens over time?\\xa0 Additional information comes in one piece at a time, and it may point in the OPPOSITE direction from what we\\u2019ve already decided and the opinion we\\u2019ve already formulated.\\xa0 What now?\\xa0 Most likely we will push THAT one piece of information aside which doesn't agree with the conclusion or decision already made. In six months or a year down the road, we may find if we were accurately keeping score that it may have been 47 for no and 38 for yes.\\xa0 A different decision would have been made in the end, but we decided too early and pushed the subsequent piece meal information aside.\\n\\nThink of friends you meet and people you know.\\xa0 Have you ever met someone who CAN\\u2019T or WON\\u2019T change their mind, no matter what arguments or information you present?\\xa0 What happens is that they have made decisions too early, and then have to become defensive about their decisions.\\n\\nAside from business and other things about success in life, look at this principle regarding politics:\\n\\n\\tNo matter what happens, a certain group of people will ALWAYS vote for one party or the other\\u2014regardless.\\n\\tMost people are on one side or the other, with a very small number in the \\u201cmiddle.\\u201d\\xa0 Therefore, a small number of people actually influence the election.\\n\\tEven though dramatic changes have occurred in BOTH parties over the last 30-40 years, some people made a decision long ago, became defensive about it, and refused to change\\u2014NO MATTER WHAT!\\n\\tThese people may or may not like the candidate from their own party, but they would NEVER vote for a person in the other party, simply based on a decision made long ago.\\n\\nIf you aren\\u2019t careful, you can develop the same bias in business and become inflexible in your decisions.\\xa0 If your decision and opinion are \\u201ccast in stone\\u201d then you are less likely to consider any new information.\\xa0 Have you ever encountered a boss who is stubborn?\\xa0 Most of us probably have at some point.\\n\\n\\xa0The solution to Not become that biased person is based on the following:\\n\\n\\tDon\\u2019t make decisions until you absolutely have to make them.\\n\\tDon\\u2019t make and develop opinions until necessary for the direction you want to go.\\n\\nI can give a person example from a situation that I encountered back in college.\\xa0 I wasn\\u2019t sure whether to go to law school or graduate school.\\xa0 I investigated and gathered information.\\xa0 A quick decision would have been for law school, mainly because of the lawyers I saw on TV shows.\\xa0 I knew I needed to attend the best school possible, so I decided to await the results of the LSAT and GRE tests, to see which was better.\\xa0 I performed well on both tests, so I took a closer look at what lawyers actually did\\u2014and not just the nice stuff you see on TV.\\xa0 I figured out I didn\\u2019t really like doing what lawyers did with most of their time, so this helped me make my decision.\\xa0 I\\u2019ve had to employ this technique over and over in my career.\\n\\nAs an example from my life today, I\\u2019m often called upon to make recommendations to firms or give advice to people.\\xa0 Rather than formulate an opinion ahead of time based on w..."