The Sunk Cost Fallacy: Supersize Your Happiness

All too often, we feel trapped in a given role because of time we’ve already invested to get there. Afterall, we work hard to earn a degree & gain valuable experiences to eventually get to our current role. However, this is ultimately a sunk cost fallacy because the past cannot be changed.

In case you’re unfamiliar, the sunk cost fallacy is when someone has the “tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment in money, effort, or time has been made” (Arkes, 1985). This is regardless of whether you’ve had positive or negative results to date.

As an example, let’s say you decide to pay extra to get the supersized combo meal at a given restaurant. Halfway through eating this meal, you realize you are disgustingly full and are no longer enjoying the meal. Do you stop eating?

For those of you who thought, “Yes,” congrats! You’ve extracted all of the value of the money you spent.

For those of you who thought, “No way, I need to keep eating because I spent money on this meal,” this is the sunk cost fallacy in action.

The money you spent to supersize the meal is already spent, but you want to get your money’s worth and keep eating despite not enjoying your meal anymore and potentially making yourself sick.

The same could be said about a specific job or career choice. If your job no longer brings you happiness and fulfillment, it may be time to reconsider your choice, no matter how much time you’ve “invested” in getting to your current role. In the end, it’s all about understanding the tradeoffs.

Alternatively, the solution could be to simply identify the aspects of your role that do bring you happiness & fulfillment and find a way to increase the amount of time & energy you spend doing those functions. By identifying the parts of your current role that you do enjoy and articulating them to your leadership team, you may be able to spend more of your efforts on those tasks. Afterall, good leaders want to empower their employees to do the things that they enjoy most. By doing so, employees are more likely to produce high-quality outputs, maintain a positive work culture, and increase retention rates.

Can you identify the aspects of your current job that bring you the most happiness or fulfillment?

How can you increase the amount of time & energy you spend on those kinds of activities?