The Decision Stress Test

The ReDecide method for finding out how sure your answer is: seven checks that tell a real winner from a near-tie, before you commit

ReDecide's tools each answer "which one?": the Weighted Decision Matrix ranks your options, the Weighted Pros & Cons Scorer leans yes or no, the Regret Minimization Scorer picks the option you are least likely to regret, and the Decision Timing Planner gives you a date. None of them answers the question that comes straight after: how sure is that answer? Our own Decision Tool Finder names the matrix's weak spot: its weights and scores are judgment calls, and it prints a winner without saying how little it would take to change it. The Decision Stress Test is seven checks, worked on those tools, that tell a real winner from a near-tie. In the worked example a premium laptop wins 100 weighted points to 98; raise the weight on price from 5 to 5.5, a 10% change, and the runner-up ties it. The pack reads the lead as a margin, finds the flip point on every criterion, keeps a tie a tie and breaks it with a tiebreaker you name in advance, removes each pro and con once to find the points a verdict rests on, and dates the decision with a start day and a decide-by day. Every figure is computed by our calculators, and the examples are tagged as examples; rules of thumb are called rules of thumb. It is a method, not advice: it does not decide medical, legal, investment or relationship-safety questions. Included: 23 printable pages with a sealed weights card, a stress test sheet, a yes-or-no card, reference tables and a quickstart, plus a personalised sheet worked from the matrix, pros and cons or dates you enter in our tools.

Look inside

Two full pages from the pack, exactly as printed. Click either to read it at full size before you decide.

What is in it

• The Sealed Weights Rule: weights written, turned into shares and sealed before any option is scored
• The Anchored Scale Rule: a 0, a 5 and a 10 for every criterion, scored down the columns
• The Margin Rule: the lead read as a margin, and the single-score swing that erases it
• The Flip Point Rule: the weight at which the runner-up ties, on every criterion
• The Named Tiebreaker Rule: a tie kept as a tie and broken with reversibility, then the regret test
• The One Point Rule: every pro and con removed once, to find the points a verdict rests on
• The Decide-By Rule: a start-deliberating date and a decide-by date, worked back from the deadline
• Printable working pages: a sealed weights card, a stress test sheet and a yes-or-no card
• Reference tables: the score swing by lead and weight, deliberation and buffer by importance, and a quickstart
• A personalised sheet worked from the matrix, pros and cons or dates you enter in our tools

The pack picks up where the free Weighted Decision Matrix leaves off. The matrix ranks your options; the pack tells you how sure that ranking is: the lead read as a margin, the weight at which the runner-up would tie, a tie kept as a tie and broken with the Regret Minimization Scorer, a yes or no tested one point at a time in the Weighted Pros & Cons Scorer, and a start date and decide-by date from the Decision Timing Planner. Not sure which tool fits your decision? Start with the Decision Tool Finder. It is a method for checking a decision, not advice on what to decide: it does not decide medical, legal, investment or relationship-safety questions, which belong with a qualified professional. If you are weighing whether a relationship is safe, in the US the National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233. The laptops, weights and dates in it are examples.