Self Analyse the Front
“Self analyse the front” is a tactic used in military warfare. It is probably one of the simplest models to understand.
All that it advocates is for the decision maker to personally look at the enemy line / opportunity / problem in front of him before taking a decision instead of solely relying on second-hand advice.
The premise of this model is that advisors, strategists, maps etc can often be biased based on various factors. Hence, to arrive at a rational decision, the decision maker has to assess the enemy himself and then through the acquired first-hand knowledge he has to improve the quality of the advice given to him.
Misaligned Incentives
Mis-aligned incentives are usually one of the biggest causes of bad decision making. Your advisor's interest need not necessarily be in your best interest.
Sometimes an advisor’s incentive might even be aligned against your interest or they might be a knowledge or insight gap that the advisor is lacking.
For example; If you are talking to an accountant and he tells you that you should take a business loan because interests are lower during a pandemic, on the outset it might sound like good advice.
But start asking some questions and quickly you’ll start to see flaws with the idea.
Is taking a loan just because it is cheaper a good enough reason to commit?
Is the accountant over-estimating the opportunity cost of not taking a loan?
What are the terms of the loan that might hurt you later?
Does the accountant lose anything if you don't take that loan?
Does the accountant gain anything if you do take that loan?
While the first 3 questions will tell you whether taking a loan is a good move or not, the latter 2 questions will shine light on possible conflicts between what’s in your best interest and what’s in your accountant’s best interest.
Join the newsletter and get free mental models. Unsubscribe at anytime.
Dealing Out Second Hand Biases
The only way to remedy these biases is to look at the opportunity at the basic level and to understand what are the most direct implications of taking up that opportunity.
In the above example, if you look at the loan offer yourself and find red flags that might have legal implications then you would have saved yourself from a lot of hassles. In this case, the accountant might not have had legal insight to avoid sharing this opportunity that a lawyer would have likely had.
With the basic first hand knowledge that you have now gained, you can now go back to the accountant and improve the quality of advice given to you by addressing the loopholes and conflicts.
So that was the “Self-Analyse the Front” mental model. What are your thoughts on this? Let me know by responding to this email.
Special Announcement
First and foremost, happy holidays!
Secondly, I’m starting a small social site for digital nomads, startup founders and indie makers.
I’ll be launching it on New Years.
If you’d like to be a part of it, just fill out this short form.
The first 100 people to sign up will get LIFETIME FREE access to the community.
After the first 100 signups, I’ll be charging a small fee for people to join.
So hurry up and get it now for free!
PS: By signing up early, you can also get a short and memorable username like “Sam”, “Jane” etc.
Once again, happy holidays.
Keep it rational.