How Strong Are Your Preferences?

Have you ever spent hours agonizing between two options, only to realize either one would be fine?

I recently made a somewhat expensive mistake and cracked my induction cooktop. I suddenly needed a new one and had a range (pun intended) of options in front of me.

My strong preferences as I began my research were for a cooktop that had better controls than my old one, and a burner large enough to accommodate my favorite oversized pan.

I had bought one of the cheaper induction cooktops the first time around, and my biggest annoyance was that the touch controls were pretty finicky when wet. Research showed me this was a consistent issue for all cooktops with touch controls, and that the one or two cooktops on the market with knobs were not well regarded.

I spent quite a bit of time researching and came up short. Eventually I realized that my strong preference for better controls was just not available. I ended up making the decision to go with a brand I liked, hoping it would be “better” in some nebulous way to make it worth the higher price.

After making my choice, I discovered something interesting. While my original induction stove saved me time with cooking, my new one is an even bigger improvement. Some dishes now take 20 minutes to cook instead of 30 on the last one. Conservatively I’ll be saving 5 minutes on average every time I make dinner.

When I was making my decision, I didn’t know it was even possible that it could make that big a difference. In the end, it paid off with real time savings I’ll enjoy every single day.

The benefit was linked to another surprising win. My previous cooktop had a large burner to accommodate my 14” pan, and so did this one. What I didn’t know is that the uneven cooking I had with my old burner was the cooktop’s fault. The first dinner I cooked on the new one I was amazed as the whole thing cooked evenly. The biggest downside now is if I accidentally burn it a little, the entire pan is slightly burned instead of just the middle.

In hindsight, I don’t think I could have gotten the information I needed to make a good decision on purpose. My preferences are an extreme edge-case of the customer population. Those preferences make a big difference to my quality of life, but the reviews don’t generally cover that need.

This situation is not uncommon. We often have to make bigger decisions than this without all the information that would help to make a good choice. If the difference in outcomes is small, you can just go with it and move on with your life. But when the different options could lead to massively different outcomes, it pays to make more careful choices.

My only other reminder is to try to brainstorm more for the many outcomes you could care about. Thinking of myself as someone with “Strong preferences” it’s a little clearer why I spend so much time trying to make good decisions.