Three, two, one... Done!

“Theories come and go, but fundamental data always remain the same.” The same can be said about the technologies that come and go sometimes too fast to be automated within a company and provide valuable data for decision-making. The ability of humans to process data and perform multiple actions over a period of time is limited. We still need business process automation. But how to implement it correctly? What are the criteria for abandoning an outdated IT system and implementing a new IT infrastructure?… In this session of the Three, two, one… Done! program we will talk about the major challenges of business process optimization using IT infrastructure and ways to overcome them.

Studying at university can be challenging because of the new activities, the complexity of the tasks, and your personality. At some point, you may even decide that you have chosen the wrong path, but surely you don't want to waste your time or risk your work-life-study balance. So, what is the right way to study at university that will allow you, on the one hand, to maintain your work-life-study balance, and on the other hand, to be successful in your studies and career?… In this special session of the Three, two, one… Done! program for students and teachers we will talk about the main challenges of studying at university, best practices for dealing with difficult assignments, the most valuable information you can get from studying at university, and how to get the most effective start to your career.

For centuries religion influenced the way people think and act. Many countries identify themselves through religion that dictates ethics, social standards, and expectations. Some people use religious principles for good, others to control the whole empires. So, how can religion help better decision making and personal growth in our modern life? During this session, we will review:

• Major religions in the world and in the USA

• Manipulation of the religion principles

• Irrational wisdom lessons for a good decision-making

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We used to think that decision-making techniques are designed for business. Purpose, goals, objectives, data, analysis, cooperation, partnership... Those words are tied to effective management. Better decisions help us grow business, overcome roadblocks, build trust in the future. Can we apply the best decision-making practices from business to grow our romantic relations, overcome misunderstandings, and build trust in the people around us? During this session of the “Three, two, one… Done!” program, we will unveil the very heart and soul of romantic decision-making.

• Decisions by humans about humans

• Main problems

• Fears and biases

• Minimize and avoid conflict

• Boredom

• How to choose partner in life 

• Useful tips

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As humans we all make mistakes, no one is perfect, we can all screw up at one point or another. But if you don't make mistakes, you can't make decisions. One way to avoid making mistakes is to learn from other people's mistakes. Simple observation and analysis can save us from lots of grief in our lives. But can you really learn from other people's mistakes, or do you have to make them yourself? In this session of the Three, two, one ... Done! program, we will look at how to use mistakes to improve your decision process and make it more efficient.

• Learn from others or make yourself?

• Why are we afraid of making mistakes?

• How to make mistakes the right way?

• How to avoid mistakes?

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Many industries and professionals use best practices to improve efficiency and success in the workplace. Best practices are methods and procedures that are proven ways to achieve greater efficiency and results. But sometimes applying best practices can follow Murphy's Law and anything that can go wrong will go wrong. So, are there any rules in applying best practices, or can any failure be attributed to making decision on a wrong day? In this session of the Three, two, one ... Done! program, we're going to look at how to apply the best practices to decision-making.

• What are best practices?

• Where to get best practices?

• How to develop best practices?

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Christmas and the New Year are times when everyone believes in miracles. We can describe miracles as events that cannot be explained by natural or scientific causes and are therefore attributed to a divine agency. Some of these events occur without deliberate intent by chance rather than design. Some miracles may have natural causes, but we still prefer to think of them as miracles. Some miracles still cannot be explained. In this last session of the Three, two, one ... Done! program this year, we will look at a brief history, psychology, and basic reasons for miracles in decision-making.

• Something Beautiful for God

• Miracle on the Hudson

• Izhma miracle

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The increased complexity of the world leads to new ideas underlying the decision-making process. "Complex" does not always mean “complicated” because complicated problems are not simple, but they can be solved, it just takes a lot of time and effort. "Complexity" refers to the structure of a thing/concept, meaning it has many components or relationships and sometimes it is difficult to control or predict. Can we find a better approach for complex decision-making in times of crisis and chaos?… In this session of the "Three, Two, One... Done!" we will talk about chaos, levels of complexity for decision making, and how to make decisions in chaos.

• What is chaos?

• Chaos Theory

• What is a complexity?

• Complexity in decision-making

• How to handle chaos in decisions?

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The phrase “a snake in the grass” comes from antiquity and means a hidden danger and we usually perceive a lie as a dangerous thing, for example manufactures do not talk about the hidden danger of the cheap poisonous materials used. But is it always true that lying is a bad thing?… In this session of the Three, two, one… Done! program we will talk about what lies are and who are liars, how lies in business differ from lies to a friend, what is a white lie and what are the boundaries of a white lie?

• What is a lie?

• What is a white lie?

• Who is a liar?

• How to recognize & respond to a lie?

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Have you ever thought about a decision that you once thought was unwise, bad or stupid. Over time, some of these decisions seem smart or reasonable to us. If the question is about ordering food for lunch, we usually don't take it seriously, but what about the things that are really important to us? Family, relationships, career, business, health, personality and even happiness… Do these areas of life have the same evaluation criteria or not? and how to apply them in a particular situation? In this session of the Three, two, one... Done! program, we will look at how to avoid the trap of bad decisions, evaluate and rethink decisions, as well as the pyramid of evaluation criteria.

• Evaluation criteria

• Cultural differences

• Commercial vs Non-commercial

• Personal vs Company

• Emotional evaluation

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Decision making can be a hidden source of stress. Too much choice can eventually lead to decision fatigue. When we finally make a choice, the battle is not over because we may regret and doubt our decision. Why is it that for some, making decisions causes stress and pain, while others can do it easily and never regret even if they fail? Is it an innate personality trait or can it be developed as an ordinary skill? In this session of the Three, two, one... Done! program, we will look at the psychological basis for decision-making to find out what prevents us from making effective decisions, as well as give some tips on how to make the decision-making process easier and more efficient.

• Why are decisions painful?

• Consequences

• Open & Closed

• Hard choices

• Avoiding decision-making

• Increasing decision speed

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Imposing limits on the amount of time spent at work dates back to manufacturing laws of the late 1800s when the work hours of women and children were restricted. The idea of work-life balance was put back to the forefront by the Women's Liberation Movement in the 1980s. Now, the idea has been cycling around for about 40 years bringing new insights and highlights to the problem. In this session of the Three, two, one ... Done! program, we will look at a brief history of work-life balance concept, as well as current trends and challenges associated with managing a good balance between life and work.

• History of work-life balance

• Definition of work-life balance

• Modern trends

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At three, we enjoy solving simple puzzles and winning. Research and social interactions remain with us through adolescence and adulthood. While some of our interests remain with us for life, from time to time we need changes in both our lives and our careers. Sometimes this change is difficult to predict. Fulfilling a childhood dream, a successful programmer with unique skills can become an entrepreneur or a farmer, leaving a knowledge gap in the corporate environment. The opposite extreme is when the employee does not want any changes and can sabotage corporate evolution, becoming a nightmare for all departments. Moreover, given the ever-changing environment, the HR department should be really good at juggling the competencies in order to maintain the balance of the company's talent assets. In this session of the Three, two, one ... Done! program, we will talk about the main decision-making trends in human resource management, burnout at work, developing new skills, finding new jobs and changing careers.

• HR Management Trends

• Burnout at work

• Improving skills

• Changing careers

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The idea of measuring performance indicators has been circulating for centuries. You can measure the efficiency of business processes, progress towards a goal, employee performance, and many other characteristics. But how close are we to understanding what an ideal performance metric is and how to use it? In this session of the Three, two, one ... Done! program, we will look at a brief history of performance indicators, current trends and challenges associated with performance measurement.

• History

• Definition of Done

• KPI Dashboards

• Agile organizations

• Modern challenges

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We've never had access to so much information before. But the accessibility of the information does not mean the quality of information and its relevance to your case. Fake news and information are everywhere, people try to fool you, even your brain shortcuts are against you. So, how to survive in this unfair world of growing complexity? In this session of the Three, two, one… Done! program we will review how to develop the critical thinking skills and use them for better decision making.

• What is critical thinking?

• History of critical thinking

• Why be able to think critically?

• Methods for the development of critical thinking

• How critical thinking can be applied

• Exercises to develop critical thinking at home

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We trust experts. Experts are people with experience and appropriate backgrounds. But are experts always correct? Remember the famous example of the ancient statue that didn’t look right, but the J. Paul Getty Museum in California bought it for several millions of dollars based on experts’ opinions. The statue turned out to be fake (Blink by Malcolm Gladwell). In this session of the Three, two, one… Done! program we will review the decision making based on expert opinion, the situations when we can trust an expert opinion, and the situations when we should not.

• Who is an expert?

• Types of experts

• Expert knowledge

• Becoming an expert

• Expert advice for decision making

• Issues with expert advice

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Jokes about women logic, men's serious decisions based on flipping coins, sense of winning option, know-for-sure, all those decisions made on the very razor-edge between logic and intuition. Can we trust them or our intuition is just an illusion? Is there any logic for intuitive decision-making or intuition in commonsense decisions? During this session of the “Three, two, one… Done!” program, we will investigate the mysterious world of intuitive decision-making logic.

• Probability and Intuition

• Logic - Big picture

• Intuition - Big picture

• Intuition vs Logic

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We used to think that decision-making techniques are designed for business. Purpose, goals, objectives, data, analysis, cooperation, partnership... Those words are tied to effective management. Better decisions help us grow business, overcome roadblocks, build trust in the future. Can we apply the best decision-making practices from business to grow our romantic relations, overcome misunderstandings, and build trust in the people around us? During this session of the “Three, two, one… Done!” program, we will unveil the very heart and soul of romantic decision-making.

• Decisions by humans about humans

• Main problems

• Fears and biases

• Minimize and avoid conflict

• Boredom

• How to choose partner in life 

• Useful tips

Click to view the PDF of the lecture presentation 

The Peregrine Falcon is the fastest bird and in fact the fastest animal on the planet, when in its hunting dive. When making decisions we may experience delays and hesitation. When we have already made a decision we do not act immediately and sometimes do nothing. Even if we start implementing the decision, at some point we may stop and never return. During this session, we will consider how to make faster decisions, how to start doing them right here right now, and, finally, how to reach a successful result as fast as we can.

• Decision-making triggers

• Setting purpose & goal(s)

• Define alternatives

• Evaluate alternatives

• Useful tips

• Multiple decision-making

• Improvement

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The final project for Bachelor's and Master's degrees usually have written requirements. When you read it you may fall into different decision-making traps. The root reason for the problem is the fact that the work consists of three major parts. Some of them have strict standards and better descriptions of the requirements. But the most important part - your creativity - falls beyond strict standards and detailed description. During this session, you will learn how to identify the alternatives for different final project parts, evaluate them, and pick the best one for the excellent Bachelor's and Master's final work.

• Paper structure

• Problems with the requirements

• Research topic

• Body, introduction, conclusion

• Useful tips

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As human beings, we have a strong need to understand and explain what is going on around us. When observing an event, people assume that things preceding the event cause it, and things following the event are effects of it. The ability to identify the cause and effect of events gives us cues to understand the intentions of other people and act appropriately. It also drives learning process, provides purpose and meaning to the events. The way we interpret events drives our own behavior and the behavior of other people. In this session of the Three, two, one… Done! program we will review attribution theory of how individuals interpret events and how this relates to their thinking and behavior.

• Causality

• Naïve Psychology

• Covariation Model

• Three - Dimensional Attribution Theory

• How To Use

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It takes only two to start playing a game. We all are playing different games all the time, but what do we know about games? Is any game unique or do they have something in common? Is it possible to win all the games you play? Is there a perfect point where you should switch your strategy to win even more? In this session of the Three, two, one… Done! program we will review how to win a competitive game, how to be fair in a cooperative game, how to develop trust in a team, and some other practical examples of the game theory.

• Classical Economic Theory

• Introduction to Game Theory

• Competitive Game Theory

• Cooperative Game Theory

• Winning Tic-Tac-Toe

• Schelling's Model of Segregation

• The Evolution of Trust

• Value Net Model

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Does your boss tell you are always late for the meeting? Does your wife call you a slow-mo? Even your dog wants you to run faster... Accusations come with different flavors and the dark game starts. Most of the time you are victim, sometimes manage to get a revanche, but almost never feel at your best. Who are those people accusing you? Do they really have the right to judge? In this session of the Three, two, one... Done! program we will review basic accusation scenarios, learn what triggers accusation and how to stop it.

• Cause and effect of accusations

• How to deal with accusation in 4 steps

• How to fix, communicate, and investigate

• Final comments

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The traditional way of getting a good job is to get a college degree with a high GPA and work experience in a relevant field, but things have changed. Companies like Google, Apple, IBM, and others no longer require applicants to have a college degree. Many companies consider skills more important than experience. Official statistics often provides a list of most in-demand job skills in general without reference to any particular job. In this session, we will review how to get the list of most in-demand skills for any particular job as well as how to develop them.

• What are the major trends in business?

• What are your personal preferences?

• How to find out the required job skills?

• How to develop the required job skills?

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After lunch we do not want to make big decisions, we want to sleep. This behavior results from our physiology, but physiology is not the only factor influencing our decisions during the day. So, can there be an ideal time for big decisions? During this session, we will review:

• The factors that influence our decisions during the day

• Perfect time for different types of decisions

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During this session, we will review:

Numbers & Data Types

Warm Up

Statistical Data Types

Data Visualization

Most Common Mistakes

Text & Content

Paragraphs

Logic

Language

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• Up and beyond (Improve your strategy) (18 Apr 2018)

• Start at the end (Organize your work) (4 Apr 2018)

• Give it a try (Developing new habits) (12 Feb 2018)

• Let me Google it for you (Reliable information search) (30 Jan 2018)

• Just tell me what you want (Effective communication) (16 Jan 2018)