Watch for the negative impact of self-serving bias in decision-making
The self-serving bias is a concept that has been extensively studied in social psychology. Essentially, it is people’s tendency to attribute positive events to their own character but attribute negative events to external factors. It’s a common type of cognitive bias that exists in all aspects of life, including in the workplace.
For example, a salesperson who attributes a significant sale to his own business insight and relationship-building skills, but attributes a loss of a sale to the customer’s lack of acumen or the competitor’s unfair advantage may be exhibiting the self-serving bias. Similarly, a leader’s inclination to take credit for the team’s success, but to blame individual team members for mistakes or missteps is another common example of self-serving bias.
The self-serving bias can negatively impact decision-making
The problem of course with the self-serving bias is that it can negatively affect organizational decision-making. For example, Continue reading
Recently I had a conversation with a scientist friend who told me how biologists use information about animal life cycles to accomplish diametrically opposite objectives – in some cases to purge populations, and in others to conserve them. The secret: determining in which stage of its life cycle is the animal most vulnerable. And it’s at these points of vulnerability that either the worst or the best is the easiest to accomplish. It is when the animals are at greatest risk that it takes the least effort to destroy them, or conversely, to protect them. He gave me two examples to illustrate his point.
“Worry is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do but never gets you anywhere”
“We need to wait until we have all the facts …” is something I hear many managers and supervisors say. It’s often in response to an issue that needs to be dealt with or an unexpected problem that has occurred. Usually the situation is a difficult one and because the manager has no prior experience with making decisions in an identical or similar scenario, s/he is stalling for time. The unfortunate reality of course is that if you wait for all the facts, you might be waiting for a really (really) long time; perhaps even an eternity.
In 1626, King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden ordered the building of the Vasa, a new warship that was intended to become, for that era, the most powerful marine vessel in the Baltic Sea. As was common in warships then, the Vasa was to have a rank of cannons on each side of the boat so that soldiers could easily fire at their attackers, no matter what direction the assault came from.
By definition, there is always uncertainty in making risky decisions; after all, the old adage “no risk, no reward” holds true. No doubt, leadership instinct and past experience play an important role in determining whether the possible reward is worth the perceived risk, but I am nevertheless often asked by leaders whether there is a more systematic approach to making risky decisions. Decision-making theory abounds with a plethora of techniques and methods, but there is one relatively simple approach that I have found to repeatedly give positive results. Ask yourself: does making the decision result in more options or fewer? If the answer is more choices, then move forward. If the answer is fewer options, then don’t take that action.
