Reducing Risks with Safeguards: Techniques for Guarding Against the Mental Distortions that Lead to Bad Decisions

By: Jo Whitehead and Sydney Finkelstein and Andrew Campbell

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Synopsis: The Bay of Pigs was a military and political fiasco, but President Kennedy learned from his mistake and created a process that reduced the risk of a flawed decision when faced with the Cuban Missile Crisis the following year. He recognized the potential to prejudge the situation, draw on misleading experiences, and be over-influenced by self-interest, so safeguards were put in place to guide his decision making. Safeguards can involve a wide range of interventions, process changes, people choices, analytical techniques, and other mechanisms that can be introduced to reduce the risk of flawed decisions. While every organization has some sort of process to manage decisions, safeguards are additional measures. In this chapter, the authors describe four categories of safeguards that fortify the decision making process. This chapter was originally published as chapter 9 of "Think Again: Why Good Leaders Make Bad Decisions and How to Keep It From Happening to You."