Had I known! Kelvin exclaimed…
Born into the family of the Clinton’s and the first child of the family, Kelvin while in University started having the symptoms of malaria, but was unbothered.
Though advised by the parents to go for medical check-up and treatment, he didn’t see the ailment to be something of much concern.
So, he decided to continue his day-to-day activities, not until the health situation aggravated for which he couldn’t go for lectures any longer and missed continuous assessments.
This condition affected his grade drastically because he was later admitted at a hospital and spent weeks which wouldn’t have been the case if he stitched in time. It was for this that Kelvin exclaimed.
Life promises to get better once better decisions are made. In the area of success, wealth, popularity, etc., there’s the need to make better decisions as the decisions one makes in life have the ability to either make or mar the person.
As simple as one might term it to be, a lot of persons are taking the wrong decision because they don’t know the ways to make better decisions hence our bringing this write-up your way.
Techniques to improve decision making
Improving your decision-making still is not an easy task. Some techniques are required if you want to make the best decisions. Some of these techniques include:
- Practice mindfulness
- Outsmart the anchoring bias
- Plan ahead.
Practice mindfulness.
Mindfulness deals with paying attention to purpose, in the present moment, and non-judgmentally.
The majority of the time that initial decisions do not lead to the desired results, most people have trouble admitting they were wrong, and practicing mindfulness entails the opposite of the said scenario.
Outsmart the anchoring bias.
To improve in your decision-making, you have to outsmart the anchoring bias which is where you base your decision on the first piece of information made available to you.
Plan ahead.
Have you thought about whether it is realistic or not to have a plan for every possible scenario?
Having a plan for every scenario puts you in control of certain areas in your life. This is where preparation is made in advance such that you are able to and appropriately in times of decision making.
Why Is It Important to Make Good Decisions?
The importance of making good decisions cannot be overemphasized as it is paramount in all situations of life. They include the following:
- It saves time
- It fosters respect
- Serves as Motivation
- Making good decision prevents conflict
- Increases Productivity
How to make good decisions in life
To make good decisions in life, you are to do the following:
- Take Note of Your Overconfidence
- Identify the Risks You Take
- Frame Your Problems In a Different
- Stop Thinking About the Problem
- Set Aside Time to Reflect on Your Mistakes
- Acknowledge Your Shortcuts
- Consider the Opposite
- Label Your Emotions
- Talk to Yourself Like a Trusted Friend
Ways one can make better decisions
The ways to make better decisions include:
- Know What Motivates You
- Find out whether the decision is a big or small one.
- If It’s no big One, don’t fret It
- Be Aware of Risk
- Balance a Worst-Case Scenario Against What You Hope to Gain
- Use Data
- Look at the Problem from a Different Angle
- Trust Your Gut Instincts Too
- Conquer Your Fear
- Don’t Give in to Excitement
- Know When to Cut Your Losses
- Limit Your Options
- Stand by Your Values
- Imagine You’re Giving Advice to a Friend
- Watch Out for Decision Fatigue
Know What Motivates You
The knowledge of what motivates you serves as a guide as it ensures that the decisions you make are in consonance with it hence would often tend towards making better ones.
Find out whether the decision is a big or small one.
This is about using the simple rule of thumb to know where the time and energy to spend on a decision is determined by how important the decision is. A decision is rated to be big or small depending on its outcome on your finances, health, relationships, reputation, or another area of your life.
If It’s no big one, don’t fret It
You wouldn’t want to dispense more energy and much time at small decisions and discover you have little or no time and energy left that is required for attending to the big ones when they come.
Be Aware of Risk
Risk can be said to be a part of life as they are inevitable and so is taking them. You have to be aware of this but beyond that, it is needful for you to know that you are not to take any risk that presents itself but calculated ones…
Don’t get too comfortable with risks and take them without calculating as this often leads to bad choices.
Balance a Worst-Case Scenario Against What You Hope to Gain
Here, you are to take on a versus relationship between a positive outcome, not necessarily an amazingly good one but a medium one at least, and the worst-case scenario that can occur.
This enables you to make wiser choices as it helps you to avert the outcome of worst-case scenarios.
Use Data
The use of data is among the ways to make better decisions and entails consulting previous occurrences (research) with regards to statistics, etc, in order to ascertain the level of risk associated with the decision you want to make.
This is to enable you to make use of hard data to look at a decision you want to take in the most objective way possible.
Look at the Problem from a Different Angle
To make a better decision, you are to have some more insight as to how to look at problems from a different angle.
Oftentimes, the way people view problems due to pessimism leads them into making wrong decisions born out of fear.
Trust Your Gut Instincts Too
There are times when circumstances surrounding you would demand that you make a decision on the fly without much clue or information required.
At those times, you are to trust your instincts to deliver and have you make the right decision.
Conquer Your Fear
Fear has done a lot of harm to people as it has prevented many from hitting their target.
Being afraid I’d already a step into making the wrong decision because fear sets people at the mercy of circumstances and no good decision is made in such a state. Hence conquering your fear is among the ways to make a better decisions.
Don’t Give in to Excitement
Excitement is an emotion just as fear is and can send you on the wrong path in decision-making.
Excitement can make you too excited or overconfident and can lead you into pessimism that doesn’t exist.
To handle this, we recommend some form of meditation practice and that in such times, you slow down and take a few deep breaths.
Know When to Cut Your Losses
Knowing when to cut your losses is among the ways to make better decisions and entails looking at occurrences objectively so as to know times when the prediction of a U-turn for a long record of losses is unlikely to come through.
Limit Your Options
Oftentimes, people are led into making the wrong decisions because they have a number of different options available for them to choose from.
Limiting your options is very much able to help you make better decisions as it helps you sieve off options that are less important so as to see things more clearly.
We recommend that you be selective with information as this would go a long way in limiting your options.
Stand by Your Values
Having values entail having things that go for you and things that don’t while standing by them talks about sticking to your values against all odds.
With being one that stands by his/her values, you will have the ability to make a better decision.
You won’t make decisions that would stand against your value comes up. Also, you wouldn’t give in to it hence this is obviously among the ways to make a better decision.
Imagine You’re Giving Advice to a Friend
One of the ways to make better decisions is by imagining that you are advising a friend.
This imagination enables you to decide better as you wouldn’t want to give a friend advice that wouldn’t yield results. This technique is known as the visualization technique.
Watch Out for Decision Fatigue
You should watch out for times when you are stressed out due to having a hard day at work, etc, and ensure that you don’t make decisions especially big ones at such times. This has been confirmed by Psychologists.
Conclusion
By following through with this guide that we have made available for you, you are sure of making better decisions. Good luck!
References
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