How can I combat Decision Fatigue?

The boring answer is, make fewer decisions.

If you’re not familiar with Decision Fatigue, it means exactly what you’d think, the exhaustion of our mental faculties when faced with too many decisions. Decisions exact a special kind of toll on our brains. They exhaust us much more rapidly than other mental tasks and learning to make fewer decisions leaves us more effective overall.

Solving a problem with only one answer takes energy but it’s a fairly linear process. You trace a linear path from requirement to resolution, from A to B.

Problems with multiple answers, requiring you to decide which, are much more taxing because of the secondary paths. Decisions have consequences. Each time you choose an answer from a set, your brain has to weigh and measure the costs, benefits, and unknowns of each possibility.

Consider a greatly simplified cost comparison. For a problem with only one solution, you must assess feasibility for a set of candidates until you find the correct answer. Assuming it takes seven ideas to get the right one, that’s 7 assessments. Your mental work load is 7.

When multiple answers exist, you must perform the same assessments but also grade them against one another. Assuming 7 options, you have 7 feasibility assessments. Cost/benefit/unknowns is a separate analysis for each option, adding 7 more threads to your thoughts. Then you have to compare the options.

Best case, it’s a simple binary analysis. You move through the list comparing the first to the next until you find a better answer, then comparing that better answer to the next. That’s 6 comparisons. Worst case, you truly need to compare each option against all others, creating a Handshake Problem. That’s 21 comparisons.

With 7 feasibility assessments, 7 cost/benefit/unknowns assessments, and 6-21 comparisons, your mental work load is now between 20 and 35.

Decisions are costly. Even when each mental task is trivial, don’t forget that you are task switching between each task (feasibility, cost/benefit/unknowns, comparisons). Task switching imposes its own mental load. I’d love to tell you how to reduce the cost of decisions but our brains simply don’t work that way. The only way to minimize load per decision is to give less thought to each decision, reducing quality. Instead, focus on making fewer and better quality decisions.

Here are some techniques:

Set Defaults

Unless I have a meeting, an event, or a date, I wear the same thing every day, t-shirt and shorts. When it’s 28°F, people look at me like I’ve grown two heads but I truck along with the same clothes. The end result is that I never think about what to wear. The morning starts with the same thing every day and my mind is clear to focus on more important decisions.

Similarly, lots of Software Development teams never ask which database to use for a new project. It is always and by default, SQL Server. I often wish this weren’t the case, as SQL Injection is still a very real problem and there are often better models for a transactional datastore. Still, it works every time. There’s almost no occasion where SQL Server can’t do it and the cost of choosing an optimal datastore often outweighs just getting started.¹

Decide by Priority

Deciding is a task. It’s work. Prioritize it along with your other activities. We often think that decisions “must be made” but no. There’s no must in life, only actions and consequences. Setting priorities for the decisions you need to make allows you to minimize the consequences when you can’t address all of them.

Suppose you’re at home one evening. You’ve had a hectic week, you need to cook dinner, you know some items are approaching the sell-by date and, oh yeah, you’re weighing competing job offers. Does it make any sense to spend time deliberating over dinner? When making a major decision about your career, do you care if the salmon spoils?

The same applies when deciding whether to migrate your application to a new framework and which tool to use for collaborative note-taking. Grab OneNote (Google Docs, a Wiki, whatever!) and focus on the impactful decision.

Limit Options

There’s a well-worn saying in the Marine Corps, “A good decision now is better than the best decision too late.” That sounds like a statement about deadlines but it’s really about resources. Time is our most valuable resource in everything, including combat. When the enemy are closing in, you don’t waste that precious commodity looking for every possible option. You choose the first path you believe can lead you to victory and trust your Marines to see it through.

When talking about mental energy, the same logic applies. Need to choose between 6 viable courses of action but you’re too mentally exhausted to review them all? Flip a coin. Heads, eliminate the first three. Tails, eliminate the last three.

Does that seem reckless? It’s essentially what recruiters do. When faced with hundreds of applicants, they lack the time to read every resume. They choose a sort order and grab the first 20. It may not be perfect but it’s apparently good enough to find someone who will serve the company for years.

Establish Routines

I’d love to tell you I wake my kids at the same time every day but no. I wake like a drugged bear coming out of hibernation and until that coffee kicks in, those kids can sleep all they want. The result, vastly different outcomes. If I can get them up on time and follow the routine, the morning is sunshine and rainbows. If I have a limited window of time to figure out exactly how to get them dressed/fed/ready, my brain slowly collapses trying to decide what gets done next.

Routines eliminate micro-decisions. “Should I check my email while I have a minute?” “Do I have time to check on that ticket?” “Should I check on Bob’s status?” Load is load and a ton of bricks weighs exactly the same as a ton of feathers. Set times for correspondence, focused work, status updates, etc. Avoiding those little decisions leaves your mind free for larger tasks. It’s okay if the routine gets messed up every now and then. Easier calm days make for easier crazy days.

Delegate

Millennials are the generation of neurotic parenting and I fit in perfectly. Dinner can’t be a microwaved sack of calories, it must be nutritionally balanced! Does it have enough protein, slow-carbs, veggies, vitamins…? What’s the correct portion size to ensure each essential element gets consumed? Do the flavors make sense together, thus maximizing the chance that the little buttheads will eat it?

A simple question can minimize the hassle. “Hey, kids. What do you want for dinner?” If they choose chicken nuggets, fine. There’s our protein, now to find complementary carb and veg. Before, we were evaluating an array of combinations and options to find an ideal solution. Now we’re choosing simple compliments to someone else’ decision.

There’s enormous power in letting others decide. If it’s in their area of expertise, they’ll probably make a better decision than you. If it’s not, they can probably find the information they need. As leaders, we should be preparing our subordinates for our role. That means letting them make decisions (including mistakes) and see them through. If your team isn’t making more and bigger decisions over time, you need to invest more in their development.

You can start by having a team member make a recommendation. Evaluate it and their reasoning, providing feedback. When they’re ready, hand over that category of decisions to them and monitor the outcomes. There’s another Marine saying, “Push leadership downward.” The more you can rely on your team to make good decisions, the more free you are to focus on the critical.

1. Yes, SQL is an outstanding platform. Yes, I love SQL. I just prefer SQL for analytical data and alternatives for transactional. Don’t send hate mail.