HAME501: Becoming a Powerful Leader

Cornell University School of Hotel Administration

Tool: Recognizing Cognitive Limitations

As leaders, we often have to make decisions quickly and accurately. To do so, our
brains take in and process a great deal of information. We use our perceptions to make
sense of this information. Often we take shortcuts or rely on heuristics to interpret data.
These shortcuts are for the most part accurate. Sometimes though, they can obstruct
how we interpret information.

Four key shortcuts that leaders need to be mindful of are:

Stereotype Selective Perception First Impression Self-fulfilling

Error Prophecy

A generalization of The tendency to select The tendency to Allowing

a group of people of information that form lasting expectations
which a person is a supports our individual impressions about people to
member. viewpoints while about an affect our
discounting information individual based interactions with
that threatens our on initial them in such a
viewpoints. perceptions. way that those
expectations are
fulfilled.

In addition, when leaders make decisions, they sometimes become so emotionally

attached to their ideas that they fail to see that it’s time to stop putting resources and
energy into a losing course of action. This is called Escalation of Commitment.

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