Which Way Should I Go?
Using technology as a decision support tool
Welcome to the Gazebo! Grab a cup and join me for some tips to help you succeed at the intersection of management, communication, and technology.
This Week’s Summary:
Learning that James Taylor shares my traffic blues
Navigating traffic is a daily reality for many of us
Driving route decisions are non-routine and impact our daily lives
Technology has helped greatly to improve route decisions
Blending information and critical thinking is key to better non-routine decision making
Do you know the James Taylor song Traffic Jam? “Damn this traffic jam! How I hate to be late! It hurts my motor to go so slow. … Well, I left my job about 5 o'clock. It took fifteen minutes to go three blocks. Just in time to stand in line with the freeway looking like a parking lot.”1 My guess is that we have all been in this situation at one time or another, and it was never any fun. Just the other day I was surprised by a construction lane change and went right instead of left only to get stuck sitting behind a bunch of trucks as the cars that went left whizzed by at 55! “Deep breath,” I told myself. “You’ll get there eventually.” Oh man … that one hurt!
Image created by Ed Paulson using Copilot in Windows.
If you live or work in a major metropolitan area navigating traffic becomes a way of life. You know which direction the morning commute goes and whether it is reversed in the afternoon, and during what times. You likely know alternate routes that take you from where you are to where you want to go, and every time you drive you have to choose one. Choosing the one with a huge delay due to unexpected accident congestion could cost you hours sitting behind the wheel burning up gasoline at nearly $4 per gallon! “It hurts my motor to go so slow.” How could you have known there was an accident?
One time I recall encountering an unexpected severe traffic jam on the Eisenhower Expressway only to hear the radio traffic person announce that there was severe traffic on the Eisenhower Expressway due to a car fire, and that it should be avoided. Sigh. Where was she 10 minutes earlier when I chose this route instead of the alternate?
Who says timing and luck aren’t important to success?
You may not know this, but Chicago’s highway system is laid out in a hub and spoke pattern which means that many major roads (the spokes) lead to Downtown Chicago (the hub), which the locals refer to as the “Loop.” Several expressway spokes come from the south, southwest, north, northwest, and west sides and when drivers get close to the Loop area driving often becomes the James Taylor traffic nightmare. When traveling away from the Loop it might be a little easier but the impact of making a poor driving route choice can still be a major time drain.
Image Copyright 2024 by Ed Paulson. All rights reserved. Downtown Chicago at night as viewed from the Southwest Side. Notice how the major highways lead toward the downtown “Loop” area.
The good news about all of this is that there are usually multiple routes you can take from one location to another, including routes that use the side streets instead of the major arteries. But after you choose a route, you are pretty much committed, so making the right choice in the beginning is important, and unless you are psychic you occasionally guess incorrectly and are forced to learn deep breathing exercises to control your frustration.
“Now I almost had a heart attack, looking in my rearview mirror, I saw myself the next car back, looking in the rearview mirror, about to have a heart attack. Damn this traffic jam!” 2 Obviously getting stressed out in traffic is not a new experience.
This is where technology has made a huge difference! Prior to the advent of tools like Google Maps or Waze, you would have to rely on radio reports or your own personal experiences to help you choose your path. Or you could simply accept your fate and make use of the commute time by playing books on CD.
The modern traffic apps do something pretty amazing that we totally take for granted. They quickly give us a color-coded representation of the current state of traffic congestion along with arrival time estimates and recommended alternate routes. And ponder this for a moment - they do it for any city in the world, at any time, on a real-time basis!
Just for grins, pick a city like Oslo, Naples, or Melbourne at random and check out the traffic there. The apps are tracking this traffic all the time for the entire globe! Stunning, actually!
Returning to driving to/from downtown Chicago, your initial route decision is key to what will happen next and offers a great example of what I call a non-routine decision. As we talked about last week, a routine decision is one where the steps are clearly laid out and easy to follow. As a routine example consider a situation where “If the gauge reading is equal to or greater than 10 PSI, then enter ‘OK’ into the computer, and if the gauge reading under 10 PSI, then enter ‘Not OK’ into the computer.” Little to no critical thinking or decision-making is involved. Read the gauge, check the level, and make a pre-defined data entry selection.3
A non-routine decision is one where additional information combined with critical thinking will lead you to the best choice for your situation. Non-routine situations often require some investigation to find the right information, and it just needs to be found.4
Selecting a driving route from Downtown Chicago to your home is a non-routine decision if you want to avoid standing “in line with the freeway looking like a parking lot.” Every day, the traffic patterns will change in unexpected ways that will affect your decision making. To deal with this uncertainty, you will look to information sources, like the radio or Google Maps or Waze, to inform your choice.
It has gotten to the point that some folks don’t even think about their driving choices anymore. They simply do what the app tells them to do, which often leads them into places they would have never chosen on their own had they been looking at the world around them instead of at the app. Overreliance on technology will be the topic of a future post.
To summarize, here is a quick way to determine if you have a routine, non-routine, or ambiguous decision on your hands. If you have a clear set of actions to take based on the facts of the situation, then it is routine. If the set of actions are not clear based on the currently available information, and by knowing additional information you expect that the best actions will become clear, then it is probably non-routine and solvable with some digging around combined with critical thinking. If there is no more information to be had and a choice still must be made, then it is probably ambiguous, and you will need to make the decision based on education, experience, expert advice, and your own personality traits. Ambiguous decisions are arguably the toughest ones to make.
When making a decision, you process information in the present moment to determine the actions that are most likely to get you the future outcome you desire. You are trying to predict the future, and each piece of pertinent information helps to reduce the uncertainty related to achieving your outcome. When the uncertainty drops to a personally comfortable level, you will be ready to decide.
It is tough to make good decisions, and you should always be looking for ways to improve your decision-making processes. Knowing whether your decision is routine, non-routine, or ambiguous is a great place to start that will put you on the path to joining the effective decision maker group.
Have a great week and thanks for deciding to stop by! ☮
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NOTE: https://genius.com/James-taylor-traffic-jam-lyrics or to hear it check out
James Taylor, Traffic Jam.
These are the types of situations that are also the most easily automated, FYI.
The ability to determine and find the right information for a given situation is, I believe, a key competence learned from education.