How Anticipating Cascading Effects Can Transform Decision Making
All of our actions produce consequences — both those we intended to produce and those we didn’t. However, all of the consequences caused by our actions will become causes to yet more consequences themselves — consequences of consequences.
In a highly interconnected world, domino effects are the rule, not the exception. And it is often those domino effects which, if unaccounted for, change the trajectory of our paths in surprising ways.
Take a business example: a company decides to cut costs by reducing the number of customer service agents. Initially, this achieves the intended effect of lowering expenses. However, the second-order consequences lead to lower customer satisfaction, which, in turn lead to a drop in repeat business and, eventually, a decrease in revenue.
This domino effect can reshape the company's future in ways not originally foreseen.
Whether it's ecology, business, politics or our personal interactions with other people, anticipating higher order consequences of actions is a cornerstone of thorough decision making — especially when the stakes are high.
"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe."
— John Muirn