Better Decision Making is a group for anyone interested in Cognitive Biases, Mental Models, or just improving their decision-making process. No previous knowledge is necessary; your interest in the topic is sufficient.

Cognitive Biases mean that our brains are sometimes playing tricks on us, and we believe that using (the right) Mental Models can help counter at least some of them.

For this second meetup, we'll be joined by Bethan Bishop, a business mentor with several decades of experience working with large corporations and small businesses to discuss bias in business. We will also look at a few more example of biases we regularly encounter in business.

Why this meeting or how we got the idea?
My wife and I built a browser extension that shows you a Cognitive Bias every time you open a new tab as a weekend project. We just wanted to work together on something we both have an interest in (but admittedly not enough knowledge about) and for her to get into more tech and digital marketing and to learn about cognitive biases.

It turns out it's been super popular with Digital people (UX/UI and product people, marketers, etc) and entrepreneurs. Then, we became interested in Mental Models and their use in countering the effects that Cognitive Biases have on us. Someone might have recommended we meet and talk about these things with strangers.

We've known Ionela for a very long time, and over the years, we had countless conversations about self-growth and how we can make better decisions. Ionela has a vast experience in delivering Bootcamp sessions, workshops, managing teams, and coaching people on different topics such as mindset, wellbeing & habit creation. When we started to think about hosting an event like this, it was a natural thought to ask her to co-host it.

These meet-ups are very engaging and collaborative and an excelent opportunity for likeminded people to discuss how our brains are sometimes helping while other times plays tricks on us. See if there are any mental models that we use effectively and generally discuss ways to improve our decision-making skills.

The plan is that the meetup will be very collaborative and fluid, but so far, the suggestions have been to so something along the lines of:
Pick random biases and/or mental models (either by using the extension or suggested by attendees) and discuss them:

• are we aware of biases and models?
• did we observe biases on ourselves or others?
• do we consciously use mental models?
• can we use a mental model to counter the effects of the bias?
• maybe even things such as commercial or product applications of the bias/model?

The above is just a starting point, but the intention is to be very agile about it.

Feedback is always welcome and appreciated.