Understanding Decision-Making in Complexity

Street Lights and Shadows Summary

• This summary examines human error, particularly in ambiguous situations, using the example of the Gimli Glider incident.
• The incident revealed several breakdowns rooted in flawed procedures and miscommunication, highlighting the limitations of relying solely on standard procedures in complex scenarios.
• The authors use the concept of "mental gears" to illustrate that humans need both standard procedures and improvisation in response to changing conditions.
• The human's ability to perceive is different in bright light than in shadows; both methods of perception are equally valid.
• Successful decision making in complex situations involves the ability to rapidly adapt to changing conditions and rely on both explicit and tacit knowledge.

Complex and Unpredictable Situations

• Well-ordered domains are structured and stable allows us to effectively predict the future.
• Complex domains, however, are less structured and more unpredictable.
• Recognizing these differences and the limitations of rigid procedures is crucial for success.

A Passion for Procedures

• Procedures (including checklists) are useful tools, but organizations often overestimate their importance.
• Over-reliance on procedures can lead to mindlessness, complacency, and a decline in expertise.
• Procedures alone are insufficient in complex settings where context is crucial for effective decision-making.
• Procedural guides can be out of date and inflexible, potentially leading to inefficiencies and unintended consequences.

Seeing the Invisible

• Tacit knowledge (or implicit understanding) is crucial for navigating complex situations.
• Tacit knowledge is the understanding of how to do something without being able to explain it.
• Expertise is built on nuanced perceptual skills, pattern recognition, and the ability to adapt procedures to the circumstances.
• Mental models are essential for understanding complex systems, but they have limitations and may cause oversimplification or bias.

How Biased is Our Thinking?

• Decision biases are flaws or errors in human judgment that can significantly affect decision-making processes.
• These biases are frequently present in both expert and ordinary decision-making.
• The anchoring and adjustment heuristic, and the representativeness heuristic are examples of common biases.
• Recognition of these biases is important as they can lead to inaccurate judgements or decisions.

We are Talking About Limitations, Not Irrationality

• People use heuristics (mental shortcut) to ease the cognitive load of decision-making which may result in errors, but these errors are not irrational.
• Reasoning strategies are generally effective in complex natural settings.
• The systematic errors are less problematic outside the laboratory, and frequently lead to adequate functioning.

What Can We Do to Protect Ourselves from the Limitations without Sacrificing the Strengths?

• Build expertise that rely more on experience
• Design better methods, as well as better data formats.
• Employ choice architects: someone that guides people towards a particular choice.

Intuition Versus Analysis

• Statistical analysis and expert judgement can provide helpful insights, but they can't eliminate all biases in decision-making.
• Using intuition and analysis may be essential

To Make a Decision, Generate Several Options and Compare Them

• Decision-making often involves generating options, and contrasting and comparing them
• A formal process for identifying options and comparing them is useful before deciding.

Experts and Errors

• Expertise is built upon experience and the development of sophisticated mental models.
• Expert's mental models evolve as a result of experience
• Experience is associated with better decision making

The Risk of Risk Management

• Attempting to predict all potential risks may be counterproductive in complex environments.
• Risk management methods can miss important problems in complex environments, and reduce the ability of the organization to adapt.

The Cognitive Wavelength

• Common ground is necessary to coordinate actions with others. The ability to rapidly interpret and respond requires mutual understanding of each other's context.
• Leaders can create common ground through clear roles and ground rules in advance. Clear instructions work better than vague instructions.
• Common Ground is not guaranteed. Different experiences will always affect our perceptions and perspectives.

Unlearning

• Unlearning is an important aspect of complex learning.
• It involves abandoning old or inaccurate mental models and perspectives in favour of more accurate ones as result of experience.
• It is often difficult to unlearn beliefs or ways of doing things, even when they're flawed or obsolete

Automating Decisions

• Decision support systems can be useful in well-ordered domains but are less effective in complex situations.
• Algorithms and automated decisions need to be adapted for the nature of the task at hand; otherwise, they can be harmful
• To make appropriate use of automated decision-making processes in complex or ambiguous circumstances, humans require a degree of oversight

The Limits of Feedback

• Feedback is not always sufficient to improve performance.
• Finding out the cause-effect relationship is particularly important in complex and ambiguous situations.
• Learning and performance may suffer if feedback is overwhelming or hard to make sense of
• Understand feedback and put it into context; it is usually better to address the underlying assumptions of the feedback.

Correcting the Dots

• Sensemaking involves connecting and interpreting data within a framework of understanding.
• In complex situations, our understanding of the data will be affected by our past experiences.

When Patience Is a Vice

• Jumping to conclusions without sufficient evidence can be harmful and hinder future discoveries.
• Sometimes a cautious approach of waiting for more information is necessary if you want to build confidence and trust in a decision.
• An open mind is not necessarily always useful
• Individuals can fixate on premature conclusions or miss opportunities to adjust their course of action.

The Risk of Risk Management

• It is important to understand that attempts to perfectly categorize and eliminate risks in advance may be detrimental

Moving Targets

• Goals in complex situations are often not clearly defined at the outset, and they can change over time.
• Flexibility and adapting to changing circumstances are crucial in complex projects.