Good Decisions Make Better Construction Decisions For Fewer Regrets

Remodeling or building a home is a tremendously fun, creative endeavor, and it can be an enjoyable process that develops relationships as strong as the structures we build. Many builders tout streamlined processes that eliminate stress, but building is complex and includes thousands of decisions. The natural stress bound up in the build process is inevitable.

Understanding that good decisions affect the result of your home, and shape the story of your build experience, how can you prepare to make good decisions? If you are planning a remodel or new build, follow these guidelines to make decision making easier.

FOLLOW YOUR CONDUCTOR, BUT KNOW YOUR PART

The role of a builder is like that of the Maestro to her orchestra. We understand how to read, interpret, and direct the score, but we rely on the skill and cooperation of the instrumentalists to make beautiful music. Our collaboration with others includes the homeowner who makes the ultimate decisions, and decisions made confidently on tempo are critical in the overall success of the project. Follow your conductor, but know your part. You have responsibilities too.

GOOD PLANNING

Many of us are too impatient (or too excited) to slow down and ask the right questions to illicit decisions that result in good planning. Because decisions are rarely emotionally neutral, appropriately timed questions guided by a team of professionals lead to unrushed, intentional thinking and good decision making.

Discussions about hobbies and passions find their way into shelving details that showcase artifacts collected during global travel. A homeowner is grateful for their outdoor shower every time they wash a muddy dog. We want to avoid missed opportunities like adding sound proofing between floors if our clients expect to have long term guests on the second floor.

These thoughtful questions answered honestly by you, lead to more useful information, clearer insight, better decisions, and more detailed planning. Don’t rush this planning process. Solid planning is the investment that moves the needle the most in your build because it saves you time, money, and heartache.

We developed a set of essential questions and touchpoints that we guide Bellwether clients through which result in more clarity in the planning process. These tools distill decisions into guiding principles that reveal and support the way a client wants to live in their new home. Request a copy of our client “Homework” in the Contact Form drop-down menu at www.bellwethersc.com

LEAN INTO TENSION THEN MOVE OFF THE DISSONANT CHORD

Options naturally create tension, which can be uncomfortable. I encourage my clients to get comfortable with this temporary discomfort. Continuing with the music analogy, introducing a dissonant chord then resolving the dissonance is what makes harmony even more beautiful. Rather than rushing through the decision simply to relieve the pressure, or trying to avoid the tension all together by perpetually keeping your options open, embrace the tension and question what the source of tension could be. Examine potential confirmation bias – the tendency to look for information that supports what we already plan to do- and ask yourself hard questions. Is this tension due to conflict between my desires and the budget? Should I re-evaluate my budget or should I adjust my expectations? Is the stress of this decision caused by general feelings of uncertainty? Should I trust my team’s experience more? Is this tension due to friction between my needs and the needs of someone else in the household? Working through tough questions like these results in more confident decisions because you’ve consciously dealt with underlying issues. Recognize that facing high-risk decisions is inherently stressful, and making lots of decisions pushes one to the extreme of natural proclivities. There are two types of people: Trust your Gut and Over-Analyze Everything, and these two types often marry each other! Your team will help you determine the right balance of intuition and data so you can avoid analysis paralysis and make a timely decision.

PROTECT CLARITY AND REJECT REGRET

Clarity about what does matter provides clarity about what does not. It’s critical to identify the sacrosanct to avoid conflicting priorities and distractions from the myriad of options you will face. It can’t all be a priority. Remember the “Law of the Vital Few”: 80% of an effect is due to the 20% of the causes. Choose your 20% and choose what to let go. For example: the window package that allows in the view and light is made possible by the decision to carpet the 2nd floor and use a tabby shell veneer on the foundation instead of brick, or the waitlisted elevator makes the ideal appliance package attainable for the passionate home chef.

I also can’t stress enough the emotional benefit of avoiding the pitfall of regret. Our brains are wired to think in right and wrong binaries, but it’s incredibly freeing to instead acknowledge there are multiple good paths toward a pleasing result. Trust your decision. There is no way of ever knowing if the choice you didn’t make could have been any better than the choice you did make. You made the best decision you could with the information you had at the time.

BE A SURGEON

The very word decide, means “to cut off.” You must decide with the definitive methodology of a surgeon’s cut. Admit to yourself that hard choices are inevitable, and sacrifices will be made. Admitting this fact makes things feel immediately lighter. Shift your perspective so you can view choice and sacrifice not as a limitation, but as an opportunity to put your energy and investment toward what matters most to you. Making a choice against something else, even another option that could also be good, is what makes your choice meaningful in the first place. Elimination elevates what remains.

CONSIDER SOBER JOY

It is a privilege to remodel or build a home. It is a process filled will hard choices, but this is what makes it an immensely rewarding experience. Bellwether clients remark about how much they miss the endeavor when it’s all over, and they look forward to building again in the future. This response doesn’t surprise me at all. It’s the reason why those of us in the business love it so much! People grow and surprise themselves, problems reveal hidden opportunities, and faith in oneself and the process is tested and celebrated. I call it a “sober joy,” an experience wherein hard and good coexist, where the expression and resolution of dissonance into consonance, much like in music, moves us mysteriously and deeply into contented happiness.

Tactics for Good Decisions

• Batch decisions according to the critical path of the build. Your builder will guide you, or you may request the framework our clients use. Go to www.bellwethersc.com and select Request Building “Homework” Docs in the drop-down menu of our Contact Form.

• Schedule no longer than 60-minute sessions of deep, uninterrupted spells of thought, examination and discussion in your decision making.

• Beware what author Cal Newport calls “attention residue.” When we switch from Task A to Task B, part of our attention remains stuck on the original task resulting in poor thinking and bad decisions. Instead focus on one task/decision at a time and if you feel your attention wander, take a break.

• Leave some things to your unconscious to sort out. Go on a walk, a swim, or hit some golf balls. That mental rest could produce the clarity you seek.

• Explore the interplay of dissonance and consonance in music (and in life) by listening to A Boy and a Girl by Eric Whitacre, performed by Voces8, God Only Knows by the Beach Boys, and The National Anthem by Radiohead.

In addition to being a licensed homebuilder and business owner, Leah England is a wife, mother, and classically trained soprano. You’ll often find her singing a tune around her jobsites.