✳flâneur — a map of the web's best reading

Reversible and Irreversible Decisions

fs.blog · 1,568 words · saved by 4 readers

Making decisions, even in areas you know relatively well, usually involves an element of uncertainty. Sometimes decisions can be made quickly, and uncertainty is acceptable or desirable. Other times, decisions are made slowly and deliberately to remove as much uncertainty as possible. Once you are faced with a decision, the question becomes whether you should make it fast or slow. Do you gather as much information as possible, knowing the process of gathering information slows you down and carries a cost? Or do you make it quickly with imperfect information? Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.com, considers decisions like doors. He asks himself if the decision is a one-way door or a two-way door. What’s the difference? Once you walk through a one-way door, you can’t come back. It’s irreversible. With a two-way door, on the other hand, you can walk through, look around, and easily come back to where you started. In a shareholder letter, Bezos wrote[1]: Some decisions are consequential an

Mental Models | Reading Time: 6 minutes Reversible and Irreversible Decisions Making decisions, even in areas you know relatively well, usually involves an element of uncertainty. Sometimes decisions can be made quickly, and uncertainty is acceptable or desirable. Other times, decisions are made slowly and deliberately to remove as much uncertainty as possible. Once you are faced with a decision, the question becomes whether you should make it fast or slow. Do you gather as much information as possible, knowing the process of gathering information slows you down and carries a cost? Or do you m

Explore this link on the map →

saved by

related reading