How to Decide Simple Tools for Making Better Choices

Annie Duke — 2020

Through a blend of compelling exercises, illustrations, and stories, the bestselling author of Thinking in Bets will train you to combat your own biases, address your weaknesses, and help you become a better and more confident decision-maker. What do you do when you're faced with a big decision? If you're like most people, you probably make a pro and con list, spend a lot of time obsessing about decisions that didn't work out, get caught in analysis paralysis, endlessly seek other people's opinions to find just that little bit of extra information that might make you sure, and finally go with your gut. What if there was a better way to make quality decisions so you can think clearly, feel more confident, second-guess yourself less, and ultimately be more decisive and be more productive? Making good decisions doesn't have to be a series of endless guesswork. Rather, it's a teachable skill that anyone can sharpen. In How to Decide, bestselling author Annie Duke and former professional poker player lays out a series of tools anyone can use to make better decisions. You'll learn: • To identify and dismantle hidden biases. • To extract the highest quality feedback from those whose advice you seek. • To more accurately identify the influence of luck in the outcome of your decisions. • When to decide fast, when to decide slow, and when to decide in advance. • To make decisions that more effectively help you to realize your goals and live your values. Through interactive exercises and engaging thought experiments, this book helps you analyze key decisions you've made in the past and troubleshoot those you're making in the future. Whether you're picking investments, evaluating a job offer, or trying to figure out your romantic life, How to Decide is the key to happier outcomes and fewer regrets.

Reviews

Alex Ker@alexker

Dec 19, 2022

Annie’s book was recommended to me on quite a few occasions. Upon hearing it in an a16z podcast and learning its status as the Greylock must-read for portfolio cos, I was convinced. In its conversational style, “How to Decide” is embedded with the usual share of key findings from psychology/behavioural economics/game theory studies. However, what sets it apart is the abundance of diagrams, exercises, checklists, that make the abstract concepts digestible and actionable, along with fictional examples that are entertaining yet realistic. The chapters are organized exceptionally—starting with common fallacies and biases, turning away to concrete frameworks, then tying it together by showing how decisions can be best made in teams. My main takeaways include (but is not limited to): spend less time worrying about what to eat for dinner, wear or watch on Netflix because it does not affect long-run happiness; hard & close decisions are actually easiest (because if both makes you happy the difference is tiny and you should just choose!); how payoffs and probabilities in decision trees and confidence intervals work; asking someone out is a “freeroll” as its outcome carries asymmetric upside compared to insignificant downside and can be repeated. I’ll definitely be revisiting + applying these frameworks to venture investing, career, and relationship decisions this year!