Extracting the best second-hand information

You’ve little time in which to learn about something completely new. The information is critical to the decision at hand for you. If you’ve found yourself out of depth managing a cross-functional project or working outside our area of expertise, this is for you.

Outside your circle of competence, the most common crutch is to do as someone with direct experience says. While that may seem reasonable, it creates problems. Here are two.

❌People have motivations that may not match yours. If you ask your Sales head what can be done to improve conversion, they may say add more people or lower prices.
❌Good teachers are rare. What most specialists share with you is an exact pattern. They don’t tell you where you’re likely to trip or what lookalikes there may be. You go into the real world and look for an exact match. That can lead to what Charlie Munger calls a ‘Johnny-one-note’ situation. You’re Johnny and you can only sing one note.

So what do you do when it is not possible to learn from direct experience? When all you have is second-hand information.

Get the closest version of reality there is. How?

By asking for stories. On a recent The Knowledge Project podcast, here’s what cognitive psychologist Gary Klein suggests you ask:

✔Where did you come up with this abstraction?
✔What happened? Tell me what went on that changed your mind.
✔Why were you surprised? How did you notice it? And what sense did you make of it?

Asking these questions elicits context that a simple oral or written account won’t offer. ‘Stories,’ as Gary says, ‘are not hampered by the limitations of language, because now we have an incident account that we can drive.’ It makes the one asked reflect.

Stories have a surprise. That’s what makes them memorable. They also spawn new interpretations in the listener that the narrator didn’t think of.

When we’re learning from somebody, we’re downloading their abstraction. Seems too good a deal if you can have everything they know without making their mistakes or spending as much time, right? And it is very much so.

As a manager or leader, you need to know enough to distinguish snake oil from the real thing. There’s a skill in extracting the most faithful abstractions from others. It needs you to get them to tell you their story by asking them the right questions.

Better information acquisition leads to better decisions.