Jawn Lam

Heads-or-Tails Gut-Check

Problem Solving & Decision MakingEssay3 min read

A thinking tool designed to harness your innate intuition when faced with decision-making challenges.

Adapted from the coin-spin trick in Piet Hein's grook "A Psychological Tip" (Grooks, 1966) and the folk "best two out of three" tell, a move later named a decision catalyst by Mariela E. Jaffé, Leonie Reutner, and Rainer Greifeneder (PLOS ONE, 2019).

What it is for

The Heads-or-Tails Gut-Check is a thinking tool designed to harness your innate intuition when faced with decision-making challenges. It's particularly effective in situations where you feel uncertain or when choices seem equally viable. This tool serves to bridge the gap between logical analysis and instinctual feeling. It enables you to access and trust your subconscious mind's insights, which are often sidelined in typical decision-making processes. By flipping a coin and observing your reaction to the outcome, you can gauge your true feelings about a decision, revealing what you might genuinely prefer or believe to be the better choice. This tool taps into the often-overlooked power of intuition, providing a simple yet profound way to uncover your deeper preferences and inclinations. It's a quick method to bypass overthinking and access your gut feelings, offering clarity in moments of indecision.

Why use it

The intuitive coin flip is a simple method for tapping into your intuition, which is your ability to understand something immediately without needing to consciously reason it out. Everyone has some level of intuition, but for some, it's easier to use than for others. This technique is particularly helpful for making decisions or confirming choices when you're uncertain. It leverages the instinctive feelings you have about a situation to guide your decision-making process.

How to use it

  1. Decide on two options and assign each to heads or tails.
  2. If choosing between a right or wrong decision, heads could mean right, tails wrong.
  3. Flip the coin and note the outcome.
  4. Reflect on your feelings about the coin's result: (a) if you're content with the outcome, it may reflect your true intuition; (b) if you're inclined to flip again, it might suggest you're not happy with the result, indicating the other choice.

Use your gut. Obviously. That's the point here.

Flip, then notice how you feel

Name the two options, flip, and watch your first reaction to the result. Flip again as often as you like; the reaction is the answer, not the coin.

The coin saysFlip the coin.Heads: Tails:

  • If you're content with the outcome, it may reflect your true intuition.
  • If you're inclined to flip again, it might suggest you're not happy with the result, indicating the other choice.

Where it fits

The process recommends it at Validating Impact and Execution, the third step of the Evaluate phase, where it is the one tool named, as a last check on a decision before it is carried out.

Related tools

Within this series, the Effort Justification Meter makes a go or no-go call by scorecard where this tool makes it by feel.