The Art of Making Assumptions
Peter de Jager is a provocative Speaker,
Writer and Consultant. His primary focus in on how we manage change,
technology and the future. In addition to speaking at conferences
worldwide, he's also written monthly columns for Municipal World and
Computing Canada. His goal is always to question what we
think is so, and in so doing perhaps open up new opportunities. If you'd like permission to reprint any
of Peter's articles, please contact him directly. You can contact him at Or sign the Guest
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pdejager@technobility.com
Here’s some confusing and contradictory advice for you;
First? Never make assumptions; they only serve to hold you back.
Second? Always make assumptions; it’s the only way to get ahead.
I’ll apologize in advance for the next observation, as it’s sure to give you a headache. Far too many people, make far too many unnecessary assumptions, and far too
few people, make far too few necessary ones.
Once upon a time, a position opened up in the company where I was currently employed. It was a somewhat technical position, requiring a fair amount of customer contact, and a large amount of personal initiative. We decided that the technical expertise was trainable, that the candidate should already have customer contact skills, and that ‘personal initiative’ was the most important attribute. We had a candidate in mind. She was an executive assistant with limited technical skills, all the people skills we could ask for, but her amount of ‘personal initiative’ was in question.
Unfortunately, she never applied for the position – thereby aptly demonstrating her lack of initiative. She knew about it. She wanted it. Not only was the work more interesting, the pay was significantly better. When asked why she didn’t apply for the position she replied, “Oh, I didn’t have enough technical skills, they’d never have hired me for that position.”
That happened about 25 years ago, and her response still frustrates, and saddens me. She didn’t know it, but the position was hers for the asking. By assuming that ‘they’ would reject her application, she placed a non-existent insurmountable obstacle in her career path.
What is more frustrating is that we see the same strange behaviour practically every day. People assume, without knowing, that the answer to a question they’d like to ask, is NO! They choose to avoid the question, and in so doing, discard an opportunity. Those are life changing roads never traveled.
On the flip side of the Assumption issue, there are those who refuse to ever make assumptions, perhaps they’re scared away by horror stories like the one above? This problem isn’t as prevalent as the first one; after all, we’re almost forced to make assumptions about tomorrow every day. A mortgage is an assumption based contract. Will we be able to pay the bills each month? If we didn’t make this type of assumption, then we’d never own a home.
Where the reluctance to make assumptions becomes more noticeable is in problem solving and problem analysis. Our problem solving efforts often come to a screeching halt when we determine we’re missing a crucial piece of information. We decide we can’t proceed because we don’t know something. Here is where the high art of making assumptions is extremely necessary. In these situations ‘not knowing’ is just a fact of life, we have to assume we know the answers to unanswered questions and then proceed cautiously, knowing full well, and never forgetting, that we’re operating under an assumption.
That’s the important difference between good and bad assumptions – do we know we’re making an assumption? Are we conscious of the consequences of making a bad assumption? In the first scenario, the lady in question should have asked herself, “What if they said yes to my application?” In the second scenario, knowing that we might not be able to make the monthly payments forces us to examine our cash flow and even modify our plans so as to mitigate the risk of not being able to pay the bank on time.
The challenge of course is more in the first scenario – was she even aware that she was making an assumption? More to the point, how can we train ourselves to be conscious of unconscious assumptions? That’s sort of like asking someone to write down everything they’ve forgotten… a non-starter at the best of times.
So? How do we make fewer unconscious assumptions? Before we can even attempt to answer this, we need to ask another question – what types of assumptions do we make? Three types come to mind...
Assumption Categories
#1 – ‘Completeness’ – We assume we have all the facts in front of us.
#2 – ‘Importance’ – We assume this fact is relevant to the problem in front of us
#3 – ‘Validity’ – We assume we know this statement of fact is accurate..
Here then is the 5¢ solution to all our assumption problems:-
i) Never assume we know it all
ii) Never assume that what we do know is important (or unimportant)
iii) and Never assume that what we think is so… is so.
“Easier said than done!”, you mutter beneath your breath. You’re correct – that’s the problem with assumptions, it’s difficult to know when you’re making them. The above ‘solution’ is the answer, but it’s not a very effective one unless we have some way of integrating this advice into the way we think. There is a way to do this, but it takes some discipline on our part.
When thinking about a problem, do the following.
1) At the top of a blank piece of paper write this heading “I assume that the following points are important”
2) Now list all the things you think strongly influence the situation you’re working on – AND in front of each and every one – write “I assume this is important”
3) When you run out of ideas, at the end of this section write… “I assume there’s nothing else I could add to this list”
4) Then, start a new section with the heading, “I assume that these things have some influence, but are not important to the solution”
5) Now list all the things you think don’t influence the situation you’re working on – AND in front of each and every one – write “I assume this is un-important”
6) At the end of this list… “I assume there’s nothing else I could add to this list”
and finally?
7) Right at the very bottom? Write the following… “I assume all of the above is true.”
Tedious? Yes. Certainly. Yet… it’s an almost fool proof method for ferreting out the assumptions we weren’t aware we were making. Left to themselves, assumptions can change your life – just ask the lady from 25 years ago.
© 2009, Peter de Jager – Peter hates making assumptions – sadly? He’s almost OCD when it comes to following the advice above. You now know more that you need to about his mental state. If you want to contact him about Change Management? E-mail him at
pdejager@technobility.com
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