Take a Leap. Why Risk Aversion is Holding You Back.

On February 6, 2016February 9, 2016 By Cathy NoiceIn Workplace Navigator2 Comments

You don’t take the promotion because you think you might fail. You don’t break out to start your own business because you’ll surely lose your house. You don’t sign up for the conference because you don’t know San Antonio and don’t want to travel alone. Leap

This thinking is holding you back. You are being lulled into status quo mode. Your brain skews towards survival and it wants you to fear anything that is not status quo. This was important when there were Sabre-tooth Tigers and poisonous berries in abundance. Survival is a good thing but stagnation is not. Being risk averse is holding you back.

So here are some ways to take the leap:

1. Focus on potential. As Margie Warrell wrote in her Forbes article, “We tend to focus more on what might go wrong – what we might lose or sacrifice – than what might go right. Because what we focus on tends to magnify in our imaginations, it causes us to misjudge (and over-estimate) the likelihood of it occurring.” So if you feel like “you are horrible at taking tests” then you are likely to be in the mind set to fail the test. It will be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Focus on what can go right.

2. Question your heuristics. We rely on “heuristics” to figure things out. These are based on your own experience. So if I have driven from San Francisco to LA successfully 20 times and then one time I take a flight, it has engine trouble; my “availability heuristic” then makes the decision based on my experience that it’s safer to drive to LA. In a 2013 study by Research in Transportation Economics, “A person who was in a motor vehicle for 30 miles every day for a year faced a fatality risk of about 1 in 12,500. Relative to mainline trains, buses and commercial aviation the risk was 17, 67, and 112 times greater, respectively.” So I really should be getting on a commercial airplane. Investigate and question your heuristics.

3. Relax. Setting up parameters can help. As Sarah Chang wrote in Muse, “Before you jump into the deep end, consider buffering your risk by setting some boundaries for yourself. One way to do this is to have a timeline. Set aside a certain number of months, and in those months, be relentless. Give it 120%. But if, at the end, there’s still no sign of promise, give yourself permission to move on.” I remember the first restaurant I was an owner of in Albuquerque, NM. I worked really hard for a year but we just couldn’t turn it into a profitable business. So we closed the doors. It was my first taste of entrepreneurship but it failed. I learned a lot but at the end of one year. Done. Life goes on.

4. Have a bias toward action. It’s easy to discount the cost of status quo. I remember a job I had where my boss had done some underhanded things. I had a really big salary. I also had a really big mortgage. But the cost of staying was killing me internally. I was stressed out and my quality of life was miserable. As Warrell writes, “We come up with excuses for why sticking with the status quo is a feasible option; why playing safe and not putting ourselves at risk of failing or looking foolish is ‘sensible.’” In reality, things that aren’t working out well for us now only tend to get worse over time, not better, and issues remain unaddressed in our relationships and lives tend to grow larger, not smaller.” Once I found a job that was willing to move me and my family, I took it. Patience is a virtue but inaction over time will set you back.

5. Speak up. I remember my first job out of college. I was working in Manhattan and had 25 employees reporting to me. We worked some of the employees 60-80 hours a week. We did not pay them overtime. I knew better but I was afraid to speak up. It was my first real job and I didn’t want to anger my boss. When you don’t speak up, it causes resentment. I had a story in my head that she would fire me if I spoke up. Instead, I paid for it with sleepless nights and the knowledge that I let my employees down. My risk aversion held me and my employees back. Now? I speak up. It might be uncomfortable, it might be scary, but it’s empowering in the end.

As I write this, I realize that I’m more of a risk taker than most. I’ve moved coast-to-coast twice, I’ve owned four businesses and I’ve traveled to three continents. It’s exhilarating. I recently found an opportunity to travel to Paris which has been on my bucket list since the age of 13. I leapt. I’m studying French feverishly and setting out a plan. Where risks are you not taking?

5 Strategies of Going With Your Gut (and Why You Should).

On January 26, 2014January 25, 2014 By Cathy NoiceIn Workplace Navigator8 Comments

Hindsight is twenty twenty. How many times have you said that? Why didn’t I…? I should have…? You know that you knew better, but you couldn’t put your finger on why you knew what you knew…but you knew it and you went the opposite direction. And then you proceed to beat yourself up. You needed to go with your gut. But you ignored it.

Dr. Richard Restak has studied this and written about it in his book “The Naked Brain.” Basically, the more you ponder, research, and weigh out your options, the less desirable the decision. That is your rational brain at work. On the other hand, your limbic brain, is your gut. You can’t put your finger on why you don’t want to hire that guy, but your gut is telling you not to. Listen to your limbic brain.

I’m sure you remember taking standardized tests in school. Your teacher told you to go with your first impression – your gut. When you start overthinking, you will likely make the wrong choice. In fact, in studies on those who have lost use of their limbic brain (i.e. brain injury) and only have use of their rational brain, they cannot make a decision. They are stuck in a rational loop of analysis paralysis. They would never finish the test.

So how do you move from the rational loop to going with your gut? Here are some suggestions:

1. Narrow. As in narrow your choices. If you go to a grocery store and there are 15 choices of jams in a display versus 5 choices of jams, you are more likely to buy from the display with only 5 choices (Crazy huh? Tell me why there are 32 types of just one brand of toothpaste). So if you are given the choice of 15, try and narrow your choices even if it might be somewhat arbitrary. Like I’ll only look at red jams. This will help keep you out of analysis paralysis.

2. Authentic. If the choice is a hiring decision or choosing a client, you should look for whether what someone says matches their actions. Frequently, it’s difficult to read if someone is being authentic or if they are really good at marketing themselves. Studies have shown that people have micro facial expressions when they are covering something up. You are reading it subconsciously and aren’t sure why you don’t trust someone. If you can’t figure out what it is or give a concrete fact as to why you don’t want to hire them – go with you gut. Listen to your subconscious because it’s reading the signs loud and clear.

3. Timer. Limit the time you spend on the choice or decision. If there is no reason why you have to delay the decision (like the college hasn’t accepted me or I don’t know if I got the funding), then set the timer. Limiting the window of time for you to weigh out the myriad of pros and cons will help you stay closer to your gut instead of letting the rational loop take over. If you are taking the SAT…you’re in luck, it’s a timed test! If you’re deciding on a new camera, give yourself 30 minutes to compare features, look at reviews, talk to your partner – then decide.

4. Irrational. Ignore the rational explanation. Crazy huh? Buried in your subconscious is all your life experiences, failures, and successes. Your brain is not going to be able to catalog and cross reference why you know that this guy is a bad hire, why those shoes are wrong for you, or why that bottle of Zinfandel is right. I can remember, from my restaurant manager days, that when I was hiring a hostess, I gave him or her about 30 seconds to make a good impression. If there was an engaging smile and eye contact, it was a yes. I went with my gut.

5. Heuristics. These are rules of thumb. It’s another way of limiting your choices. The world is overwhelming with the amount of information at our disposal…or rather immediate consumption and distraction. This does not mean you need to consume every piece of information available. Use some rules of thumb. I want a camera with the most megapixels for under $200. I’m looking for a forklift driver who is OSHA certified and has worked for a company with perishable products. I’m looking for a training course that is on presentation skills, no more than two days long within a 5-hour drive for less that $1,500. It helps narrow the focus and limit the analysis as well.

For some of us, this is easy. We are comfortable going with our gut (for the record, I was always one of the first ones done when taking exams). Some of us struggle with giving up the analysis. Start small. Maybe the next time you get an ice cream cone, you narrow your choices to those with some kind of chocolate in it or only flavors that start with the letter R. Go with your gut.

When did you listen to your gut?