LATEST RESEARCH ON EFFECTIVE DECISION MAKING REVEALED

In the last few decades, psychologists, neuroscientists, even economists have been trying to pull back the curtain on our brains so as to examine what goes on when we make decisions – whether these be large or small, understanding why someone might choose a Coke instead of Pepsi, could mean millions of dollars for someone in the drinks business. If you're a lawyer, it could be a question of life or death for your client. How would you decide whether to convict?

This article reveals radical new research, some compelling facts and an easy solution to debating any difficult dilemma by making better, more balanced decisions.

Since the time of the Ancient Greeks, we have been making democratic decisions through a process of debate which effectively weights up the pros and the cons to reach a satisfactory compromise. Certainly, to make balanced decision it's imperative we're aware of all of the sides of the argument however it is nonsensical that we should limit our point of view to purely the positive or negative; the black and white shades of such conversations.

Are the gray areas really so confusing? Surely the world is much more multi-coloured than that!

So too are our minds and our opinions and this is why the process of making a decision is perceived to be so complex. It is also the reason why such decision making processes often disintegrate into arguments and emotional exchanges. It's why we fail to make decisions and procrastinate over them instead.

Procrastination is NOT productive and neither is argument and conflict. Both cost more than making the wrong decision and then recovering from it.

If you want to make progress then you must make decisions.

Indecision fuels fears and frustration whilst consuming energy and resources. It leaves you feeling de-motivated, unsatisfied and out of control. The only way to re-establish control and remove yourself from such a cycle of despair is by taking action. Knowing what action to take requires you to make a decision and this is why knowing how to make the right decisions at the right time is such a life-altering skill.

Knowing how to collaborate to be creative and constructive during your decision making process will further add to your rewards.

Jennifer Lerner, PhD, director of the Emotion and Decision Making Group at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government concludes that a bad mood can cost you because a sense of sadness lowers our self‐esteem and urges us to pay more in an attempt to re‐establish self‐worth. Equally an Australian psychology expert Professor Joe Forgas, who has been studying emotions, has found that being grumpy makes us think more clearly. In contrast to those overly happy types, miserable people are better at decision‐making and less gullible, his experiments showed. While cheerfulness fosters creativity, gloominess breeds attentiveness and careful thinking. Emotional extremes radically influence our interpretation of the facts.

Our emotions play a fundamental part in ruling the decisions we make and so too do other people.

The culture, community, environment and mind-sets with which we mix play a fundamental role in influencing our decision making process. Such influences can be both positive and highly detrimental. It is imperative that you become aware of what factors may be influencing your mind if you want to make a rounded and balanced decision.

But, balanced decisions are never comprehensive enough unless they have explored all potential avenues of opportunity. So often when we make a decision we start by considering our options or the end objective and in so doing we limit our field of view.

One of the main reasons why our current way of thinking lets us down is because we have yet to adequately understand how best to quantify the quality of our own creative thoughts.  They are often easier to dismiss than they are to take into consideration. 

Creative thoughts cause us to make emotional and impulsive decisions of the ill-founded and sometimes seemingly foolish nature – the types of decisions we may later live to regret.  It’s by making such bullish mistakes that we learn to dismiss what are effectively our intuitive and most creative thoughts. We learn to rely on our critical brain and place our trust in absolute answers. 

Critical thinking takes part in the left hand side of the brain as opposed to the right hand side of the brain which deals with creativity.  Left brain thinking is logical, it follows a linear order and can be quantified, analyzed and judged.  Critical thinking gives right or wrong, black and white answers and although life is very rarely like this, it is for this reason that critical thinking tends to be the type of thinking that is mainly taught in schools.  There is a way to measure the results.  It is also the type of thinking that determines most business decisions but it leaves our emotions and feelings out of the picture.

Our brain capability is incredible. The brain contains about a hundred thousand miles of blood vessels (160,000 kilometers) and about 100 billion neurons. These neurons are able to perform about 10 quadrillion operations per second. What this means is that your brain capacity is virtually unlimited and you are nowhere near using it to its full potential.

The Whether? Forecast™ decision making system instantly helps you make the right decision at the right time, every time.