口译时事：决策力并非与生俱来

　　Good management is about nothing if not good decision making. Unfortunately, decisiveness has been seen as a character trait like courage: there are those who can pull the trigger – the great executives – and those who can’t – the armies of wafflers who are terrified of being forced to accept the consequences of their actions.

　　有效管理的精髓全在于优秀的决策机制。但不幸的是，决策力被看做是一种类似于勇气的性格特质。有些人就是能够果断扣动扳机——例如出色的经理人;而另一些人则做不到这一点——这帮犹豫不决的家伙们对于被迫接受自己行为的后果感到胆战心惊。

　　A new wave of social scientists, however, is upending this view by digging into the psychological and social factors that influence our decisions. By developing better processes, they hope to make decision making less like voodoo and more like carpentry.

　　然而，一些社会学家通过深入研究影响人们决策的心理和社会因素，正在颠覆上述看法。通过研究更好的决策机制，他们希望使决策不再像巫术那样神秘，而是像木匠活那样可被学习掌握。

　　Chip Heath, a professor at Stanford’s business school, and his brother Dan Heath, a fellow at Duke University’s Center for the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship, have already written two excellent books of pop social science: Made to Stick and Switch . Their latest, Decisions: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work digs into the latest findings on decision making.

　　斯坦福大学(Stanford)商学院教授奇普 希思(Chip Heath)和杜克大学(Duke University)社会企业发展研究中心研究员丹 希思(Dan Heath)俩兄弟合著了两本出色的通俗社科书籍《让创意更有粘性》(Made to Stick)以及《瞬变》(Switch)。他们的最新著作《决策：如何在生活和工作中更好抉择》(Decisions: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work)深入探讨了决策领域的最新研究成果。

　　“Being decisive is itself a choice,” they write. “Decisiveness is a way of behaving, not an inherited trait. It allows us to make brave and confident choices, not because we know we’ll be right but because it’s better to try and fail than to delay and regret.”

　　他们写道，“表现得坚决果断本身就是一种选择。决策力是一种行为方式，而不是一种遗传特征。它使我们能够做出勇敢而自信的选择，这不是因为我们知道自己一定正确，而是因为尝试并失败要好过拖延和后悔。”

　　The Heaths identify four villains that obstruct good decision making: narrow framing, limiting the options we consider; the confirmation bias, our tendency to look for evidence which supports what we already think; short-term emotion, which will fade over time; and overconfidence.

　　希思兄弟指出了阻碍有效决策的四大因素：第一点是视野狭隘(narrow framing)，这限制了我们纳入考虑的选择范围;第二点是证实倾向( confirmation bias)，我们倾向于寻找能够支撑自己现有想法的证据;第三点是短期情绪(short-term emotion)，它将随着时间逐渐消退;最后一点是过度自信(overconfidence)。

　　They lay out a four-step process called “WRAP” that addresses each of the villains in turn. We must “widen our options” away from simple either/or decisions. We should “reality test our assumptions”, to ensure we are basing our decisions on fact rather than prejudice. We should “attain distance before deciding”, or sleep on big decisions rather than letting ourselves be carried away by the emotion of the moment. And we should “prepare to be wrong”, because there is a good chance we will be.

　　希思兄弟提出了名为“WRAP”的四阶段流程，依次针对解决阻碍决策的四大障碍。我们必须“拓宽自己的选择空间”，避免非此即彼的简单决策。我们应当“把自己的假想放到现实中检验”，以确保我们的决策是建立在事实而非偏见的基础上。我们还应“在决策之前减少情绪干扰”，或者在面临重大决策时，要留出一段时间来考虑，而不能让自己被当下的情绪所左右。最后我们必须做好“出错的准备”，因为有很大可能我们确实会犯错。

　　The Heaths make a convincing case that bad decision making is ubiquitous. Take job interviews. Rather than requiring candidates to perform the specific task for which we want to hire them, we sit them in a room and ask them questions about their ability to do the task. “Imagine if the US Olympic track coach used two tests in selecting the men who’d run on the 4x100 relay team. Test 1: get the man on the track to see how fast he runs. And test 2: meet him in a conference room and see if he answers questions like a fast runner would.”

　　希思兄弟很有说服力地指出，糟糕的决策机制随处可见。以招聘面试为例。当前的通行做法不是让候选人尝试执行招聘方希望他们入职后履行的具体任务，而是让候选人坐在一间屋子里，通过提问来判断他们是否具备履行职责的能力。书中写道，“想象一下，假如美国奥运会田径队的教练在筛选参加4x100接力赛的队员时使用了两种测试方法。其一是让运动员在跑道上比赛谁跑得更快。其二是在一间会议室里面试运动员，以判断他回答问题的方式是否像个飞毛腿。”

　　We also often decide earlier than we need to, say the Heaths. What we should do, instead, is conduct small experiments to test our ideas before going in all the way.

　　希思兄弟表示，人们还经常过于仓促地做出决定。而我们真正应当做的是，在做出决策并贯彻执行之前进行一些小试验，以检验自己的想法是否正确。

　　Much of what the Heaths write is echoed by Francesca Gino, a professor at Harvard Business School, in her much wonkier book, Sidetracked: Why Our Decisions Get Derailed, and How We Can Stick to the Plan. She writes that if only we were more aware of the strange influences on our decisions, we could exercise more control over them.

　　希思兄弟书中的许多观点，与哈佛商学院(Harvard Business School)教授弗朗西斯卡 吉诺(Francesca Gino)的观点相呼应。吉诺在《偏离：决策为何脱轨，以及如何贯彻既定方案》(Sidetracked: Why Our Decisions Get Derailed, and How We Can Stick to the Plan)一书中写道，假如我们能够意识到自身决策所受到的各种奇怪影响，我们就能更好地掌控它们。

　　For example, most of us tend to exaggerate our perceptions of our own competence and capabilities. Asked to rate our own qualities, ranging from decision-making abilities to physical attractiveness, most of us will rate ourselves well above average. We think we’re better than we are. Psychological biases such as these are the bane of good decision making.

　　例如，绝大多数人倾向于高估自身的才干和能力。如果让我们给自己的素质打分，包括决策能力以及外表吸引力等多个方面，绝大多数人会认为自身条件高于平均水平。我们眼中的自己好于我们的实际表现。诸如此类的心理倾向正是妨碍我们做出正确决定的罪魁祸首。

　　Similarly, we tend to follow advice we pay for more than advice we receive for free, regardless of its quality. There is something about having paid for it that makes us credulous, a fact exploited by high-priced consultants.

　　相对于免费得到的意见，我们更倾向于听从付费以后得到的建议，不论这些观点本身的质量如何。为了获得建议而付费的行为使我们变得更加容易轻信，这一事实被要价高昂的咨询师们加以利用。

　　But once you understand these tendencies in the human mind you can take advantage of them to persuade others. Hotels have found that guests will reuse their towels at a much higher rate if you tell them that other guests reuse their towels than if you simply tell them that it’s the environmentally friendly thing to do.

　　但是一旦你理解了人类心理的这些倾向，你就可以利用它们来说服别人。宾馆现已发现，在告知宾客其他人也在重复使用毛巾的情况下，毛巾的使用率比仅仅提示宾客重复使用毛巾有利于保护环境时要高出不少。