GAME CHANGERS GAMING SKILLS AND THE WORKPLACE

DECISION MAKING

Literacy Link South Central

Decision Making: Participant Playbook

2
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

This participant playbook is part of a series created for the course “Game Changers: Gaming
Skills and the Workplace.” Built in a modular fashion to allow for maximum flexibility, this
course provides training on real-world skills that can be developed and practiced in a game-
based environment. Using a combination of facilitated lessons, activities, research, and games,
this course will help teach a new generation of job seekers the 21st Century soft skills critical to
Canadian employers. Modules in this course include:

Why Gaming is Good

Verbal Communication
Non-verbal Communication
Observation Skills
Decision Making
Problem Solving
Teamwork
Flexibility and Adaptability
Work Ethic
Conflict Resolution
Resiliency
Who Do You Think You Are?
The Employment Game
Leveling Up

A Youth Advisory Committee played a key role in the development of this course. Literacy Link
South Central offers thanks to committee members Cassandra Smith, Colin Todkill, Eleyas
Araya, Eric Rice, Jamie Kaill and Taisha Jenee Pinsonneault for their input and guidance.

Gaming recommendations for this project were provided by our advisors at Teleos
Engagement. Literacy Link South Central recognizes Gabriel Hancock, Robert Durant and Shayne
Ganness and thanks them for sharing their in-depth knowledge of game design and
development.

This curriculum was developed and formatted by Summer Burton, Project Manager, Literacy
Link South Central. For questions about this curriculum, please contact Literacy Link South
Central at 519-681-7307 or literacylink@llsc.on.ca

Literacy Link South Central is pleased to provide this course through

the support of the Royal Bank of Canada’s Future Launch fund.

3
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Agenda:

1. The Choices We Make

2. Making Decisions

3. Decision-Making Tools and Resources

4. Critical Thinking

5. Sushi Go

6. Selecting the next session’s topic

7. Wrap-up and take-away

Research
Gut
instinct

Options

4
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

The Choices We Make

We have to make decisions every day – some big and some small. They might be influenced by
past experience, emotion, research or other people.

How can emotions impact our decisions? ____________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

What things would you consider when making a decision about buying a car? _______________

______________________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Where would you go to find out that kind of information? ______________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

5
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Making Decisions

There are often two key elements at play when making a decision. What are they?

Your _____________ Your _____________

Think about your dream car. What is it? _____________________________________________

Why is it your dream car? ________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Is that your head talking, or your heart?  Head  Heart

6
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

How do we make decisions? Draw a line between the kinds of decision-making we use, and the
matching statement below.

Well-researched Based on what other people are doing,

influenced by their actions or opinions.

Indifferently Based on avoiding the issue, or choosing not

to make a decision at all.

Self-sacrificing or self-protective Based on anger, fear, tiredness, hunger or

anxiousness.

Through mob mentality Based on past experiences, taking into

account what happened in similar situations
last time.

Through avoidance Based on very little, because we don’t care

about the outcome or think our decision
won’t make a difference.

Impulsively Based on the results of research and critical

thinking, considering our choices and their
possible outcomes

Emotionally Based on a need to make other people

happy, or to avoid conflict.

From experience Based on gut instinct, without fully

considering the consequences of our actions.

If you avoid making a decision, have you made a choice?  Yes  No

What choice did you make? _______________________________________________________

7
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Building your decision-making skills

Just like every other skill, decision-making takes practice. Record suggestions for how to
practice your decision making skills below.

Break big decisions up into _______________________________________________________.

Small choices are easier, and are like stepping stones helping you work toward the larger
decision ahead.

Make _____________________________ decisions to practice. Making deliberate and

thoughtful decisions that you know aren’t critical can build your decision-making muscles.

________________________ and _______________________ when you are making decisions.

When you make a choice, ask yourself why you made it, and think about what happened as a
result of the decision you made.

Make a __________ of decisions you made that

had __________________________________.

Tip: When you’re struggling with a decision – read

it. Remind yourself that you’ve made good
decisions in the past and can do it again.

8
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Questions to ask once you’ve make a decision:

1. How did you make that decision?

Knowing how we made a decision can

help us understand both ourselves and
why our choices do or do not work out.

2. How do you feel about it?

How we feel immediately after making a
choice can be an indicator not only of
how we handle pressure, but whether
our instincts are telling us that we did
the right thing or not.

3. What was the outcome of the decision?

Even when the decisions we make don’t work out well we can learn something from
that – especially if we start to notice that when we make decisions a certain way they
tend to turn out better for us.

Remember, in most cases “no

decision you make has to be the last
decision you make.”

One of the great things about

practicing decision-making is that
we have lots of opportunity to do it.
We have small decisions we can
make every day, and as we learn,
grow, and change - we can choose
to change our minds.

9
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Decision-Making Tools and Resources

Tool 1: a “pros and cons” list

What sort of decisions might you make using a pros and cons list? ________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Tool 2: a weighted “pros and cons” list

1 Something a bit positive

Something pretty negative 2
2 Something pretty positive
Something extremely negative 3
Something a bit positive
1
Total = 4 Total = 5

What sort of decisions might you make using a weighted pros and cons list? ________________

______________________________________________________________________________

What can you do to change the weighting on a list like this? _____________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

10
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Tool 3: a decision matrix

The decision matrix below has been started to help someone decide what job offer they should
take – bartending, kitchen prep, retail sales, or factory work.

Enjoyment Hours Pay Location

Weight Final Score
Rank Total Rank Total Rank Total Rank Total
Bartending
job at a local
pub
Kitchen prep
job
Retail sales
job at the
mall
Factory
(overnight
shift)

Steps to creating and filling in a decision matrix:

1. List your different options in the first column under the word “weight.”
2. List the factors that are important to you and will help you make a decision across the
top.
3. Use a scale of 1 to 3 to assign a weight to each of the factors you included.
4. Next, look at each of the options, and consider what it offers in each factor on a scale of
1 to 10.
5. Once there is a ranking number in each of the columns for all your different choices, fill
in the “total” column by multiplying the ranking number (1-10) by the weight (1-3).
6. Add up the numbers from each “total” column and put the result
in the Final Score column at the end of the row. Do this for each
of your options.

11
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

An example of a completed row in the chart is shown below.

Enjoyment Hours Pay Location

Weight 3 2 3 1 Final Score
Rank Total Rank Total Rank Total Rank Total
Bartending
job at a local 8 24 3 6 5 15 8 8 53
pub

If it were you who had gotten these four job offers, how would you complete the chart? Return
to page 11, add your own weights and rankings, and see which job gets the highest score.

The job with the highest final score was: _____________________________________________

12
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Additional Resources

There are many other tools available to help you make good decisions. Two have been outlined
below, with links to learn more about them. Next time you need to make a decision, consider
using one or more of these tools to help!

A decision tree is a flow chart used to visualize the

decision-making process by mapping out different
Decision to
be made courses of action, as well as their potential outcomes.
Visit this site to learn more about decision trees, and
Option 1 Option 2 use some of their templates to create your own. Note
that you need to create a free account, and cannot
Possible Possible
Outcome
outcome outcome download your finished product without a paid
account. Tip: take a screenshot when you’re done,
and save the image to your computer.

https://venngage.com/blog/what-is-a-decision-tree/

A SWOT (which stands for strengths,

weaknesses, opportunities, and threats)
analysis is usually used by organizations
in their decision making. This version is a
personal SWOT analysis, and includes
both a video and a free worksheet.

https://www.mindtools.com/pages/arti
cle/newTMC_05_1.htm

13
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Critical Thinking

 Watch the video “5 tips to improve your critical thinking” on the TED-Ed YouTube channel,
and answer the following 10 questions as the video plays. Be prepared to share your answers
when the video is done.

1. What is one advantage of critical thinking?

 It can make the decision-making process go faster
 It guarantees that everyone will be happy with the
decision
 It can help us reveal hidden issues like bias and
manipulation
 It is easy

2. Is critical thinking based on what “feels right”?  Yes  No

3. What is the first step (of five) in the critical thinking process?
 Gather your information
 Apply the information
 Formulate your question
 Consider the implications

4. Write what that means in your own words below: __________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

14
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

5. Why do you want to gather information as part 2 of the critical thinking process?
 To delay making the decision until later
 To weigh different options, moving you closer to a decision that meets your goal
 To involve other people in the decision-making process
 To find research that confirms your point-of-view

6. Once you have information to help you make a decision, you have to ask critical questions
about it. This is step 3: Applying the Information. What is one of the questions you might
ask yourself during this step?

___________________________________________________________________________

7. What does it mean to consider the implications of a decision (step 4)?

___________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

8. Step 5 is to look at what other people think, and why. It’s a great way to explore alternative
views, evaluate your own choices, and make more informed decisions. What is step 5
called?

___________________________________________________________________________

9. Will critical thinking eradicate difficult decisions in our lives?

 Yes  No

10. Can it be used to help you and increase the number of

positive choices we make?

 Yes  No

15
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Sushi Go

One of our take-aways today is the importance of practicing your

decision-making skills. The fast-paced card game Sushi Go offers the
chance to choose cards from a constantly moving hand, trying to find
and save the combination of sushi that will earn the most points.
Each hand represents a new decision, so focus on what choices
you’re making as you go, and why you’re making them. Be ready to
talk about those choices at the end of the game.

Note: This is a competitive game that can be played by up to 5 people at a time. If you don’t play
the game, be sure to watch carefully and make notes about what you saw. Your facilitator will ask you to
share your observations after the game.

Notes: _______________________________________________________________________________

Question: What impact did getting a new hand of cards for every round have on the way you
played?

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Did you change your strategy and start collecting different sushi rolls part way through? If so,
why?

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Did you plan for a specific card to come back around, only to find out it didn’t? How did that
change the way you played?

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

16
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Selecting the next session’s topic

We will be discussing another skill from the list during our next session. Each of these skills can
be developed and practiced in a gaming environment, and are important not only in games, but
in a non-gaming environment.

1. Verbal communication
2. Non-verbal communication
3. Observation skills
4. Decision making
5. Problem solving
6. Teamwork
7. Flexibility and adaptability
8. Work ethic
9. Conflict resolution
10. Resiliency

Which skill should we look at next? Participate in the poll to let your workshop facilitator know.

17
 Decision Making: Participant Playbook

Wrap-up and take-away

You make decisions every day, inspired by different things and based on different factors –
sometimes without even realizing it. In today’s session we discussed how we make those
decisions, and the importance of practicing your decision making skills.

Spend some time between now and our next session using the tools and techniques you
learned about today by completing the following two activities:

1. Fill out a blank decision matrix with information related to a real choice you need to
make. It can be to make a simple one (should we have chicken or fish for dinner?) or a
more complex one (should I go to post-secondary school, or get a job instead?)
2. Think about an upcoming choice you may have to make, and write down how you can
use critical thinking make a good decision. Record how you can use three of the five
steps mentioned in the video we watched in this session.

A decision I think I’m going to have to make soon: _____________________________________

______________________________________________________________________________

Three steps of critical thinking I can use to help me make this decision:

1. ___________________________________

2. ___________________________________

3. ___________________________________

Your facilitator will be asking about your decisions at the start of the next session.

Reminder: record the date and time of our next session below.

The next session is: ___________________________________ at ____________.

18