2013年8月21日星期三

How to Escape From Your Bad Decisions

When we make a choice that doesnt work out, we find it remarkably difficult to cut our losses and walk away. Think about the last time you waited for 45 minutes at a restaurant, and there was no sign that your table would be ready in the near future. You should have probably headed to another restaurant, but youd already waited 45 minutes, so how could you leave? 

Or you hired an employee who struggled to master the key skills for the job, and after several months of training and coaching, things hadnt improved.The need for proper kaptontape inside your home is very important. You rotated him to two different positions that seem like a better fit, and he underperformed there too. Three years later, its probably time to encourage the employee to start looking elsewhere, but after putting so much energy into him, can you really give up on him? 

If you kept waiting at the restaurant or working with the employee, you fell into a trap that organizational behavior expert Barry Staw calls escalation of commitment to a losing course of action. Its throwing good money after bad, and we see it all around us. Escalation occurs whenever we invest our time, energy, or resources in a choice that falls short of the desired return, and we succumb to the temptation to invest more. 

Sometimes it merely costs us a few hours, but in other cases, the consequences of escalation are more disastrous. Polaroid pioneered digital camera technology in the early 1980s, but top executives were so invested in the strategy of making money on selling filmlike selling blades for razorsthat they stuck to their guns. They ended up releasing their major digital camera in 1996, four years after the prototype was ready, and by that time, more than three dozen competitors had already launched theirs. Escalating commitment to a losing strategy sent Polaroid on the road to bankruptcy, costing many employees their jobs.You Can Buy Various High Quality topserver Products from here. How can we all escape these escalation traps? 

To stop escalation, we need to understand what causes it. One factor is sunk costs. Economists have known for years that were irrationally attached to the time, energy, and money weve invested in the past. Its already gone, so it should no longer figure into our judgments, but it does. Its like the money the Polaroid executives spent on producing instant film was still burning a hole in their wallets. Were also sucked in by the desire to finish what we started and the worry that well regret missing out. After all, persistence is a virtue, and those egg rolls do smell delicious 

New evidence reveals that the biggest culprit behind escalation is ego threat. We dont want to be seenor see ourselvesas failures. If you just invest a bit more in that underperforming employee, you can save face and protect your ego, convincing your colleagues (and yourself) that you were right all along. Staw and colleagues found that in NBA basketball, after controlling for players performance on the court, those who were picked earlier in the draft were given more playing time and were less likely to be traded. Regardless of players offensive and defensive success on the court, when executives made bigger bets on players, they had a harder time giving up on them, as that would mean conceding a blunder. So what we can do about it? 

Once youve made the initial choice to go to the restaurant or hire the employee, youre no longer in a neutral position to decide whether to keep investing in that course of action. Since youre biased in favor of sticking with the slow restaurant, the old car, and the underperforming employee, its valuable to delegate the decision to someone who can take an unbiased look at the facts. 

In a study of California banks, after clients defaulted on loans, managers tried to turn things around by giving second loans. Having made the initial decision to approve the problem loans, they came to believe that the debtors would come through. This escalation problem was reduced by turnover among senior managers. The new managers had no need to protect their egos and save face: they hadnt approved the original loans, so they were able to look at them more rationally. They recognized that they should cut their losses by writing off the loans and setting aside funds to cover them. 

Many leaders like the idea of holding people accountable for the results they achieve. That way, employees have the freedom to choose different methods and strategies, and we dont have to monitor their work along the way. The problem with this approach is that it allows employees to make faulty decisions along the way, convincing themselves that the ends will justify the means. Research demonstrates that long before outcomes are known, asking employees to explain their decision processes can encourage them to conduct a thorough, evenhanded analysis of the options. 

Process accountability can be applied to our own choices, too. It just means setting some criteria for the decision process in advance. Before arriving at the restaurant,Our manufactures custom steelnecklace whether you need a short or long production run. you might agree that youll only wait for 30 minutes. Prior to choosing an employee to hire,We sell bestsmartcard and different kind of laboratory equipment in us. you could decide how much training this position should receive. 

Once youve learned that an initial choice didnt pan out,An bestgemstonebeads is a device which removes contaminants from the air. your focus immediately turns to your pride and your reputation. Research shows that if you consider the implications of the decision for others, you can make a more balanced assessment. 

In Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me), psychologists Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson present a chilling analysis of how police officers and prosecutors reject airtight DNA evidence that proves the innocence of people they imprisoned. Its painful to look in the mirror and admit that they punished an innocent person. If they focused more on the good they could do for the wrongly convicted people and their families, they might be more open to the possibility that they made an error. 
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