Decisive

Decisive gives you a scientific, 4-step approach to making better decisions in your life and career, based on an extensive study of the available literature and research on the topic.

How many times has this happened to you in school? On Wednesday, someone starts talking about a party on Friday and by Thursday, everyone’s invited, including you. Now you have to decide what to do.

Interestingly, how we decide something like this often ends with us trying to answer some variant of this question: Should I go to Jake’s party – or not?

The problem with making decisions like this is that it’s a binary approach. You only consider two options: yes and no. To get the full picture though, you’d have to also consider opportunity costs. There are actually a lot more options, most of which start with “no, but…”

For example, if you didn’t go to Jake’s party, you’d have the option to just call it an early night and go to bed, of course. But you could also invite a friend over and watch a movie, go ice-skating, to a club, throw your own party, or get dinner with your family.

It’s not so much about going or not going, it’s about what else you could do in that time.

With money it’s the same thing. You can buy a $700 stereo or a $1,000 one. The question is what you’d do with the remaining $300, if you chose the cheaper version. Would you save it? Invest it? Book a flight? Buy 50 records?

Even just being aware of the option of doing something else with your time and money helps a lot in seeing the full picture of available choices.

For example, when people were given the choice between buying a $14.99 video or not in a study, without any hints 25% didn’t buy. But as soon as the no-option was labeled “Keep the $14.99 for other purchases,” decline rates shot up to 45% – just because people were suddenly aware they could do other things with their money.

In case of Jake’s party this won’t work, but in quite a lot of instances, you don’t even have to decide right away. You can just set up various trials and see which decision works out best. For example, I’m really struggling with what paid product I should create first on Four Minute Books. So instead of just picking one and potentially building something that falls flat on its face, I’ll just release a bunch of ideas and see which ones people really want me to make. If you think you want to be a writer, you don’t have to quit your job right away. You can…