Resulting

Football teaches us a lot, even for those not on the field. Here's a story about two famous names in football: Mourinho and Balotelli. Here's how Mourinho tells the story:

Let's dissect a tale involving Mourinho and Balotelli, two towering figures in the world of football. Here's the story recounted by Mourinho himself:

"I remember one in Kazan. We went to Kazan in the Champions League. In that match all my strikers were injured. No Milito, no Eto'o, I was really in trouble and Mario was the only one.

"Mario gets a yellow card in minute 42nd, 43rd. So when I go to the dressing room at half-time, I spend 14 minutes of the 15 speaking only for Mario.

"Mario I cannot change you. I cannot make a change. I don't have a striker on the bench. Don't touch anybody. Play only with the ball. When we lose the ball, no reaction. If somebody provokes you, no reaction. If the referee makes a mistake, no reaction. Mario, please.

But, Mario, who was only 19 years old then, got another yellow card and was removed from the game in the 60th minute.

What's the lesson?

Mourinho knew Mario might get into trouble, so he used the whole break to talk only to him. It was the right call.

But even though Mourinho made a good decision, things didn't go well. So, what happens when you do the right thing, but it still goes wrong?

This is not rare. There is a fallacy called “resulting” which is dangerous since it prevents us from properly evaluating whether we're making good decisions, because we tie our decisions solely with their outcomes. Sometimes we win or lose by factors we can't control, regardless of the decision we made. For these reasons, we need to understand that our end results alone don't tell us the whole story, whether we're good making good decisions.

Here is a chart the describes combinations between outcomes and process behind them.

The combination of “good process + bad outcome” is the most challenging one.

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