When knowledge makes us hesitate

http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2221-when-knowledge-makes-us-hesitate

by fogus • 16 years ago

24 12 16 years ago

vital101• 16 years ago

Making decisions blindly is far worse than hesitation. I agree that you can't let new information keep you from making a decision forever, but it's valuable to take a bit of time to fully consider the repercussions this information may have on you.

vinhboy• 16 years ago

I would agree with you when it comes to life and death situations, like in a war or something.

But in an office building, I don't see this being a problem. Having long meetings to discuss the virtue of different options is more often a waste of time and productivity.

aero142• 16 years ago

That isn't the only option though. I would prefer that the person closest to the problem make the decision, which isn't usually the person most willing to make a decision.

cookiecaper• 16 years ago

It's obviously valuable to evaluate your options, but there's a point where it becomes useless. Like most other things, this just needs to be done in balance; you can spend all day arguing why OO is better than procedural and vice-versa, or whatever you're arguing about, and in the end a decision still has to be made.

It's much more useful to get out there and do something, basically anything, than it is to wax on about that thing's implications for an unreasonably long time.

Everything should be considered, but then a decision should be made pretty quickly.

olliesaunders• 16 years ago

I'm one who likes to think things through to some kind of conclusion before acting. Often the conclusion can be "I'm not going to reach any sort of meaningful conclusion if I wait on X, so ..." And it's very rarely too difficult to complete that "so ..." part.

khafra• 16 years ago

The amount of time you spend considering the data shouldn't depend primarily on the magnitude of the decision. It should depend on your beliefs about how much another marginal unit of delay will cost you, vs. how much another marginal unit of considering data will benefit you.

For instance, if you're wondering which new ballpoint pen to buy, that's trivial next to strategic decisions in war. But it still might be worth comparing reviews on Amazon.com to increase your chances of getting something ergonomic which won't annoy you in some way.

Likewise, if you're Stanislav Petrov, you may have to make the most important decision in the history of mankind based on incredibly limited information, but with a large delay-dependent penalty if you just go with the flow until you can evaluate a sufficient amount of information.

Contrariwise, if you slip while climbing a tree, you don't stop to work on a coherent theory of quantum gravity even if you're only a few feet off the ground, however more accurate that might make your actions; you just grab in the general direction of a branch.

mrcharles• 16 years ago

I think this post can be summed up as "With experience comes the ability to make intelligent educated guesses with limited information".

Seems to me that once you reach a certain level of mastery, any chance event that happens can be seen in the light of previous similar chance events, and so that person with the most experience is able to say "this is likely how things will go from here" and move forward.

At least, that's been my experience. When I was green, and something changed, I had no idea what to do. Now, when there's something that changes, it barely slows me down. I've seen it all, I've heard it all, and at the end of the day, everything has a solution.

At least in software.

run4yourlives• 16 years ago

The key is that there are some individuals that can be masters at their craft and still doubt themselves, and some that know nothing and are able to create new realities.

Subject matter knowledge is only a part of the equation. The ability to "think on you feet" - and to do so correctly for often than not - is one of the most undervalued yet important skills of modern life. It affects everyone from Generals to Data Entry clerks, and will probably mean the difference between a meteoric rise up the success ladder and questioning why that other guy got promoted over you.

mootothemax• 16 years ago

This reminds me of the line from The Cable Guy: He who hesitates, masturbates ;)

In non-critical situations, I think it holds true, be it for chatting up girls, starting a new code project, or when you're facing a pile of dirty dishes in your flat.

philwelch• 16 years ago

Patton: "A good plan violently executed now is far better than a perfect plan executed next week."

knuckle_cake• 16 years ago

This phenomenon hit me hard when I was learning to play Poker back in the day.

fleitz• 16 years ago

One of the really interesting things that the US military took from this is to make decisions within the opposing force's ODA (Observe-Decide-Act) loop. The theory goes that if you make your decisions within their ODA loop that your actions appear to be random and start to cause analysis paralysis in the enemy force's command structure gaining further advantage for your force.

When knowledge makes us hesitate

Related Stories