My leader is a particularly talkative person. In a small talk, he threw out a topic: how to find a boyfriend/girlfriend? Is it inappropriate to get along with only one person at a time and find the next one? Everyone says it's something like this. However, the leader criticized: it is wrong for you to do so. The correct way is to get along with several people at the same time, compare them and choose the most suitable one. After listening to this, I strongly disagreed. I thought it was just stepping on a few boats, so I can't be so confident.

Until recently, I read Decisiveness written by Heath Brothers, a best-selling author of international psychology, and then recalled this topic. Suddenly, I felt that it was correct to put aside moral factors and simply consider scientific decision-making.

Choosing a spouse is a process of choice. In life and work, we often encounter more things to choose from. The book Decisiveness tells us how to make better choices in work and life. Usually, when faced with choices, narrow thinking limits our choices; When analyzing options, confirming the tendency enables us to collect information that is beneficial to us or that we are inclined to believe; When making choices, short-term emotions often make us make wrong judgments; Too confident about the future trend when accepting the consequences. In order to make the right choice, we need to overcome these four obstacles.

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In decisiveness, there is such a short story about choice.

In the autumn of 1772, a man named joseph priestley faced a difficult decision. Priestley is excellent and has amazing talent in many aspects. As a supporter of religious tolerance, he helped to establish monotheism in Britain; As a philosopher, he wrote some works about metaphysics, which is said to have a great influence on john stewart Mill and Jeremy Bentham. As an outstanding scientist, priestley discovered 10 gases, including ammonia and carbon monoxide. He is famous for discovering the most important gas-oxygen. As a political speaker, priestley supported the French Revolution. Priestley published more than 150 works, covering a wide range, including the history of electric power development, pioneering work in English grammar, and even invented soda water. A great man with so many identities and achievements is still a husband and a father. In the autumn of 1772, he had to solve a very practical problem-lack of money.

At that time, as a priest, he worked in a non-state church in Leeds, England. The annual income of this job 100 is not enough for eight children, so he began to look for other opportunities. His colleagues introduced him to Earl Shelbourne, a science enthusiast and supporter of dissident religious groups in the House of Lords. The count has just lost his wife, and he wants to find someone who can communicate with him in knowledge and help him raise his children.

Earl Sherbone offered priestley a job as a tutor and consultant with an annual salary of ￡ 250. Priestley was asked to supervise children's education and make suggestions to the count on political and government issues. Priestley began to be interested in the job-especially its salary, but at the same time he was cautious about signing the agreement. He wrote to many of his respected colleagues for advice, including the resourceful Benjamin Franklin he met while writing the history of the store.

Franklin wrote back and suggested that priestley use the pros and cons list to guide his decision. Advantages: more money and good family security; There are many disadvantages: he may be asked to move to London and leave his present home. If the relationship with Shelbourne is accepted, will it be like a director and a slave? Even if it started well, what if Shelbourne got tired of him later? If you accept this job, can you focus on other more important jobs?

According to the pros and cons list, accepting the job seems to be a very bad decision. In fact, there is only one big advantage-salary, and the others are a bunch of serious disadvantages. Priestley largely ignored Franklin's suggestion, and he found a way to avoid four obstacles that affected decision-making.

First of all, he resisted narrowness and did not confine himself to the two options of "accepting" and "giving up". He strives for new and better choices. He considered many alternatives to increase his income, such as making a lecture tour according to his scientific work. He negotiated a better deal with Shelbourne with the attitude of "giving consideration to both, not neglecting one thing", at a time when people rarely questioned the nobility. Priestley convinced Shelbourne that besides him, there was a tutor who could handle the children's education well. He also arranged for himself and his family to spend most of their time in the country and only went to London when Shelburne really needed him.

Secondly, he avoided the tendency of confirmation. While seeking advice, priestley received a strongly worded letter from his friend, which strongly opposed his accepting the job, thinking that it would make him humiliated and need to rely on the charity of a noble. Priestley studied the objection carefully, and for a moment, he himself began to tend to refuse the job. But instead of worrying about the pros and cons list in his mind, he chose to collect more information. More specifically, he consulted those who knew Shelbourne. The final conclusion is very clear: people who know Count Shelburne encouraged him to accept his proposal, but most people who don't know Count Shelburne well dissuaded him from accepting it.

Third, priestley tried his best to make himself less affected by short-term emotions. He actively seeks outside advice and does not allow himself to be distracted by his inner feelings: excited by getting a 150% salary increase, or humiliated by being regarded as "dependent behavior" by his friends. His decision is based on his long-term concern for two factors: family happiness and academic independence.

In the end, he was not too confident. He expects to establish a harmonious relationship, but he knows it may just be an illusion. He is particularly worried that if Shelbourne suddenly changes his mind, his family may face financial difficulties. To be on the safe side, priestley signed an agreement with Shelbourne: Shelbourne agreed to pay priestley 150 a year, even if their employment relationship was terminated.

Finally, priestley accepted the job and worked for Count Shelburne for about seven years. This is one of the most fruitful periods in his creative career. He created his most important philosophical work and discovered "oxygen". Shelbourne also abided by the agreement and continued to provide priestley with 150 every year even after its dissolution.

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We may think that priestley's choice is too good for ordinary people, but it is undeniable that his decision-making method is worth learning. Many times, we confine ourselves to the yes or no options: whether to change jobs, whether to stay with someone, whether to go to a party … but we seldom think that these options can be flexibly expanded. Don't worry about changing jobs. If you are tired of a job, you can choose something you are interested in to do besides finishing the job, and maybe you will slash it carelessly. You don't have to worry about whether you want to be with someone. If you are not sure about the relationship, you can communicate with different types of people and maybe find new choices (of course, my suggestion does not mean that I did it at that time); Don't worry about going to the party. If the meeting place is close to the place where business was supposed to be discussed, you can do your own thing first and go to the party by the way (if you don't really want to attend the party, it's hard not to go) ... In short, don't just make multiple-choice questions among the options given by others, increase the options that are beneficial to you according to your own situation and avoid being narrow-minded.

In the selection, when an option is more in line with our wishes, we always tend to pay attention to the information supporting this option in the process of verification. For example, I met myself: Do you want to go downstairs for a run? Option a is feasible and option b is not feasible. The weather forecast for that day shows that it will be cloudy and there may be light rain. If my original intention is to run, I will think when I see this weather warning, but there may be light rain, and it may not really rain. Besides, if there is, I will come back as soon as possible. If I don't really want to go, I may think, it may rain, or it may rain as soon as I get downstairs, so forget it, or don't. If you make such a choice, it is not a scientific choice. The scientific choice is to look at the probability that the weather forecast predicts how long it will rain. If the probability of rain within 1 hour is 10%, then you can run downstairs and go home in case of rain. If the probability of rain within 1 hour is 80%, then you can choose some sports suitable for running at home to avoid the risk of rain.

We often hear words like "carried away by joy", such as joy, sadness and excitement. We call them temporary emotions, which will eventually disappear after a period of time. In the process of making choices, such short-term emotions also greatly affect our scientific decision-making. If you are suddenly invited by a partner you know at work to join their startup company, which is in a city 0/000 km away from home, he describes to you how promising this job is, how easy it is for colleagues to get along with each other, and even better, the position and salary of this job far exceed your current job. How exciting it sounds. At this exciting moment, maybe you can't wait to join them, step onto the peak of your life, become CEO and marry Bai. Oh, no, it's hopeless to marry Bai. As mentioned earlier, you already have a home. If you had made this choice on impulse, you would have regretted it. I might as well wait for my mood to calm down and think about it carefully: this job is away from home 1000 kilometers. Do I really want to be reunited with my family? If my family moves, how much will my partner and children be affected? How is the company developing? Is it really as promising as it says? What are the uncertainties in the initial stage of the company? As an airborne post, will new colleagues really be so friendly and easy to get along with? Although the salary is high, is it unsustainable? ..... you will find that there are many uncertainties to consider. When the initial excitement disappears and the mood returns to calm, we can think about these problems rationally and make a relatively scientific decision.

Another obstacle to making scientific decisions: overconfidence. Self-confidence is a good thing, but overconfidence can easily lead to bad things. A friend is very interested in catering. It is said that he has a secret recipe for cooking Thai food, especially Dongyin Gongtang, which is as authentic as enjoying it in Thailand. The neighborhood he lives in is very prosperous, but there are not many restaurants to eat, so he recently found a suitable berth nearby. Shortly after he had this intention, it happened that a restaurant next to his community was transferred and he wanted to put it down immediately. Strange to say, this restaurant has changed hands frequently in such a good geographical location. My friend is very confident in himself. He thinks other people's cooking is not good. The food must be tasteless. He is Thai food, which tastes good, there is little competition nearby and the location is excellent. If he does, his business will be particularly good. Even if there are many failed cases, it is always easy for us to believe that we are different from others and want to try. This is a kind of overconfidence. What others have not done well, why do we think we can do well before analyzing the real reasons? Because we are God's chosen children? The restaurant in this position can't be done. Is it really because the former restaurant owner didn't make special dishes? Or is it because people don't want to eat here because there is no restaurant and there are few choices, although it is bustling and crowded? No matter how good your Thai food is, how many people passing by are interested in it? Others have confirmed that the restaurant here has a high probability of failure. Although you can't completely believe in probability, at least before you find the core problem, don't be too confident, believe that you are the special one, and make a choice.

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From the book Decisiveness, we know four obstacles to effective decision-making:

Obstacle 1: narrow thinking (inappropriately limiting the scope of choice);

Obstacle 2: confirmation tendency (looking for information to support your point of view);

Obstacle 3: short-term emotions (affected by those emotions that will disappear);

Obstacle 4: Overconfidence (trusting your own predictions too much)

So, what methods can we use to avoid these obstacles and make the right choice? That is the WRAP process method: broaden the choice space-turn the hypothesis into reality-leave a distance to consider before making a decision-and be prepared to make mistakes. Because the space is too long, I will share it in the next article.