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As I stated in my January post, my plan this year is to read one book each month on subjects such as negotiating principles, group dynamics and/or decision making, and then share something pertinent to mediation from that book with each of you. This month I read Thinking in Bets by Annie Duke.
The author has an interesting background. In 1991, with only the defense of her dissertation remaining as the last step to obtain her Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Pennsylvania, she abruptly left school. The next year she got married and moved to Billings Montana. For the next 20 years she pursued a career as a professional poker player, beginning in poker rooms in Montana and then progressing to tournaments all over the United States. During that time, she won more than $4 million, earned a World Series of Poker bracelet, and is the only woman to have won the WSOP Tournament of Champions and the NBC National Heads-Up Poker Championship. Since retiring from poker in 2012 she has been an author of five books, and a corporate speaker and consultant on decision strategy. And, in case you are wondering, in 2023 she returned to UPenn to complete her Ph.D. She is now an adjunct professor at the Harvard Kennedy School and at the UPenn Wharton School.
This book is not about poker, and the author makes that clear at the beginning. However, she does merge her vast poker experience and her graduate level research in psychology to focus on how to make smarter decisions when you do not have all the facts. She makes the point that most of our decisions in life are actually “bets” about what will occur because of any particular decision. She helps us understand that, although a certain amount of “luck” is involved in the outcome of any decision, there are disciplines we can learn through experience that can allow our decisions to be based upon more than just the “flip of a coin.” Her book teaches those disciplines.
As it relates to mediation, Dr. Duke discusses the value of what she calls “organized skepticism” in the decision-making process. She states that “without embracing uncertainty, we can’t rationally bet on our beliefs. And we need to be particularly skeptical of information that agrees with us because we know that we are biased to just accept and applaud confirming evidence.” This is one of the values of the mediation process. Good mediators (which I trust includes me) will challenge the parties’ closely held beliefs in the strengths of their relative positions as an essential part of the settlement process. It is only by understanding and recognizing the potential weaknesses in your cases that you and your clients can make informed “bets” in reaching a settlement. So, the next time the mediator comes into your room and wants to test the strength of your case, don’t resist. It is simply part of the “organized skepticism” process that is essential in reaching a durable settlement.
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