What makes a good decision? When I ask people that question, I often get answers like:

“When the outcome is successful.”

Why is it that we, as a society, romanticize outcomes? Only things and people that succeed are celebrated. Just look at all the articles and books that idolize successful people. And to a degree, that’s obvious.

But it’s also misleading. We tend to overlook cases that did not come with a successful outcome. And when we do look at failure, we are often quick to explain why things failed.

In hindsight, we can all look at mistakes and say that it was imminent. But if preventing mistakes is that easy, why are we still make decisions that we regret?

Take the case of the Titanic. Looking back, we all know that the luxury liner that traveled from Southampton to New York made many costly mistakes.

For example, it is well known that the Titanic didn’t carry enough lifeboats.

“What happens when all the lifeboats are used in case of an emergency?” is something that someone surely said, right? We just don’t know! We weren’t there.

How about another interesting fact? The Titanic was tested for 6 hours and never with a full crew. After that, they loaded up the passengers and set sail towards New York.

“Shouldn’t we try this thing out more before we bring passengers on board?” someone surely said. I guess not.

But here’s the thing. No one wanted the Titanic disaster to happen. And no one predicted it…Until after the fact.

A few decades before all those innocent people died, Fyodor Dostoevsky famously said:

“Everything seems stupid when it fails.”

Bad Decisions and Good Decisions

It’s easy to look at success and attribute it to good decision making. But here’s the thing—that statement is also true the other way around.

Failure is not always explained by bad decision making. However, that’s what most historians do. But like Dostoevsky said, in hindsight failure is always obvious.

The people who were responsible for the Titanic probably thought they were making the right decisions at the time. After the fact, they probably regretted many things.

But I don’t think good or bad decisions have anything to do with the outcome. Peter Bevelin, the author of Seeking Wisdom, puts it well:

“Good decisions can lead to bad outcomes and vice versa.”