Read the two brief articles from the Harvard Business Review. In the dialogue box provided, respond to the following questions in 300-500 W: ((THE TWO ARTICLES BELOW ARE THE REFERENCES))

1) What two ideas stood out? Why?

2) How will these tips help you make decisions and not be paralyzed by indecision?

FIRST ARTICLE:

HowlobopOwrtllinking Enrytllilg How to Stop Overthinking Everything by MelodyWiltling Published on HBRbrg it February10.202l .Ir Reprint HOGGLR As a product load at a maior technology company, Terence's job is to make decisions. How should the team prioritize features to develop? Who should be sta'ed on projects? When should products launch? Hundreds of choices drive the vision, strategy, and direction for each product Terence DVETSEES. While Terence loved his job. making so many decisions caused him a lot of stress. He would waste hours in unproductive mental loops analyzing variables to make the \"right" choices. He would worry about the future and imagine all the ways a launch could go wrong. Then. he would beat . ..; . HwhshpOwrtllinkingEnrytllirg himself up for squandering valuable time and energy deliberating instead oftaking action. In other words, his thoughtfulness, which was typically a strength, often led him to overthink situations. Terence is what I like to call a sensitive striver a high-achiever who processes the world more deeply than others. Studies show that sensitive people have more active brain circuitryr and neurochemicals in areas related to mental processing. This means their minds not only take in more information, but also process that information in a more complex way. Sensitive strivers like Terence are often applauded for the way they explore angles and nuance. But at the same time, they are also more susceptible to stress and overwhelm. Deliberation is an admirable and essential leadership quality mat undoubtedly produces better outcomes. But for Terence and others like him, there comes a point in decision making where helpful contemplation turns into overthr'nhing. [f you can relate, here are ve ways to stop the cycle ofthinking too much and drive towards better, faster decisions. 1. Put aside perfectionism Perfectionism is one of the biggest blockers to swift, elfective decision- making because it operates on faulty alloInoiing thinking. For example} perfectionism can lead you to believe that ifyou don't make the "correct" choice (as if there is only one right option}, then you are a failure. Or that you must know everything, anticipate every eventuality, and have a thorough plan in place before making a move. Trying to weigh every possible outcome and consideration is paralyzing. To curb this tendency. ask yourselfquestions like: - \"Thich decision will have the biggest positive impact on my top priorities? - Of all the possible people I could please or displease, which one or two people do I least want to disappoint? HBR / Digital Article / How to Stop Overthinking Everything HBR / Digital Article / How to Stop Overthinking Everything . What is one thing I could do today that would bring me closer to my happy 60 percent of the time. That's because relying on rapid cognition, or goal? thin-slicing, allows the brain to make wise decisions without overthinking. Based on what I know and the information I have at this moment, what's the best next step? Terence, the product lead I mentioned earlier, was so intrigued by the idea of making decisions from his gut that he planned a "Day of Disinhibition" After all, it's much easier to wrap your head around and take action during which he followed his own intuition about everything he said and towards a single next step rather than trying to project months or years did for twenty-four hours. The result? Going with his gut gave him the into the future. courage to stop censoring himself and make tough calls, even when he knew it might upset some stakeholders. "It wasn't just what I got done, 2. Right-size the problem but how I got it done, how quickly, and how I felt about it," he later told Some decisions are worth mulling over, while others are not. Before you me, "It put me in the best frame of mind to deal with whatever is in front make a call, write down what goals, priorities, or people in your life will be of me," he said. Try the "Day of Disinhibition" experiment for yourself, or impacted. This will help you differentiate between what's meaningful and simply set aside a few minutes today and list three to five times you what's not worth obsessing over. trusted your gut in and whether the outcome was favorable. 4. Limit the drain of decision fatigue Likewise, if you're worried about the prospect of a decision bombing, try the 10/10/10 test. When the prospect of falling flat on your face seizes you, You make hundreds of decisions a day - from what to eat for breakfast to think about how you'll feel about the decision 10 weeks, 10 months, or 10 how to respond to an email - and each depletes your mental and years from now? It's likely that the choice will be inconsequential or that emotional resources. You're more likely to overthink when you're drained, you won't even remember it was a big deal. Your answers can help you put so the more you can eliminate minor decisions, the more energy you'll things in perspective and rally the motivation you need to take action. have for ones that really matter. 3. Leverage the underestimated power of intuition Create routines and rituals to conserve your brainpower, like a weekly Intuition works like a mental pattern matching game. The brain considers meal plan or capsule wardrobe. Similarly, look for opportunities to a situation, quickly assesses all your experiences, and then makes the best eliminate certain decisions altogether, such as by instituting best practices decision given the context. This automatic process is faster than rational and standardized protocols, delegating, or removing yourself from thought, which means intuition is a necessary decision-making tool when meetings. time is short and traditional data is not available. In fact, research shows 5. Construct creative constraints that pairing intuition with analytical thinking helps you make better, faster, and more accurate decisions and gives you more confidence in your You may be familiar with Parkinson's Law, which states that work expands choices than relying on intellect alone. In one study, car buyers who used to the time we allow it. Put simply, if you give yourself one month to only careful analysis were ultimately happy with their purchases about a create a presentation, it will take you one full month to finish it. But if you quarter of the time. Meanwhile, those who made intuitive purchases were only had a week, you'd finish the same presentation in a shorter time.HBR / Digital Article / How to Stop Overthinking Everything I've observed a similar principle among sensitive strivers - that overthinking expands to the time we allow it. In other words, if you give yourself one week to worry about something that is actually a one-hour task, you will waste an inordinate amount of time and energy. You can curb this tendency by creating accountability through creative constraints. For example, determine a date or time by which you'll make a choice. Put it in your calendar, set a reminder on your phone, or even contact the person who is waiting for your decision and let them know when they can expect to hear from you. A favorite practice of my clients is "worry time," which involves earmarking a short period of the day to constructively problem solve. Above all, remember that your mental depth gives you a major competitive advantage. Once you learn to keep overthinking in check, you'll be able to harness your sensitivity for the superpower that it can be. Melody Wilding, LMSW is an executive coach and author of Trust Yourself: Stop Overthinking and Channel Your Emotions for Success at Work.Harvard opportunities. When should you just make the decision versus gathering more data or cogitating on it Business longer? Review In order to figure out whether a decision requires further time or should just be made, you need to do a little "meta-decision analysis," or put more simply, you need to decide how to decide. In order to decide when your choice needs to be made, you have to think about how important it is, how urgent DECISION MAKING it is, and whether you can use some organizational decision-making approaches to make it more accurate and likely to be correct. When to Stop Deliberating Consider the Importance of Your Decision and Just Make a Decision The single most critical factor in determining how long a decision should take is how important it is. Decisions of little consequence should not take very long. So the first step in deciding how to decide should be to ask yourself - or others if you don't trust your own judgment: How much of a difference by Thomas H. Davenport will this decision make? If it won't make a big difference to your life or business, just make the JULY 09, 2019 decision and move on. Then you can devote your scarce time and brainpower to the decisions that really matter. For more important decisions, there are two good reasons for extending your decision-making process a bit. One is to reflect, and the other is to gather data and analyze it. Reflection - particularly when the decision maker can engage the unconscious mind - can be a good way to determine which factors are most important in a complex decision. Some observers recommend sleeping on a decision after reviewing the key factors around the decision, but there are other ways to engage the unconscious mind as well. Rest, play, meditation, or even taking a shower may do the trick. In any case, reflecting on a decision won't require much additional time; a day or night should be sufficient. The other good reason for waiting on a decision is to gather data and analyze it. There has long been evidence across many decision domains that data- and analytics-based decisions are more accurate than those made by human intuition. However, it takes a lot of time to gather data, and some more to analyze it. But if it's an important decision and the data exists somewhere, it is probably worth the trouble to employ a data-driven decision-making approach - particularly if it's going to be made multiple times. JORG GREUELAGETTY IMAGES Determine How Often the Same Decision Will Be Made Whether and how often a decision is repeated is also an important factor in the speed of decision- You've come up with ideas, narrowed down your options, and looked at the available data. You've asked all the right questions to guide your choice. And yet, for some reason, you just can't pull the making. If the decision is one that's made often - for example, pricing, inventory reordering, or trigger on a decision. What's the hold up? hiring decisions - it may be worth investing in an analytical approach. Decisions that are repeated often are also likely to generate data; capturing the inputs to the decision and the decision outcomes makes it possible to produce a model that optimizes positive results. The first time a repetitive Whether you've experienced this indecision yourself or you've known a leader or executive with the decision is treated analytically, it will be time-consuming to gather and analyze the data to create a habit, it can be incredibly problematic - and potentially damaging - to sit on decisions. Waiting too model. But it's worth taking this extra time up-front, since every instance of the decision thereafter long to make decisions can slow businesses down, frustrate employees, and mean missing critical can be made much faster and with a high degree of accuracy.Decisions that are both important and rare are often quite strategic, such as "Should we change our business model?" or "Should we acquire our biggest competitor?" It may be possible to acquire some information related to these types of decisions, but probably not enough to create an analytical model. Such decisions are worth spending some time on, but after they've been viewed from a variety of perspectives, they're not likely to get better with time. Waiting too long to make the decision may mean that the opportunity passes you by. Look into Buying an Option If a strategic decision involves a lot of uncertainty and you can't make it after some deliberation, one approach to easing the process is to buy an option from which you will learn more. Options are well-known in investing, where buying an option gives the investor the right to buy an asset at a particular price in the future. In decision-making, it means taking a small step to learn more, before making a call that could significantly impact your people or the organization. For example, instead of acquiring a company, buying an option might mean creating a partnership or investing a smaller amount in the company than the cost required for a purchase. Buying an option as a decision-making approach can both ease and speed up the process for important decisions, and can result in a better eventual outcome if the decision maker takes advantage of the learning opportunities the option provides. Keep in mind, of course, that buying an option shouldn't be an excuse for avoiding or delaying substantial action that your organization needs to take. Put a Clock on Your Decision Finally, if you find yourself struggling to make a choice, assign a deadline by which it needs to be made. You can quickly assess this time line when you are first facing the decision or after you've deliberated. This is one of the most important components of your meta-decision analysis, because the due date for a decision will guide many other aspects of your approach. It determines, for example, whether you can employ data and analytics, whether you should involve more people, whether you can study the issues thoroughly, and even whether you can sleep on the decision overnight. Several of the ways to improve the timing of decisions that I've mentioned suggest an organizational process for decision-making, rather than relying on individual approaches and whims for every decision. While an organization can get carried away with decision bureaucracy, in general it's wise to not leave important decisions totally up to individuals - even the CEO. Good decision-making only happens through the use of effective methods, ex post facto analysis, and reflection about how to improve. Putting a clock on decisions and monitoring how long they take are also actions that organizations are likely to be better at than individuals. Yes, it's important sometimes to just make that decision, but not at the expense of systematic thought about how best to go about it. By taking these steps and strategically deciding how to decide, you'll find that you can break out of indecision and finally move forward