My
reflection blog this week is to review the four methodologies Sheena Lyengar
suggest as option to improve our experience in choosing. I will reflect on two
of the methods in terms of my own decision-making as an individual and an
organization. I will offer some suggestions that I can improve my ability to
decide.
Less is Better
Sheena
Lyengar provided an example in the video that if you have fewer options for a
choice it is better. An Example she provided is when “Proctor & Gamble went from 26 different kinds of Head &
Shoulders to 15, they saw an increase in sales by 10 percent”. I related this example to
my own personal experience as a consumer who has to shop for a family, weekly.
The decision-making choice begins before I ever leave my home. I always poll
each person to define what food they want to include any personal items to make
it through the next week. As an example, I will get a reply from daughter that
begins with “anything healthy”. Well healthy is a pretty broad array of
products. Everyone eats pretty healthy in my home, but the word healthy is very
sporadic based on each person’s wants. It takes more than an hour to just
define a list to even leave the house. (Lyengar, 2011)
When
it comes to narrowing down the list, I have to apply my own decision-making
efforts. First, I narrow down the options for the family to chose from, guiding
them to make a decision as a team that is common. An example, when it comes to
fruit, I would suggest bananas and explain to the other family members the
value of this item verses multiple choices. I also negotiate; if I am buying
items that I later find in trash, I will objectively not let the trashed item
be something that is a choice. Recently I had bariatric gastric bypass surgery,
so my food options are limited and require an extremely high protein diet. With
this, my food choices are very simple as I live off protein shakes and eggs.
The value of going through this procedure is the family has taken on the
interest to focus on their own health, so the choices for them is also very
limited and making shopping simpler as most items are ordered online and I am
not faced with the multiple choices at the grocery store and less is better.
When
it comes to my work organization, less is better as well. As a program planner
decisions for me is if I am going to do a specific task within the business
rhythm. Recently I lost my co-worker to another program due to a
re-organization. I knew I could handle my work and my co-workers just fine.
However, I was consumed with over 30 hours a workweek in planning meetings, and
this was to double. I immediately
cancelled all the standard status meetings and the monthly status call, where
we ask for schedule status. I re-designed to request status weekly, and only
hold a one-hour status meeting a week to review status. This past week was
two-weeks post the change and it was important to ask for feedback. Change is
always accepted, and to my surprise it was well received. The feedback is the
new format allowed the team members to provide status via a computerized tool,
and it reduced the amount of time they were in a meeting to work on other work.
My own personal assessment is I was in less meetings sitting around a big table
and could actually spend more one-on-one time with those I support. I found
myself getting my deliverable products out earlier than scheduled, and had more
time to reflect on my day and workload. In this scenario removing the amount of
meetings increased performance output of the team I support and myself. I left
work feeling more accomplished verses tired from running from meeting to
meeting. The change is definitely something I am proud of, especially since my
co-worker made a comment that it wouldn’t work, but it did.
Condition for Complexity
The technique
that Sheena
Lyengar talked about is the “Condition for complexity” basically identifying
that a person can actually handle a lot more information than they think they
can, but they have to take it a bit easier to understand. From a personal
standpoint, I have always considered myself to be a complex person who thinks
fast in sorting information into buckets in my mind and make decisions fairly
quickly. I enjoyed the example of the buying a car, which I did the same thing
last summer. (Lyengar, 2011)
I knew exactly
what car I wanted except I wanted the luxuries of a built in GPS system,
leather heated seats, and a sunroof. The rest of the features where not that
critical for me, but it do spend ample time in my vehicle each day therefore my
decisions for features were based on my personal comfort. The complexity came
in after I found the car and I had to sit in the business office and hear about
the various maintenance plans, warranties, and suggested options to protect the
electronics, long-term. I had already spent over six hours at this dealership
and just wanted to sign the paperwork and go home. The comical part is my
husband and I both had our calculators out and the business person asked if we
were engineers as we just could not make a decision that quick based on all the
options. I ended up purchasing the car with more options than I planned to in
the beginning, but it was after a long eight hours at the dealership. I think the complexity is due to the options
that tend to increase prices, which needs more time. Now my daughter works at an
automobile dealership, and I am fortunate to hear the real ins and outs of
those options and will allow me to be a better shopper in the future.
When it comes to condition for complexity in the work
place is based on the type of work that we do. My currently role as a planner
is to put a schedule together based on engineer input, and not completely
understanding what the actual work is. The project is centered on building
aircraft software, where I am not experience in software code or product
design. I can efficiently design and manage a schedule based on a tool,
however, understand the actual product deliverable is a progress in work. The
product itself is very complex of information, and I have asked those I support
to provide me an information walk through of the product to understand and how
it interacts. We are saturated with product acronyms that are not the same for
each product. I am one year into this role, and everyone on the team is very
helpful with teaching me how the coding and testing works, which has helped me,
be more efficient in managing the schedule. I had the experience in project
scheduling, but lacked the understanding of the how the software world works.
The more I understand the complexity, the easier it is for me to make decisions
relating to the product. The value I have to the team is I am a person who is
always asking “why” or “how” things work. Owning up to those I work with that I
don’t understand what they do, has gained more respect from those I support.
Conclusion
Sheena Lyengar had four techniques to consider when making
decisions, the less is better and condition or complexity is the two that hit
home for me as a person and within the organization that I support. I had
watched another video in another education course that Lyengar spoke about the
“Art of Choosing”, which one of the most inspirational videos that I have
watched. Lyengar does a great job at explaining the decision making element of
choice.
References
Lyengar, S. (2011). Sheena Iyengar: How
to make choosing easier. Retrieved from
