CHAPTER 15
INFLUENCING DECISIONS
Decision making in firms can be very opaque. Only the most naive manager believes that decisions follow formal decision-making processes. If you submit your report and hope for the best, then prepare for the worst: you will be disappointed. To make sure you get the decision you want, you have to hustle. Fortunately, “hustle” was defined by Daniel Kahnemann, who won the Nobel Prize for his work on decision-making heuristics (short cuts, to you and me). Here are seven principles of decision making and how you can put them to your advantage:
1. Anchoring. The motto of the Welsh Rugby team in the 1980s was “get your retaliation in first”, which is what anchoring is all about. Don’t wait for the planning group to ...
