Decisions and Opinions

Most decisions people make are subjective, at least the bigger ones are. An outsider in any group – country, company, or public sector organisation – has a certain degree of freedom and can be more objective than people who became part of the group earlier. In earlier times, there was a practice in Italy where cities sought judges from other places, as no native was free from local entanglement.

A group may implicitly demand that its members sacrifice the truth to preserve an illusion. Your mind will take the shape of what you frequently hold in thought. Carrying assumptions is like a comforting blanket – you tuck under it, and your mind will feel cosy and lazy. There is no shortcut to being smart, and as one of the Nike advertisement says, Greatness: It takes everything. Subjective opinion is a sign of cognitive lethargy, and it erodes more value in the long term than it creates in the short term.

Good Judgement is Underrated

To be more objective, one has to develop a questioning attitude. It does not mean asking questions to be perceived as a probing person. If you feel something is odd, start making those polite and measured enquiries. Be subtle and not combative. Be precise and not vague. The ultimate goal is to improve the processes, eventually leading to better outcomes. True wisdom is knowing the long-term consequences of thoughts and actions. Clear thinking is better than being smart.

You may think that I should begin the pursuit of objectivity by having a contrarian view to everything, but this will make you a conformist of a different sort. A contrarian reasons independently from the ground up and resists the pressure to conform. Optimistic contrarians are the rarest variety of people.

A few weeks back, I was listening to a Podcast featuring Naval Ravikant. Towards the end of the conversation, the show host asked him a very cliché question – looking back at your life, what would you have done differently? Naval, in his trademark poise and with the benefit of hindsight, said that he would do everything the same way but with less anger and fewer emotional decisions. Emotions, the whole range of them, impair the decision making capability.

If your decisions are more right than wrong and more rational than irrational, you will get non-linear returns in life, sometimes even exponentially. Try developing mental models, as these are compact ways to recall knowledge.

Every Decision Counts

Most decisions have an explicit monetary value. When a particular investing decision does not deliver desired results, our long-term returns deviate from the initial trajectory. This is where the concept of compound interest comes into play. If you cannot decide with the available variables, ask more questions that have the right why, how, and when.

Balance is Key

Beyond a certain degree, opinions become subjective, which reflects our diversity rather than a weakness in human understanding. Our personalities, cultures, and backgrounds shape our worldview. In contrast to conventional wisdom, acknowledging this subjectivity can promote empathy, open-mindedness, and a desire to have conversations. Although subjectivity is unavoidable in many aspects of life, it is beneficial for everyone to balance it with objectivity when making decisions. Personal biases and emotional factors that can impair judgment are reduced when decisions are made objectively, using facts, statistics, and logical analysis. Decision making, if done right, is about striking a balance between the depth of one's viewpoint and the discipline of critical thinking, which benefits both people and communities. Image by Pixabay