“Success is so much easier to imagine than failure. There is often only one correct outcome we hope to achieve, yet countless ways for the plan to go haywire.”

—Daniel Kahneman

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While planning is essential and central to every organization, the planning bias presents one of the biggest threats to success because it creates optimistic prediction inaccuracies across multiple planning principles, including scope, resources, and timing.

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Often, planning can take on a life of its own—sometimes due to a captain’s aversion to risk. Anchoring in the harbor of risk aversion usually manifests in excessive planning and pointless ocean boiling - at the expense of execution.

 

It turns out, planning is often the enemy of action, and the planning fallacy is absolutely the saboteur of effective execution.

 

It’s at the root of good-intentioned plans that, well…don’t go according to plan. And that’s because this bias causes plans to go more off-plan than on-plan.

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In this chapter, we explore the Planning Fallacy Bias through the lens of Captains of Ocean Boiling - prone to what I call the perfection plunge.

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“A good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week.”

—General George Patton

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Navigating Planning Fallacy Bias

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Know your Knots

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Do I tend to be overly optimistic about how long things will take in my planning initiatives?

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Have I underestimated the complexity of projects in the past, leading to delays or difficulties in execution?

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When planning, do I build in contingency plans and buffer time and resources to account for unexpected delays or setbacks?

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Am I willing to adjust my plan and timelines when new information or circumstances warrant it, or do I stay tied to my initial estimates?

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THE BOTTOM LINE

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When you can't beat them, you join them!

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The Strategy Equation:

Planning Bias + Action Bias = The Fortified Forereaching Model

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Course corrects from planning pitfalls to risk sensitive, purposeful, and prompt execution, harnessing sturdy principles of planning and timely action.

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Learn how to harness the force of cognitive and emotional biases to work for you instead of against you.

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You'll find navigation techniques and strategies to manage the Planning Fallacy bias for the leader, and for the organization 

in Mind Knots

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Adapted from Mind Knots

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