First Order Thinking, A Personal Story

An 84-year-old woman falls in the middle of the night. She is in excruciating pain. Her husband is there with her, trying to provide her comfort. She thinks maybe it will let up in a couple of minutes.? It does not take two minutes; it is obvious this is a major event. 911 is called. The ambulance arrives in six minutes. Two professionals gently aid her onto a gurney. She’s in extreme pain. They are very aware of her situation and are kind and are doing everything they can to minimize the pain? she’s in.

The ambulance takes off for the hospital. But instead of turning on the lights and traveling at high speed. The ambulance does not turn on the siren or lights.? Instead, it navigates the streets very slowly. Less than 10 miles per hour. Why? Because the driver knows that the streets from this lady‘s house to the hospital are laden with speed bumps every few dozen yards. And jostling her in the back of the ambulance would be extremely painful for her. So, they do the best that they can navigating their way to the hospital slowly and thoughtfully.

Did this have to happen? No. It is a symptom of first order thinking. First order decision making.? That lady is my mother-in-law. This was in our neighborhood. Let me share what happened as an illustration of poor decision making that happens too often.? We can do better.

Making Poor Decisions – Thinking Too Simply

In the city where we live, people complained that cars were driving too fast.? The city council and planners thought, “Okay we can quickly, and resource efficiently fix the issue.? We will have a bunch of speed bumps laid down and that will slow the traffic down.”? Simple thinking.? Poor thinking.? Ineffective thinking. 1st order thinking.

They should have thought okay, maybe that will slow people down, but will placing this large speed bumps have other consequences?? Say……? Slow down ambulances!? Fire Trucks!? Police Cars!?? Really? Do you think?

Can you imagine a decent chess player only thinking about the single consequences of her next move?? Shouldn’t she be thinking, “if I do this, then this will happen, then I will do this, etc.”.? There are no master chess players that make decisions based on one move ahead.

There are no effective football game strategies that are planned singularly, one play at a time.? There are few social party planners that don’t think about how their guests might interact when planning who to invite.? There are no good CEOs that do not anticipate how the market will respond to their company’s actions.

Often, there are bad decisions made by governments and social policy makers.? They want expedient, simple explainable solutions to problems that quiet the few. They do not anticipate the second order (and third, etc.) reactions of their actions.?

Or they just don’t rationally think things through. I just delivered a manuscript that included a vignette that illustrated the consequences of China’s One Child policy.? The 2nd largest country in the world made a bad decision.? Why? They never considered second order consequences.

?Poor decisions can be found everywhere.? I have made my share.? But we can learn from mistakes and do better in the future.? I hope you understand from this article that it is important to take not only immediate consequences from your actions, but downstream consequences.?

I would love to hear your ideas and criticisms. We can learn together. Scott

PS: My mother-in-law had surgery and is doing well.? She broke her hip and will have to go through rehab.? Her care team and doctors were excellent.

PPS: The speed bumps that were installed do not slow down most drivers,? Teenagers use them as takeoff ramps.? Other speeders feel they are a minor annoyance and speed anyway.