by Gary Klein
ISBN: 0262611465
Klein has written an academic (but not pinheaded) book about how people make decisions in the real world, versus how they are observed to make decisions in a lab under tightly controlled and artificial conditions. He calls this approach naturalistic decision-making.
He and his colleagues spent time interviewing and observing key decision makers at work, including neonatal intensive care unit nurses, fire ground commanders, and various military personnel. What he learned is that people under pressure don’t make decisions the way they are supposed to — instead of the deliberate consideration of two alternatives and choosing the best option (the rationalistic method) they tend to “satisfice,” meaning they tend to choose the first option they can make work without comparing it side-by-side with an alternative.
It was interesting to see how people utilize pattern matching, intuition, mental simulation, analogues, metaphor, and storytelling in making decisions. Klein backs up everything he says with plenty of examples, and he takes great pains to spell out how he reached his conclusions (it is an academic oriented book, after all.)
Much of what he presents seems like it would be common sense, but apparently it isn’t. He finds that most of what we teach people about decision-making isn’t going to do them any good in the real world: they don’t have the time, complete information, or support to make completely measured, rational decisions. Expertise, it turns out, is the sole most important criteria in making good decisions.
So it would be better to focus on how experts make decisions, and how they perceive situations than to teach classical decision-making. That way others can be trained to recognize the things that “stick out” to experts. Klein’s associate does this after interviewing experienced NICU nurses — she develops training materials for new nurses from her notes at the request of hospital administration. For a military client, Klein and his colleagues consider what information would support expert decision makers, and redesign a user interface to make those tasks easier.
That is what is most interesting about this book — the clients Klein has and what they expect him to figure out by studying decision-makers. While it is somewhat troubling to see that the U.S. military needs outside consultants to improve tank platoon leader training, I suppose it is good that they are getting it.
If you are in need of a scholarly but readable refutation of b-school decision planning texts, this book is probably it. If you are curious about how people actually make decisions, and perhaps want to become aware of what are unconscious processes are going on in your own head, look for it in the library.
