So kids, those are my questions
So kids, those are my questions.. May you find and create many of your own. Be sure to look for simple solutions. If the answer isn’t simple, it’s probably not the right answer.
— from Decisions & Choices (Decision/Choice/Focus/Forethought/Consequences) · Tools of Titans
In the book
Keep a couple of thinking tools on the shelf: break a problem down to its irreducible parts, or ask what you most want to avoid, or trace the consequences of the consequences. And lean, always, toward simplicity — the simplest explanation is usually the best, and if a solution isn't simple it is probably not the right one; assume of others not malice but a plain lack of knowledge, which frees you from blame and gets you to the decision. Guard against the mind's built-in distortions, because they hijack decisions silently: loss aversion, which makes you fear a loss more than you value the equal gain; the framing of the same facts in different lights; and the anchors the first number drops in your head — and beware, above all, overconfidence, with its dismissal of bad news and its illusion of control. […] Weigh it honestly. Run the costs, benefits, alternatives, and worst case — can I get back here? — and ask whether it will matter in five years. Think in probabilities and simulations when the outcome is uncertain, prefer the simplest solution, and average independent judgments to cut the noise. Get critique, then own it. Lay big decisions before trusted people who hunt for the weaknesses — and then make the call yours. — Decisions & Choices (Decision/Choice/Focus/Forethought/Consequences)