Basic Strategic Decision Models
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How to make decisions with simple visual models. The talk explained what a model is, gave some examples in everyday life, and showed how to make your own. It's drawn badly.
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Editor's Notes
- I love making decisions based on facts, rather than emotions or other factors. As a web designer I try to use split testing, analytics and other data for decision making. Decision models are a great way for me to apply that thinking to other areas of business, personal development, etc. This presentation will explain what a model is and show a few examples of my favourites, and show off my really bad drawing.
- First – what is a model? A model tries to do six things; Simplify – by ignoring data we don't need Pragmatic – by only focussing on proven data inputs Summary – it distils data input Visual – quickly see an output visually Organise – see what data is important Method – a model provides a method for answering questions, not the answers themselves
- President Eisenhower was famous for always having time to tackle urgent tasks, no matter how busy he was. He did this by using a model to decide when things should be done. Decide timings by how urgent, and how important, a task is. Most of us (or at least I) live in the “do it now” space where we only find time to do the urgent+important stuff. We should find a balance between all four. There are modern equivalents to this model, and more complex methods, such as Getting Things Done (thanks Jamie+Lion)
- Similar (but better) to the pros and cons method most people use. If faced with a tough decision like moving house or changing career, this model let's us draw up a list of positive things holding you where you are, and a list of positive things pulling you to the new decision. It's a better way to make decisions by using positive aspects of both options rather than the usual pros/cons list.
- This model describes the decisions and knowledge in the lifecycle of a project. At the start of a project very little is known but the consequences of our decisions are high. Moving further through the project gives us more knowledge, but by then it's too late to make decisions of any real consequence. Therefore it's important to either maximise knowledge at the start of the project, or simply bite the bullet and realise that decisions should be quickly made even if little knowledge is available. In some cases decisions can be deferred until knowledge is to hand, but putting off decisions is a decision in itself (and usually a bad idea).
- The Supermemo learning programme uses the most efficient way of remembering information by “topping up” knowledge on a frequent basis. Your mind forgets stuff very quickly unless the information is used regularly. This model is a result of that programme and shows the most efficient “top up” times for retaining knowledge. As you can see the “curve of forgetting” gets shallower the more you use or top up the knowledge.
- This is my paper slide model. As it got closer and closer to #bcl9 my enthusiasm for drawing slides changed, and the probability of axes running of the page dramatically increased. Someone in the audience correctly pointed out that “hours remaining until #bcl9” should actually be a decreasing scale rather than an increasing one. Someone else pointed out that the mistake only proves the model further. Later on I'll show you how to make models as cool as this one.
- Maslow's hierarchy of needs is a theory which describes the things we need in life to be happy. First (at the base) comes food, sleep, water, sex, etc. Then physical, financial, etc security. Then friendships and social relationships. Then recognition such as fame or money. And finally self realisation. I'd certainly seen Maslow's hierarchy of needs before, but not the second upside-down pyramid which made an interesting point. It says that once we achieve physiological needs and security then we forget about them and focus on the other three. In the western world our wants are prioritised as the complete opposite of what we actually need.
- The long-tail model describes mass market and niche markets in terms of sales and the number of products/companies/competitiors. “The body” of a market is the 20% of products that achieve mass market and sell an awful lot. “The long tail” of a market is the other 80% where a lot of different companies sell fewer individual products but actually account for 80% of sales. It shows that while big companies have a strong hold on the 20% there is still a lot of money to be made by small companies who find or create a nice. I accidentally deleted this slide in the actual presentation, sorry!
- The “black box” model says that the speed of a system and its complexity are directly proportional. As we progress technologically the systems intrinsically become more complex. At the time this was a scary trend – instead of pulling a system apart to understand and trust it, people were forced instead to trust the people who designed these systems, because no one person could understand them all. Today I am very happy to do this. I script PHP which is a very high level language. I trust the BIOS coders, the operating system guys, the web browser and server teams to do their job and create dependable black boxes. If I create an API and document it well, other people can rely on my black box and so on.
- The Drexler-Sibbet team model says that a team-driven project must go through 7 phases, in order, for it to be successful, starting at the top left. If any of these steps are omitted or done badly then we risk having to go back to that step later on. If, for example, we get to the “high performance” area where everyone should be churning out great code, but a level of trust hasn't been built between team members or within the project, then the whole thing has to go back 4 steps, which is a big time waster and demotivator. It depends on the project and the people involved, and the model is more a rule of thumb, but interesting nonetheless.
- Making your own models is fairly simple. If you repeat an action long enough you'll start to see patterns in behaviour – things that occur most often and things that rarely occur at all. You can use the frequency of occurrences to drop the stuff that doesn't matter and focus on the main occurrences. Make a note of things you need to move forward (progressives) and things that push you back (regressives) for future reference. Be even cooler by pulling loads of data together in a database and writing software for pattern recognition. Generate simple models on really complex data. I've tried and failed.
- If this talk tickled you then you'll love The Decision Book (ISBN 978-1846683954). It has loads more models useful for business, project management, personal and social living and self improvement. Jamie+Lion recommended Getting Things Done (a book I absolutely love) with some very practical methods and models. Adrian (the agile guy) recommended Hohmanns Innovation Games for further research.
- Thanks to everyone who attended! As always with Barcamps I walked out the room knowing more than when I walked in. Jamie+Lion was the 5% who noticed I can't draw pie charts.