When making or debating a decision, most people default to a pros and cons list. This is a reasonable approach. When faced with multiple options, it’s important to think about the upsides and downsides of each one.
The problem with pros and cons lists, though, is they’re not objective. It’s easy for people to disagree on the contents of the list. There is no objective measure to compare options because what what may be a pro to you, may be a con for me.
But there is a better way.
An excellent product leader at Facebook gave me a framework for debating decisions that has become my go to. I’ve been using it consistently for a year, and it has yet to fail as an approach to help people with different points of view have a fair debate and get to a decision.
It’s called the Options and Trade-offs Table.
I’ve sketched up what this table looks like in the abstract, and then we can dive into how it’s used.
There are few critical rules we must follow to make this work:
- In the rows, we list our OPTIONS.
- In the columns, we list our DIMENSIONS. Which are framed as objective questions that have a definitive answer: What is the cost? How quickly can we get it done? What is the risk? Do we have the capabilities?
- Everyone involved is allowed—and encouraged—to debate the DIMENSIONS. We do not move into filling the boxes until we we all agree on the set of objective questions we’re going to use to assess each option.
- Once the DIMENSIONS are agreed, we then fill in the answers to each of the boxes. This step should be straight forward now that we’ve done the hard work of hashing out and agreeing on our DIMENSIONS.
- Because us humans aren’t great at digesting a wall of text, we then colour the boxes green, orange, and red based on the performance of the answer vs. the ideal outcome for each DIMENSION.
- We then begin to see a pattern form, and at this point, teams generally move very quickly to agree on a decision.
The thing I love about the Options and Trade-offs Table is that by focusing the debate DIMENSIONS, it helps removes personal bias, and makes the trade-offs clear for any given option set.
It’s so useful that now whenever members of my team disagree, someone instinctively suggests that the group puts together an Options and Trade-offs table.
If you end up giving it a go, please let me know how you find it!
Here’s to making better, faster, clearer, and bolder decisions.