"the I-don’t-knows"

"In general, the I-already-knows, confident in their snap judgments, and the Now-I-knows, confident after pondering, tend to be older males. Male business students are also represented in the I-already-knows. The I-don’t-knows, unsure of their thoughtful decisions, tend to be somewhat younger. And females make up well over half of the I-don’t-knows, a much higher percentage than in the other mindsets.
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Make your prediction: which of the three styles selected the best-performing Tournament strategies?
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The best-performing group: the I-don’t-knows.
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Perhaps it’s about age: we gain confidence over time, but maybe not skill. Perhaps it’s about gender: rather than the conventional wisdom that females don’t have enough confidence, maybe males have too much. I don’t have enough data yet to assess those hypotheses. And perhaps the results will change as the sample sizes grow.
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Still, the I-don’t-knows’ success fits my business war-gaming experience.
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It’s not that the managers didn’t care or were incompetent; it’s that they were overconfident. When you think you know the answer, you sincerely believe it’s a waste of time to keep looking for it. It feels like continuing to search for your keys after you’ve found them.
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I think the essential lesson for competitive-strategy decision-makers is not so fast, in both senses of the phrase: take your time and don’t be so sure."

Fiquei logo a pensar na mensagem do Eclesiastes. E nesta frase:

"Acreditar mas não confiar demasiado!"

Acreditar numa estratégia como se fosse a orientação certa. No entanto, manter a mente aberta porque o mais provável é termos errado:

"“The world,” as Jacob Bronowski once put it, “can only be grasped by action, not by contemplation.”" 

A estratégia inicial é a ferramenta que nos permite pôr os pés ao caminho. A caminhada acaba por alterar o mundo, acaba por alterar-nos e por alterar a nossa percepção sobre esse mundo. Então, uma nova iteração terá de ter lugar.
Trechos retirados de "Slow Deciders Make Better Strategists"