Okay, so your offsite was going well, but now there’s tension in the air. Your group has reached that dreaded point of ‘analysis paralysis’ and ‘ship to learn’. It’s that moment in the conversation where we realise that we’re never going to have enough information to be 100% confident with our understanding of a complex situation, or in making a complex decision. So… we should just make a call, move on, and learn. But we’re still not clear on what that actually means, what success would be, and what action we can take… but let’s just do something so that at least we’re moving.
You feelin’ it?
That restless urge for action for the sake of it is the hyperbolic discounting bias. We generally prefer to receive a reward that arrives sooner rather than later, and we discount the value of the later reward, the further it is away. Crazy, right? Shiny tangible thing now, ambiguous-but-more-valuable thing later.
We all know this, but it’s what happens next in the discussion that determines whether the offsite is a mediocre collective shrug, or something truly extraordinary.
Here are some things to try:
Ask your group: “We seem to be really anchored into [doing the short-term thing]. Thought experiment: how would we argue to do the [long-term thing] instead?”
Write out each strategic option/objective/idea on a Concept Canvas. This helps everyone to objectively evaluate options apples-to-apples by shaping each option in the same way, with the same sliders.
Concept canvas example template
Keep your group honest by helping them to compare their chosen option with the strategic goal they’re aiming for: will this option get them to that goal? If not, what will? What are they uncertain about, and what would help with that uncertainty?
Answers & Comments
Answer:
Okay, so your offsite was going well, but now there’s tension in the air. Your group has reached that dreaded point of ‘analysis paralysis’ and ‘ship to learn’. It’s that moment in the conversation where we realise that we’re never going to have enough information to be 100% confident with our understanding of a complex situation, or in making a complex decision. So… we should just make a call, move on, and learn. But we’re still not clear on what that actually means, what success would be, and what action we can take… but let’s just do something so that at least we’re moving.
You feelin’ it?
That restless urge for action for the sake of it is the hyperbolic discounting bias. We generally prefer to receive a reward that arrives sooner rather than later, and we discount the value of the later reward, the further it is away. Crazy, right? Shiny tangible thing now, ambiguous-but-more-valuable thing later.
We all know this, but it’s what happens next in the discussion that determines whether the offsite is a mediocre collective shrug, or something truly extraordinary.
Here are some things to try:
Ask your group: “We seem to be really anchored into [doing the short-term thing]. Thought experiment: how would we argue to do the [long-term thing] instead?”
Write out each strategic option/objective/idea on a Concept Canvas. This helps everyone to objectively evaluate options apples-to-apples by shaping each option in the same way, with the same sliders.
Concept canvas example template
Keep your group honest by helping them to compare their chosen option with the strategic goal they’re aiming for: will this option get them to that goal? If not, what will? What are they uncertain about, and what would help with that uncertainty?