After the Bay of Pigs failure, President Kennedy and his advisors reflected on their mistakes and created a new process for group discussion and decision making to prevent future groupthink and promote diverse perspectives. Here, Professor Roberto introduces the concept of developing a decision-making process. -From the Lecture ‘Deciding How To Decide’
This is a great lecture series that a friend of mine hooked me up with, and I highly recommend it. It was engaging and thought provoking, and there were so many cool ideas to take away from this if you are looking for leadership guidance. As I listened to it, there were many Jundism concepts that kept popping up in various forms and examples.
The particular lecture that I will highlight in this post is the ‘deciding how to decide’ portion. I took notice, because this method of decision making was born out of the highest levels of leadership during the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Bay of Pigs invasion failure. The Bay of Pigs invasion was an embarrassing mistake that resulted from poor decision making at the top. Or what the professor referred to as ‘group think’ (being surrounded by ‘yes men’ and folks unwilling to question the group or leadership out of fear of being wrong or just assuming everyone else is right)
The Cuban Missile Crisis was an extreme test of wills, and required the best possible strategy that would prevent the US and the Soviet Union wiping each other out with nuclear weapons. President Kennedy devised a system of decision making that would produce the best product or solution possible, that was not a victim of group think. He used a system of subgroups that would develop solutions independently, then those groups would exchange their solutions with the other groups and critique.
A second set of devils advocates or eyes would also review the solutions, and further nitpick the possible solutions until the best idea was standing. So this solution was hammered out of truly honest debate, and any influences that would cause people to not speak up was eliminated. I thought it was an ingenious way of problem solving, and especially during crisis. (be sure to listen to the series to get the specifics on how to set up this system) The situation with North Korea bombing South Korea, and the US and China reaction to it is a prime example of modern day critical decision making with high stakes involved. How President Obama decides, will really be based more on deciding how to decide first, so that the solution he gets is strategically sound and not at all influenced by group think.
Military leaders and CEO’s can learn from this as well. Leaders should strive hard to have honest debate about strategy and it takes listening to your people, and being open to ideas to get there. It also requires breaking down those walls that limit honest debate, and really being aware of group think and it’s dangers. Check out the series to learn more, and let me know what you think. Also check out Professor Roberto’s blog if you want to follow his ideas or contact him. –Matt
THE ART OF CRITICAL DECISION MAKING
Genre: Audio or video CourseLength: Twenty-four, thirty-minute lecturesTeacher: Prof. Michael Roberto, Bryant UniversityPublisher: The Teaching Company
By Tom Alderman
July 23, 2009
Following the disastrous 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, President Kennedy asked former President Eisenhower to the White House to seek the old soldier’s counsel. The new president wanted to know what he could learn from the whole sorry mess. Instead of the expected military hoo-hah, Ike wanted to know how the decision was made to go ahead with the Cuban invasion? How did the president gather advice from his advisors? Not a surprising question considering the five-star general led a contentious military coalition during World War II, not because of his martial skills, but because of his extraordinary leadership abilities which included understanding the core ingredient in all critical decision making: whether you’re launching a D-Day invasion, a career, a product or service, HOW you decide is more important than WHAT you decide. The process you use determines a successful outcome and if that process is not clear and effective, you’re going down.
Song writer Fats Waller put it another way, “T’aint what you do, it’s the way that you do it.” While Ike and Fats nailed it, a fellow named Michael Roberto gives it depth and dimension in The Art of Critical Decision Making, 24, exceptionally cogent lectures offered through The Teaching Company. These are the Chantilly, Va. based folks who troll the country for master, college/university level teachers, put them on video and audio, and sell their wisdom and courses through an extensive catalog.
Roberto, Trustee Professor of Management at Bryant University and a Harvard Business School grad, says, “The biggest mistake individuals make when faced with important decisions is the ‘sunk-cost effect.’ We keep sinking time, money and resources into a failing course of action because we’ve already sunk so much time, money and resources on it.”
Roberto uses the 1996 Mt. Everest Into Thin Air tragedy as an classic example of a flawed decision made mostly because the climbers had already plowed $65,000 into the project, plus months of training and preparation and they were not about to give it all up so close to the summit. Five climbers died as a result.
Drawing heavily from his government and business consulting work, two previous books on leadership and extensive research by others, Roberto examines real case histories, diagnoses how decisions are made and offers structures and guidelines to move the process forward. Powerful stuff. The Bay of Pigs, Cuban Missile Crisis, Columbia shuttle disaster, Coca-Cola’s blundered New Coke decision, General Motors’ decline, Enron’s collapse, and Washington’s 17 different intelligence agencies, are among examples well ventilated in Roberto’s course.
One of his main points is that while some organizations default to a top-down approach – the alpha-dog proposes and everyone else disposes – Roberto recommends an inclusive process that generates constructive conflict and debate among a group BUT is well managed from the top. Good leaders design, shape and direct the process, he says. They know that “It’s important to understand there are two forms of conflict. COGNITIVE conflict is task oriented. It’s debate about issues and ideas. AFFECTIVE conflict is emotional and personal in nature. It’s about personality clashes, anger, and personal friction.” He maintains that effective leaders channel emotions; they do not try to eliminate them.
When asked if the process works for any organization, Roberto politely points out that university and college institutions are a bit challenged when it comes to making decisions. You can’t lead, says the professor, when you have a huge group of tenured people who can’t be fired. Ouch.
BOTTOM LINEFor any leader, any group, making tough decisions – except, perhaps, academia – Roberto’s unambiguous, extensive and genuinely engaging course is like having a heavyweight advisor on hand without the $500 hourly fee.
Story here.
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Art of Critical Decision Making
Taught By Professor Michael A. Roberto, D.B.A., Harvard
Course Lecture Titles
24 Lectures30 minutes / lecture
1. Making High-Stakes Decisions (info)
2. Cognitive Biases (info)
3. Avoiding Decision-Making Traps (info)
4. Framing—Risk or Opportunity? (info)
5. Intuition—Recognizing Patterns (info)
6. Reasoning by Analogy (info)
7. Making Sense of Ambiguous Situations (info)
8. The Wisdom of Crowds? (info)
9. Groupthink—Thinking or Conforming? (info)
10. Deciding How to Decide (info)
11. Stimulating Conflict and Debate (info)
12. Keeping Conflict Constructive (info)
13. Creativity and Brainstorming (info)
14. The Curious Inability to Decide (info)
15. Procedural Justice (info)
16. Achieving Closure through Small Wins (info)
17. Normal Accident Theory (info)
18. Normalizing Deviance (info)
19. Allison’s Model—Three Lenses (info)
20. Practical Drift (info)
21. Ambiguous Threats and the Recovery Window (info)
22. Connecting the Dots (info)
23. Seeking Out Problems (info)
24. Asking the Right Questions (info)
The ability to make wise, educated decisions is essential to living a successful and fulfilled life.
• When is the right time for your company to change its business model?
• Is moving across the country for a new job the best option for you and your family?
• At what point do you roll out a new product or service currently being tested?
• Should you sell your house now, or wait until the housing market improves?
Whether simple or complex, private or public, decisions are an essential part of your life. Not only do decisions affect your own life for good or ill, they can also affect the lives of your friends, your family, and your community.
But making a good decision and avoiding a horrible one is not a chance act. It’s a skill—one that can be learned, honed, and perfected. Mastering the art of critical decision making is the key to improving your life at home, at work, or in your community. When you understand the necessary components of a smart decision, you can examine mistakes you might have made in the past and sidestep potential mistakes in the future. And when you know the underlying psychological, social, and emotional components that influence decision making—whether they are your own decisions or the decisions of others—you can make sounder choices that produce better results.
Now you can learn to approach the critical decisions in your life with a more seasoned, educated eye with The Art of Critical Decision Making, a fascinating 24-lecture course that explores how individuals, groups, and organizations make effective decisions and offers you tips and techniques to enhance the effectiveness of your own decision making. Taught by award-winning Professor Michael A. Roberto of Bryant University—a scholar of leadership, managerial decision making, and business strategy—this dynamic course is an engaging and practical guide to one of the most fundamental activities in your life.
Three Levels of Decision Making
The heart of this accessible course is a thorough examination of decision making at three key levels.
The individual level: Studying how individuals make decisions reveals a wealth of insights into how—and why—they make particular choices. Most individuals do not examine every possible alternative but instead draw on experience and rules of thumb. Most of us, it turns out, are susceptible to what psychologists call cognitive biases: decision traps that can cause us to make certain systematic mistakes when making choices. You also learn how intuition, surprisingly, is more than just a gut instinct and represents instead a powerful pattern recognition capability.
The group level: Because you don’t always make choices on your own, it’s important to understand decision making at the level of group or team. Here, you try to answer the question of whether groups are “smarter” and more capable of making critical decisions than individuals. The lectures show you problems that typically arise in group decision-making scenarios, including groupthink (the notorious tendency for groups to be pressured into conforming to a particular view) and a lack of synergy between team members. You also learn how groups can overcome these and other problems to make better decisions.
The organizational level: Studying decision making on the organizational level requires you to grasp how the structure, systems, and culture of a particular organization shape the behavior of its individual teams and members. Professor Roberto shows you how history’s wrong decisions usually cannot be attributed to one wrong decision or poor leader. He also demonstrates how some organizations have encouraged and reliably performed vigilant decision making in the face of risky scenarios.
The Key to Effective Decision Making
The Art of Critical Decision Making reveals that bad decisions are usually made because of a poorly thought-out decision-making process. If decision makers put more emphasis on how to make a decision, ensure that they remove personal biases, collect information beforehand, glean the diverse perspectives of others, and perform a number of other constructive activities, they can vastly improve the strength and success of the process.
Professor Roberto employs the case method used by America’s most prestigious business schools, including Harvard University. Designed to expose students to a breadth and depth of real-world examples and scenarios, the case method allows you to compare and contrast various situations as a way to recognize patterns. In doing so, you refine your ability to distinguish between smart and poor decision making.
Among the many compelling case studies you engage in throughout the course are these:
• IDEO’s appropriate use of expertise: You study the decision-making practices of this California-based design consultancy. One of the key lessons you learn is that IDEO uses experts and their knowledge in an appropriate manner—recognizing that sometimes expertise as defined by past successes is not always ideal in a quickly changing environment.
• Improving patient care in hospitals: Professor Roberto’s independent study of hospital staff demonstrated how experienced nurses can positively influence patient care through intuition. By relying on an understanding of warning signs and using the Socratic method of asking questions, veteran nurses were able to prevent patients from experiencing life-threatening problems and reduced the rates for heart attacks and mortality.
• General Motors’ financial woes: In 1972, General Motors was the nation’s most profitable company, but in late 2008 the carmaker’s profitability sank drastically. According to Professor Roberto, the management team’s assumptions during the 1970s—including the persistence of energy sources and the internal promotion of managers—were proved false in the near and long term and only perpetuated outdated ways of thinking in the company.
Compelling historical and contemporary examples provide a captivating window through which to see the process of decision making at work. In taking key principles that great scholars and leaders have studied from history, business, and the modern world, Professor Roberto helps you understand exactly how the successful and unsuccessful decisions involved in these and other events are relevant to your own life.
Learn to Make Smarter Decisions
Whether you’re the head of a Fortune 500 company, a government agency, or an everyday household, you constantly make decisions important to you and those immediately around you. The Art of Critical Decision Making offers you a toolbox of practical knowledge and skills that you can apply to various decisions—whether large or small—in your everyday life and work.
Professor Roberto’s lively lectures are packed with useful anecdotes, tools, and advice designed to improve your own ability to make informed decisions. Among the many insights you gain from these lectures are that
• a large part of making a good decision is not just solving a problem but accurately defining it;
• framing a decision in terms of what may be lost usually causes us to take greater risks than if a problem is framed in terms of potential gains; and
• hidden problems, not visible ones, are the true enemies of effective critical decision making.
Become a Better Critical Thinker
While a thorough exploration of decision making can be a complex endeavor, it takes a professor as knowledgeable and comprehensible as Professor Roberto to expose just how easy to grasp this science is. Warm, engaging, and vibrant, Professor Roberto possesses a passion for his field that is undeniably contagious.
You quickly discover why this former professor at Harvard Business School and former visiting associate professor at New York University’s Stern School of Business has won numerous coveted teaching awards. These include Bryant University’s Outstanding M.B.A. Teaching Award and, on two occasions, Harvard University’s Allyn A. Young Prize for Teaching Economics.
Professor Roberto has also consulted at and taught in the leadership development programs of a number of America’s most prestigious firms, including Apple, Morgan Stanley, Coca-Cola, and Walmart. This breadth of real-world experience shines through in each one of these 24 captivating lectures, as concepts and theories that might seem complex and confusing are instead made practical and accessible to everyone.
As you explore the intriguing process of making a good decision, you strengthen your grip on individual theories of decision making and the situations—both well known and relatively obscure—that illustrate them.
Most important, by the end of The Art of Critical Decision Making, you’ll become a better critical thinker. You’ll possess a stronger ability to learn from your mistakes, be able to approach and weigh individual choices more effectively, and make smarter decisions.
Buy the audio series here.