🎙️Episode 4: Are You a Maximizer or a Satisficer? Find Out Your Decision Making Style!
- Focus Performance Systems
- May 6
- 18 min read
In this episode of All We Know About the Stuff We Know, Dave and Ashley explore the second thing you really need to know about decision-making: your unique decision-making style. Are you someone who’s quick to pull the trigger, or do you research every option for weeks (hello, Jeep saga)?
We dig into what it means to be a satisficer vs. a maximizer, how your DiSC style affects the way you make choices, and how understanding your tendencies can reduce stress, improve collaboration, and help you make better decisions—at work and at home. From analyzing your "decision fatigue" to sharing a strategy for working with D, I, S, and C styles under pressure, this one’s full of insight, stories, and a little lagniappe.
Listen or Watch This Episode:
💡 Key Takeaways
Know thyself (in decisions): Whether you're a satisficer or a maximizer, knowing your default approach gives you power and flexibility.
Decision fatigue is real: Especially for maximizers who second-guess and over-process—even for things like shutter colors.
Your DiSC style shapes how you decide:
D styles: Fast and unafraid to course correct.
I styles: Crave collaboration and buy-in.
S styles: Seek harmony and may struggle with people-pleasing.
C styles: Need facts, not feelings—don’t ask them for a ballpark.
Working across styles? Use confidence percentages to bridge the “speed vs. quality” gap on teams.
🔗 Resources Mentioned
Curious about your DiSC style? Get your profile here!
Want to explore your decision-making style deeper? Check out our ebook: 5 Things You Need to Know About Making Decisions
🛠️ Stay tuned — we’re building a mini-course to take these ideas even further!
We've included the transcript for your reading pleasure below.
Episode 4 | What's Your Decision Making Style? | 5 Things You Need to Know About Making Decisions
EPISODE 4 THING 2 TRANSCRIPT
Ashley Martin (01:37)
Hello and welcome to All We Know About The Stuff We Know. We're gonna talk about some good things, I'm sure. Welcome, Dave.
Dave (01:47)
You're going to get all we know.
Ashley Martin (01:49)
And a little more, a little lagniappe is what we like to say down here in New Orleans.
Dave (01:53)
Okay, I don't know that term. A little what?
Ashley Martin (01:55)
L-A-G-N-I-A-P-P-E. It's French. We got these French Cajuns up in here. A little bit extra, a little something, a little surprise.
Dave (02:01)
That's not even a word, is it? And what's it mean? A little bit extra, okay. We go, we go to this restaurant every now and then. Uh, it's a French bistro and we love it because the food is authentically French and we both like French food, but, uh, we get, give me that word again, land. So the first time we went there, we got land yapped. We were all done and waiting for our check and they brought us over a couple of desserts on the house. And we're like, this is amazing.
Dave (02:38)
Next time we go, we're like, I wonder if we're gonna get the free desserts. They come by, would you like dessert? And we go, no.
Ashley Martin (02:39)
Yeah.
Dave (02:44)
Because we might get the free one. Well, sure enough. Sure enough. Yep. Here comes the free one. Now, they're little tin bits. Whatever they're making at the time. So it might be like a little mini cake or like a tart or some ice cream or something else French. So we brought our friends there, Patty and Steven, a few weeks ago. And we're like, should we tell them? No, let's not tell them. OK. So we get done with our meal. Would you like dessert? And we're like, nope. We don't want to pay for it. Nope.
Dave (03:10)
And so they bring us the check and we're like, where's our free dessert? And we didn't say it out loud, but like, we're not going to get the free dessert because usually they give you the dessert with the check. Mary and I are going, well, we can't tell these guys about the free desserts we've already gotten, but not getting today. So was just right before we get up to leave.
Ashley Martin (03:21)
Yeah. Don't train me. They're training you like Pavlov's dogs.
Dave (03:32)
I know right before we get up to leave the waiter comes by with four sample desserts that were absolutely amazing. He goes, this is compliments of the chef, da da da da da. And so Patty and Steven were like, this is the best place ever. We're going back.
Ashley Martin (03:47)
Dave, this is why your filet mignon is like $12 more than what it should be. Because they're building those free desserts into the cost. What is it we were talking about the other day? burger place. Five guys. They gonna give you two patties for the price of one and just, you know, you can have one patty or two patties or three patties. They're all gonna be the same price. And we're gonna dump the fries in the bag. And we've already charged you.
Dave (04:15)
All right. There you go. There you have it. Now do you want to hear about the thing?
Ashley Martin (04:22)
for those of us who are just joining us, we're talking about the five things that you need to know about decision making that you probably don't already know. And in no particular order, we're gonna talk about number two today. And Dave, can you quickly recap for those who missed it what number one was? Me too. You know how much life I've lived in the past 48 hours?
Dave (04:39)
I forgot.
Ashley Martin (04:57)
Right.
Dave (05:03)
Well, yeah, so these are five things you didn't know that you really do need to know about decision-making, right? And the first thing is you need to know is what kind of a decision are you facing, right? We talked about type one versus type two decisions. We also got into some other really cool stuff. So if people are curious, they can go look at that one.
So second thing that you didn't know that you really do need to know about decision making is what your decision making fingerprint is or what your decision making style is because we all have a unique way that we go about making decisions.
Ashley Martin (05:20)
You know what my fingerprint is? You make the decision, because I don't.
Dave (05:24)
Yeah, that's right. Yeah, so avoidance is your fingerprint.
Ashley Martin (05:28)
Yeah, uh-huh, uh-huh. Then I don't blame myself. I can blame them.
Dave (05:32)
Perfect, well let's see, I'm sure we can work that in there somewhere. So yeah, so if you think about it, you really need to know and...
Ashley Martin (05:37)
Okay, good.
Dave (05:42)
Earlier, you and I were just talking about self-awareness. Well, we can now put that in context for decision-making. We really need to be self-aware as to what our style or what our preferences are or how we approach things. And if you've been around at all, you've got a decision-making, I'll call it a fingerprint. You've got a unique way that you approach decisions. And there's lots of tools that you can use out there to help you figure out what that is. Tools that are really kind of cool. I'm going to use two terms here and you get to choose it whether you're one or the other. Okay are you a satisficer? Which is a combination of satisfying and sufficing. Are you a satisficer?
Or are you a maximizer in your decisions? So where does this come from? There's a guy whose name is Herbert Simon. He wrote a bunch of stuff on decision making and a lot of stuff on economics. And these two terms were coined years and years ago about the way people tend to approach decision making. So if you are a satisficer, you're to be somebody who's fine with good enough. It's good enough. Okay, and so when you find an option or a decision or an outcome that's good enough, you're fine. You're going to go with it and away you go. If you are one.
Ashley Martin (06:51)
I don't think I'm that one because I tend to lean towards perfectionism and trying to get it right.
Dave (06:54)
All right. Yeah, so then you might be the second one, a maximizer. And a maximizer is someone who seeks the best possible outcome or option in a decision that they face. Okay, so Yeah, so think about that. Are you one or the other? And here are some questions. I was just jotting down some some ideas the other day about this. So here's some questions that you can ask yourself to kind of figure out which one of these am I so? Yeah, when making a decision do I aim for the best possible option or? Am I okay with an option that's good enough. Okay, so we just talked about that. Okay. Do I spend a whole bunch of times comparing this option versus that option versus the next option? Yep. Or, yeah, so, and you might even do that even after you've found an option that's really good, okay? You wonder if there's something better out there.
Ashley Martin (07:35)
Yep. Researching! Isn't it smart research? Yeah, I did do that. Let me tell a story because I had to buy a new Jeep. I went to go see Matt Rife. I missed the whole show because I got into a wreck on Canal Street in New Orleans. So didn't get to see my boo comedian, Matt Rife. Side note, I might go to Minneapolis and go see him. Anyway, I had to find a new Jeep. I found a new Jeep. That was exactly what I wanted.
Dave (08:07)
Hmm?
Ashley Martin (08:13)
But was I willing to commit to it? Hell no! What if there was something better out there? And so I still researched not only Jeeps, even though I knew I wanted a Jeep, I'm a Jeep girl, I've had Jeeps since 2004. I had to make sure that this was the most absolute best choice for me and exercise and exhaust myself out of all the options to where I'm constantly spinning all this data in my head, even though I know deep down I'm probably gonna get the Jeep.
Dave (08:17)
Yeah. Yep. Yep. So you'd say in that scenario, you are definitely a maximizer. Right? All right. So here's another question. Do you frequently feel like regret or do you second guess your choices after making decisions? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So let's take away maybe some, some big personal emotional decisions. And talk about, yeah.
Ashley Martin (08:45)
Okay, got it. Are we talking about one decision or my life in general? That's a question!
Dave (09:07)
Yeah, exactly.
Ashley Martin (09:09)
Yes!
Dave (09:11)
Let's, yeah, exactly. OK, maybe that was a bad question to ask you. I don't know. But yeah, let's just say day in and day out. Like, let's take the Jeep, OK? So you ended up buying the Jeep. Did you regret that decision, or were you OK with it? OK. All right.
Ashley Martin (09:20)
Okay. Okay. No. No. I knew it was gonna be the right thing for me. I just wanted to make sure and I was just still a little scared. But no, I didn't regret it.
Dave (09:31)
Yeah. So I think you're really across the board maximizer if even the lower value decisions, you still look back and then you go, gosh, I wonder if I could have done better. Yeah. Yeah.
Ashley Martin (09:45)
All the time, all the time. I mean, does that have to do with being a Virgo, being a perfectionist? Like I never know if I got it right. Like, and I think that's one thing of my last relationship. was never good enough. Nothing was ever good enough. I was always trying to optimize up, right? And make it better and better no matter what, like frequently changing. But sometimes I just need to be content and at peace.
Dave (10:00)
Sure, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that thing might not have been a maximizer, satisfactor thing. That might have been a female thing.
Ashley Martin (10:13)
No? When can we do that deep dive, Dave? The difference between men and women.
Dave (10:16)
Yeah, that one's gonna be episode 76. We're going to hit that in episode 76. Yeah, we got time on that one. All right, here's one more question. So, you know, if you are a maximizer.
Ashley Martin (10:24)
Okay, okay, gosh. Okay.
Dave (10:30)
You know, you're grinding over these decisions and you and I have talked about the concept of decision fatigue, or at some point you just get worn out because you're making so many decisions or you're processing decisions for so long that the mental toll that takes on you is huge. Okay. So have you experienced that again, you might be that.
Ashley Martin (10:45)
Yes, it's an emotional way.
Dave (10:47)
And then the last question that I wrote down the other day was, I rely on strict rules or criteria for decision making or am I flexible? Am I free to kind of switch gears, especially if I find an option that's good enough and I'm willing to say, yep, I'm done and I'm happy and let's go. So the reason why this is important as you can...
Ashley Martin (10:47)
interesting.
Dave (11:07)
understand. So you got again two concepts one is business and one is personal. But if you know what your tendencies are then you can self-manage if you choose to right. You can say wow if I'm a maximizer maybe what I ought to do is when I'm facing a decision just ask myself is this a decision where I need to be a maximizer or is this a decision where I can find a really good option that meets all my musts that I can go with so I can you know create bandwidth to do other things in life. So on a personal side that's that's something. For business it really pays to know how you approach things because your role on a team is going to be influenced by what your style is whether it's a maximizer or satisficer and if you get a team that's mixed then you're gonna have to work through that stuff and again it depends on the value of the decision how important it is how much time you have and all that stuff but it's really important to know what your tendencies are that way and there's some and I'll say one more thing about that it can kind of flip-flop okay because you might be one way at home
but a different way at work, okay? Because maybe your role calls for it, maybe the culture that you work in requires one versus another. We've talked about different organizations we've worked with that are maximizing organizations that have to get it right the first time versus organizations who really need speed and those are going to be more organizations that are more satisfied. So they'll find good enough options and off they go. And they reserve the right to course correct if something doesn't go well. That kind of thing.
Ashley Martin (12:36)
Got it, got it.
Dave (12:40)
So that's the first tool. Second tool is one that you are super familiar with and that we know has a big time influence in decision making and that's your DiSC style, right? Yeah, so we know that whatever, where you land on that DiSC map is probably gonna have something to do with the way that you approach decisions. You wanna talk a little bit about that?
Ashley Martin (13:00)
Yeah, yeah, so if I am, let's see, I started out when I first took disc survey 15 years ago, I was in iS And then I kind of oscillated to the S during the pandemic because I lost my i because I wasn't seeing and talking to people all the time. I lost my influencing nature a little bit. And then I moved back to the i and kind of had a little bit of D in me. And so with decision making, I find that my disc style is like, yes, I learned that I was a maximizer, but I kind of toggle between like speed, but also like wanting to get it right and like research all the things.
Dave (13:15)
YeahSo, so, know, your DiSC style is going to have some tendencies that are going to shape the way you approach decisions. So for those of our listeners out there who know DiSC, then you'll, you'll understand some of this. If you don't know DiSC and want more, then head over to our website www.focustools.com/disc and have a look because you can get a profile there. But it's a great tool to really understand what your style is and so we wrote some blog posts about this that you can find on our website. But yeah if you're a high D style, D for dominant, the word you live by is speed and so you're gonna tend to make decisions very quickly and you'll reserve the right to course correct if that decision didn't turn out the way it should. Okay so that's it.
Ashley Martin (14:16)
Right. And D styles don't fear failure as much. This is going to be a lot of your entrepreneurial styles and they need that in order to do big things in the world, right? Like they're going to move fast, they're going to take some risks.
Dave (14:18)
No, no. Yeah, failure to a D is sort of like throwing a gutter ball, but you got the bumper in the gutters, right? You just go boink, okay, all right, I've changed directions and we're fine, yeah.
Ashley Martin (14:33)
Yeah. Right. They don't have like that mental, emotional toll that some of the other disc styles may have, it seems like.
Dave (14:43)
Yep, so again, it's important to know if you are that style, then these are going to be some of your tendencies. Maybe not all the time, but that's probably going to be your home base way of looking at decisions. The I-style stands for influencer, right? And so the key word we always use for that, especially in group decisions, is the term buy-in. The I-style will want buy-in from those that are affected by the decision. They'll want to collaborate with others in the decision-making style.
Ashley Martin (14:47)
Okay.
Dave (15:12)
Seek out opinions from lots of different people because they know more is better in that regard. so participation is a big deal. And again, this is more in work decisions, but probably also in personal decisions, especially with the people that are close to them.
Ashley Martin (15:26)
Sure. I was going to ask you this question anyway, but it's really applicable at this time. Is crowdsourcing a bad thing when it comes to making decisions for yourself?
Dave (15:38)
I don't know. That's a really good question. I would say, you know, it could be a good thing, but you have to put brackets on what kind of input you're asking for because...
Ashley Martin (15:47)
So boundaries need to be in place in a way.
Dave (15:51)
Yes. Yeah. Because if you, if you ask a kind of a yes, no question, Hey, is this a good thing? You're going to get every opinion under the stars, because people are going to approach it without a lot of structure into, terms of what opinion, what input you're going to want or desire or need or value. Yeah. So.
Ashley Martin (16:04)
I'm thinking right now, I'm like, should I add shutters to the house? And I'm like texting my family pictures and they're like, yeah, do it. And this is just what people do. They want you to do things because they're not gonna do it. And like, why not? It's no risk to them. So of course you're gonna say, Yes.
Dave (16:19)
Sure. Right. No, yep. No skin in the game. So if you got no skin in the game, then you are free to communicate whatever opinion you want. Yes. Yeah. So me, I don't know, if I crowdsource personal decisions, I'm going to find a few people that are close to me, whose opinion I trust and value and use them as my crowdsource rather than the world out there. Yep.
Ashley Martin (16:29)
Egg them on! I see, I see. So it's good to know the right audience.
Dave (16:47)
Yes, exactly. All right, that's I style, S style. The word that you would attach to that style in decision making is the word harmony. OK.
Ashley Martin (16:55)
Sure. huh.
Dave (16:55)
So yeah, the S-style is all about stability, S-dance or steadiness, it's all about stability and lack of chaos, lack of conflict. And so if you attach the word harmony, that really does the job for all that. So an S-style is gonna make sure that anyone affected by the decision is gonna be okay with that decision. Again, you can apply that in personal life and in work life too. So the S-style is gonna take great pains to make sure that everyone's okay.
Ashley Martin (17:17)
I find that S-styles take a lot of great pain through overcoming people pleasing when making decisions for their life, right? Because I see this a lot who have this fear of rocking the boat because we value harmony so much, but yet we're not doing the thing that we wanna do, you know?
Dave (17:28)
Yeah. You know, and that's not necessarily a bad thing Remember a couple years ago you and I talked about the topic hate can s styles really be good leaders because of some of those tendencies and I told you the story about a Boss I had early in my career his name was Steve Johnson He was a super high s and he was vice president of marketing for this company. I was with and he He made sure everyone was on board with decisions, but he did it in a very planful, rational way. And so the downside was decisions took a little longer but the upside was literally every important decision he made he got total buy-in on and
Ashley Martin (18:19)
Got it.
Dave (18:20)
So yeah, I don't know if it's a bad thing, but you have to just understand that it's gonna take probably some more time. And if you're getting buy-in for the sake of just avoiding conflict rather than seeking an optimal solution, then that might not be a good thing.
Ashley Martin (18:28)
Yeah.
Dave (18:35)
Yep. So, that’s the S style, the C-style, C stands for conscientiousness. And the key word there, or at least the key two words there is that the C-style is always going to lean towards fact-based decisions. Right? So, yeah. So, the C-style is going to look for data, information, analytics, whatever they can to make sure that the decision is fact-based and is the optimal decision. The S would probably take a back seat to quality in decision making. And so the C-style is going to probably have a much more either formal or informal process, but there's definitely a plan that needs to happen in order to make that decision analysis work the way that it should work to come up with the best outcome.
Ashley Martin (19:19)
Sure, sure.
What kind of advice would you give to managers or people who are in relationships with the C-Style when you want something to happen in a certain time frame, but yet they want to make sure they get it right and so that decision may not happen as quickly or they couldn't give you an answer as to when it could happen? What do you say to that? How do you help?
Dave (19:42)
Well, your question assumes that that the person asking the question is not also a C style, right? Yeah.
Ashley Martin (19:48)
Correct, correct. They're driving the ship. They're like we're going, here's what I need to have happen. When can it happen?
Dave (19:55)
Yeah, I told you this story before about the team we worked with where the team leader was a high D and most of the rest of the team were C styles. And so you had this need for speed, contrasting with the need for quality. And so you constantly had this push, pull, push, pull, push, pull.
Ashley Martin (20:16)
Yes.
Dave (20:16)
And the guy, still remember this in one of the meetings, the team leader said he was looking for something he could use to make a decision. And finally, out of exasperation, he goes, just give me a ballpark. Just give me a ballpark so I can use that information to kind of figure things out. And one of the guys who was a high C-Style stood up and said, well, here's something you should know about our C-Styles. We don't do ballparks.
And you're like, oh, okay, well, how do you handle that?
Ashley Martin (20:40)
No. No, we don't work in gray area at all. Either black and white.
Dave (20:45)
Right. So the solution they came up with was they used probabilities and percents of confidence. So give me your best conclusion right now and then give me a degree of confidence you have that that solution is going to be the right one.
So all of a sudden now you give that person the permission to say, based on what we know right now, we think this is the direction and we are 80 % confident in that. Okay, all right, well, I can work with that. Or right now we're just getting into it. We think this might be a direction, but we got a lot of stuff to check out, so we're like 35 or 40 % confident in it.
Okay, well that's good to know too. So that's one tactic people can use in decision making to kind of bridge that gap between the needs of the different styles.
Ashley Martin (21:33)
Right, right, because you're getting the communication that you need, right? You're just wanting an answer.
Dave (21:39)
Yep. So, there's a lot more, to decision making through the lens of disc. And so, yeah, if this is something that if you haven't really learned, disc it's a great opportunity to learn that especially if you're curious about your decision making style and what your fingerprint looks like and how you can use that. that's the second thing you really didn't know you need you really didn't know need you forget it that's the second thing.
Ashley Martin (22:09)
Stay tuned for number three, four, and five. There's five total. You change your mind? You're gonna oscillate? No.
Dave (22:13)
There's five things. Exactly. Yes. And if you didn't get it here, and we're going to expand on that in a little mini course or an e-book that we're working on right now that will take each of these things and dive into them little bit even more deeply.
Ashley Martin (22:28)
We're excited to learn more. Thanks, Dave.
Dave (22:31)
Yeah, you know what I hope you're recording.
Ashley Martin (22:34)
It's on the checklist.
We have course corrected that thing.
Dave (22:39)
Yes.
Comments