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EP. 43: MAKING BETTER DECISIONS: ANNIE DUKE ON CREATING YOUR OWN CRYSTAL BALL.

October 20, 2020 by Larry Weeks Leave a Comment

There are only two things that determine how your life turns out: luck and the quality of your decisions – Annie Duke 

What do you do when you’re faced with a big decision?

If you’re like most people, you might take out a piece of paper and make a pro-con list: two columns, one side lists the arguments in favor (pros) of making a particular decision or action. The other (cons) are listed arguments against it. As simple as that is, many don’t even do that. And, if you’re like me, you might over-analyze with spreadsheets and spend too much time searching for that extra data point that might make you sure. But I still second guess myself.

Enter Annie Duke.

Annie is an expert on decision fitness and is the author of two books on decision making, the bestseller Thinking In Bets, and her latest How To Decide, Simple Tools For Making Better Choices, is the topic of the show.

Prior to the books, Annie used high stakes poker as her decision lab and became one of the world’s top poker players, winning her first World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet in 2004. That same year, she won the Tournament of Champions and 2010, the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship. Before her professional poker life, Annie was awarded a National Science Foundation Fellowship to study Cognitive Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania.

This is the second time I’ve had Annie as a guest (See Ep. 22) and the topic of this episode follows from the first except here we shift from highlighting causes of bad decisions to discussing more of the process for making better ones. We move to the more practical as she outlines the tools and heuristics we can use to make quality decisions and second-guess ourselves less.

Here are just some of our talking points.

  • A review of “resulting” and why it’s a problem
  • Motivated reasoning
  • Memory creep
  • What’s wrong with pro-con lists – and what’s better
  • Assigning probability and forecasting
  • The tree of possibility
  • The decision multiverse
  • The three-column decision map
  • Why we should embrace educated guesses
  • Factors leading up to election cycles and how predictions might be wrong yet correctly made before
  • and much more

Being a better decision-maker means being a better predictor of the set of possible futures. This podcast will hopefully help you sharpen your decision skills, getting you closer to having a crystal ball.

Enjoy!

[Note Annie’s audio is less than optimal so listen closely, it’s a gold mine of advice you can use right away]

Filed Under: Personal Growth

About Larry Weeks

Larry is a technologist, consultant and host of the Bounce podcast.

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PODCAST ARCHIVE

  • EP: 47: CHATTER: ETHAN KROSS ON UNDERSTANDING AND MANAGING THE VOICE IN OUR HEAD
  • EP.46: HIGH ON LIFE: TOMMY CHONG ON PRISON, POT AND KARMA
  • EP. 45: SURVIVING SURVIVAL: LAURENCE GONZALES ON TRAUMA AND NEW NORMALS
  • Ep. 44: FREEDOM FROM RESULTS : MASSIMO PIGLIUCCI ON REDEFINING SUCCESS
  • EP. 43: MAKING BETTER DECISIONS: ANNIE DUKE ON CREATING YOUR OWN CRYSTAL BALL.
  • EP. 42: HOW TO FEEL GREAT: DR. DAVID BURNS ON WHAT NEGATIVE EMOTIONS ARE TRYING TO TELL US
  • EP. 41: MISTAKES WERE MADE: CAROL TAVRIS AND ELLIOT ARONSON ON COGNITIVE BIAS AND LEARNING FROM THE ERROR OF OUR WAYS
  • EP. 40: HOW WILL WE BEHAVE? RORY SUTHERLAND ON THE NEW WORLD OF WORK AND CONSUMER BEHAVIOR POST COVID-19
  • EP.39: CORONAVIRUS UPDATES: JAMES ALTUCHER AND BOUNCE BACK PREDICTIONS
  • EP.38: HOW STOICS KEEP CALM, WILLIAM B. IRVINE ON PHILOSOPHICAL FRAMING
  • EP. 37: THE WEDGE, SCOTT CARNEY ON STRESS AND HACKING THE NERVOUS SYSTEM
  • EP. 36: CORONAVIRUS QA WITH DR. ALEX LICKERMAN, M.D.
  • EP. 35: STRESS INOCULATION: STEVEN SOUTHWICK ON THE SCIENCE OF RESILIENCE AND COPING WITH EXTREMES
  • EP. 34: THE MOTIVATION EQUATION: PIERS STEEL ON HOW TO STOP PUTTING THINGS OFF
  • EP. 33: LIVING THE LIVES WE WANT: NIR EYAL ON BEING INDISTRACTABLE
  • A FRAMEWORK FOR HUMAN EFFORT
  • THE TECH FALLACY:
  • Learning To Live With Learning Machines:
  • WORKING WITH A.I. :
  • MAKING CHANGE HAPPEN:
  • THE WISDOM ASSET:
  • EP. 26: SECOND CHANCES: CATHERINE HOKE ON REDEMPTIVE ENTREPRENEURSHIP
  • EP.25: MELTDOWNS: CHRIS CLEARFIELD ON PREVENTING SYSTEM FAILURES
  • EP.24: MEANING AND WORK: FRED KOFMAN ON THE ROI OF PURPOSE
  • EP 23: MOTIVATION MYTHS: JEFF HADEN ON PROCESS VS. PASSION
  • EP.22: HOW TO THINK IN BETS: ANNIE DUKE ON POKER, PROBABILITIES AND BETTER DECISIONS
  • EP.21: MEDITATION FOR FIDGETY SKEPTICS: JEFF WARREN ON A DIFFERENT WAY OF BEING
  • EP. 20: CHOICE ARCHITECTURE: RORY SUTHERLAND ON THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ADVERTISING
  • NOT IMPOSSIBLE: SUSANNAH MEADOWS ON MEDICINE, MINDSET AND MOTIVATION
  • EP. 18: HOW TO TALK TO YOURSELF: MARISA PEER ON RAPID TRANSFORMATION
  • SURVIVING ASSHOLES: ROBERT SUTTON ON OUTWITTING JERKS IN YOUR LIFE
  • HOW TO GET OUT OF YOUR OWN WAY: TASHA EURICH ON SELF AWARENESS
  • EP. 15: ON THE IMPORTANCE OF HARD THINGS: CAROLINE MILLER
  • EP. 14: ON FAILURE PART 2, FAILING WELL: ASHLEY GOOD
  • EP 13: FAILURE PART 1 : FAIL FAST, FAIL OFTEN: RYAN BABINEAUX
  • EP. 12: HOW TO BOUNCE BACK OVER AND OVER AGAIN: A TALK WITH JAMES ALTUCHER
  • EP.11: HAPPINESS AND TECHNOLOGY IN THE DIGITAL ERA: AMY BLANKSON
  • EP.10: AFTER CANCER: DR. WENDY HARPHAM, HAPPY IN A STORM
  • EP. 9: A PHILOSOPHY FOR HARD TIMES: MASSIMO PIGLIUCCI
  • Ep. 8: SUCCESS, FACTS & FICTIONS: ERIC BARKER
  • EP.7: RESILIENT GRIEVING: DR. LUCY HONE TALKS ABOUT LIVING WITH LOSS
  • EP. 6: WHAT DOESN’T KILL YOU: A TALK WITH SCOTT CARNEY
  • EP. 5: FEELING GOOD, OVERCOMING DEPRESSION AND DISTORTED THINKING: DR DAVID BURNS
  • EP. 4: HOW GOING BLIND HELPED ME SEE: ISAAC LIDSKY
  • EP.3: WHY THINGS BOUNCE BACK: ANDREW ZOLLI
  • EP. 2: ON CREATING AN UNDEFEATABLE MIND: DR. ALEX LICKERMAN
  • EP. 1: NO ARMS, NO LEGS, NO EXCUSES: KYLE MAYNARD
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