Indecisive? Do You Know The Right Thing to Do, Yet Still Hesitate?

Source: Michigan Daily

Have you ever found yourself "doom scrolling" on Netflix while your friend or spouse implores you to simply, "Pick something already!"  Many of us have experienced this type of indecision.  We are overwhelmed by choice in those cases.  In other situations, we encounter equally good, or equally poor, courses of action, and we can't decide amongst these roughly comparable options. 

In my research, I've found another form of indecision that occurs frequently.    Indecisiveness does not always stem from an inability to determine the best course of action.  Instead, in some cases, individuals know precisely what to do, but they resist moving forward anyway? Why?  They know that the implementation of this course of action will be quite bumpy.  There will be challenging pitfalls to avoid and obstacles to overcome.   They know it will be painful at times.  They aren't quite certain how to tackle these challenges.  Thus, they resist making a decision at all.   They delay the choice, even though they know it is the right thing to do.  Perhaps you can relate...

What can we do in these situations?  First, we can identify precisely what skills, resources, and talent will be needed to address these implementation challenges.  We have to identify the gaps in our own expertise and identify the people to complement us and provide the know-how to execute our planned course of action successfully.  Second, we can reflect on those past situations we have encountered in which implementations have not gone as planned.  We should consider what strategies have worked for us in the past.  How have we overcome obstacles, pivoted effectively, and iterated when initial plans faltered. Reflecting on lessons learned from those circumstances will help us become more decisive in this moment. Third, we can imagine what success will look like.  Many people have heard of the pre-mortem method.  That's when we imagine what failure will look like, and then identify what is likely to cause that poor outcome.  The pre-mortem can be very helpful when we face a risky decision.  However, if we are indecisive, sometimes the pre-parade can help us move forward.  In that method, we imagine what a great success would look like, and we identify what will be the key drivers of that success.  Then we can start working on putting those conditions in place to insure success.  

Why We Might Keep Hunting for More Data Despite The Costs

Michalis Mamakos and Galen Bodenhausen have published an interesting new paper in the journal Cognition titled “Motivational Drivers of Costly Information Search.” These two scholars examined whether our search for additional information may hinge on how we frame a problem. They hypothesize that our tendency to gather more data and conduct additional analysis may depend on whether we frame the issue in terms of gains vs. losses. Kellogg Insight's Emily Stone summarizes the key concept:

The idea is that people have one of two different types of motivations for reaching a goal. Broadly speaking, those with a promotion focus are eager to achieve a goal because it offers a chance for self-advancement—a gain—while those with a prevention focus are vigilant about the need to fulfill their obligations, and thus they’re more occupied with what they might lose if they make a bad decision. Prior research has shown that people with a promotion focus are more likely to take risks in their decisions, while prevention-oriented people are more deliberate.

While prior studies have compared this promotion vs. prevention focus, this study went further by examining whether people in a prevention mindset will seek to gather more information even when aware of the costs of acquiring more data. Moreover, they examined whether those in a prevention mindset might be willing to gather more information even if it disconfirmed existing beliefs. Indeed, the scholars found that, "prevention-framed messages can motivate the search for decision-relevant information, even when this search is costly and could lead to disagreeable data."

Of course, this search for an additional information can be a double-edged sword. On the other hand, the additional comprehensiveness may lead to higher decision quality. On the other hand, perhaps being worried about downside risks and potential losses may lead people to engage in highly costly search and time-consuming analysis that ultimately leads to untimely decisions. Companies may see opportunities pass them by, or competitors gain the upper hand, because leaders engage in costly and time-consuming search for that elusive "perfect" information to make a tough decision.

Weighing the costs and benefits of additional information search is critical. In particular, we must consider that the marginal benefits of additional data may decline over time, while the marginal costs of searching for more data may escalate over time.