Guest: Cheryl Strauss Einhorn. Cheryl is the creator of The AREA Method, an evidence-based decision making system that uniquely controls for and counters cognitive bias to expand knowledge while improving judgment. She developed AREA during her two decades as an award-winning investigative journalist, writing for publications including The New York Times, Foreign Policy Magazine, Barron’s, and Harvard Business Review. She’s also the author of three books, including Problem Solver: Maximizing Your Strengths to Make Better Decisions.
In a Nutshell: Rather than making decisions by gut feel or pure instinct, Cheryl presents a well-researched framework that helps you make better decisions when the stakes are high.
On today’s show, Cheryl Strauss Einhorn explains the AREA Method and the five “problem solver profiles” that will help you determine your most effective course of action when making big decisions.
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.Cheryl Strauss Einhorn and I discuss:
- How The AREA Method (Absolute, Relative, Exploration and Exploitation, Analysis) highlights our common cognitive biases and perspectives.
- The differences between the five basic decision-making approaches: Thinker, Detective, Adventurer, Listener, and Visionary, and how to use them to transform your decision-making habits.
- What an extensive career in journalism taught Cheryl Strauss Einhorn about decisions and choices she might have made differently if she’d applied The AREA Method in her previous line of work.
- Why we need to “frame” problems before we can solve them.
- Using The AREA Method to game out the ripple effects of our decisions.
- Pushing past confirmation bias to seek a wider variety of pertinent information.
- Incorporating emotional intelligence (EQ) and intuition into our decision making.
- How continuous learning and managing our physical energy can help fight decision fatigue.
Resources Related to This Episode
- Problem Solver Profiler Take this free interactive quiz to uncover your profile and start making more thoughtful decisions.
- When Your Inner Voice Lies To You Watch Cheryl Strauss Einhorn’s TEDx talk.
Note: The image of Cheryl was created using Midjourney AI.
