An old one-liner goes . . .
. . . “A good leader is one who can make decisions quickly — and sometimes even correctly.”
Now, that’s supposed to be amusing. Unfortunately, an immense number of serious and costly mistakes are made every day in businesses, nonprofits, and government agencies precisely because some managers believe speed is all that counts in being a good decision maker.
Master Decision Makers know that decisions have to be made on a timely basis. But they also realize that the best decisions, those that yield value to customers and that others will accept, require a thoughtful, intelligent approach.
Smart leaders want decisions to be made at the lowest appropriate level in their organizations. So they develop their team members’ decision-making skills, and then support the decisions they make.
Make it a rule never to take on decisions that can be made effectively at a lower level. That way, you’ll have more time for the important decisions that only you can make.
Why Are Some Decisions Harder Than Others?
We all make lots of decisions quite easily every day — such as, whether or not to go to work, what to wear, what to eat. Obviously, we do know how to make them. Then why do some decisions that we’re called upon to make as leaders seem so threatening and difficult?
In most cases, it’s because those decisions present us with:
1. Perceived risks – You may think to yourself, “If I make the wrong decision, how much could I (or the organization) lose? Will customers rebel? Will my boss be angry with me? Will it kill morale? Will it hurt my credibility with my team?”
2. Conflicts and confusion among values – When you’re making a decision about how to deal with a poor performer, for example, you may find yourself caught between your sense of yourself as a “good, fair, patient leader” and your sense of responsibility to get results for the organization as a whole. You may be angry with the poor performer and, at the same time perhaps, feel guilty because you should have done a better job of training or coaching the person.
How To Make Good Decisions More Easily
Some skilled leaders appear to make decisions — excellent decisions — quickly and painlessly. What’s their secret? Consciously or unconsciously they follow a thoughtful process that includes all or many of the suggestions coming up. Start using such a process yourself. You too will make better decisions —
decisions others will accept — more easily and quickly.
PREPARE
Reduce the Risk By Involving the Right People
As a leader, you have the primary responsiblility for certain decisions. The accountability and the risk for those decisions is yours too, no matter who else or how many people you get involved in the process.
Even so, when you get the right people to participate to the right degree, you reduce your risk of failure and increase the likelihood you’ll end up with a good decision. Getting others involved could be the most critical factor in making wise decisions. Here’s why.
A Good Decision Has Two Critical Elements
1. The quality of the decision itself. Is it technically, intellectually, ethically, and financially sound?
- Are there technical, legal, or policy standards that require absolute compliance, or are some or all of the quality requirements for the decision flexible? Be clear about the distinctions in your own mind and be prepared to articulate and defend them to others.
- On a scale from one to ten, ten being extremely important, how important is it to meet those standards in order for this decision to be successful?
- What specifically will have to be done in order to ensure that you end up with a decision that meets the necessary standards of quality?
- Do those who will be affected by the decision or called upon to implement or support the decision have knowledge or experience in these technical, legal, or policy areas? If not, what would it take to bring them up to speed so that they could participate in crafting this decision?
2. The acceptance of the decision. Will those who must implement it and those who are affected by it support it?
- Whom do you want or need to accept, support, or implement this decision?
- On a scale from one to ten, ten being extremely important, how important is it for you to have acceptance of this decision from those who will be affected by the decision or called upon to implement or support the decision?
- What would happen if you failed to gain that acceptance?
- What needs will have to be met for people before they are likely to accept the decision? (Clarity? Addressing fears? Feeling heard? Alignment with personal values? Meaningful participation and collaboration? Some level of authority and self-determination? Social needs? Personal growth needs? Need for information and data? Need to do their own research and study?)
- What specifically will have to be done in order to ensure that you end up with a decision that meets the necessary standards of acceptance?
The relative importance of quality vs acceptance varies from decision to decision. Who and how many people to involve is your call, but consider carefully.
Involve People Close To the Decision – If the decision involves changing a process or a task, the people who actually carry out the process are more likely than anyone else to spot the pitfalls of changing it. People in other departments who supply something needed for the process in question or who depend on its results to do their work may also have valuable insights. Ask yourself whether you should involve them, at what point, and to what degree.
Think carefully about who else could be affected by the decision and how they might react, as well as how their reactions could affect your success in implementing the decision. Should you involve them? If so, when and to what degree?
Know When to Choose Acceptance Over Quality – It’s possible that a higher quality decision might be made by one or two people with specialized knowledge of the situation at hand. Despite that, you may sense that acceptance of the decision is so important that you should involve more people and settle for a slightly lower quality decision. The degree of their involvement might range anywhere from (1) your simply informing them in advance that you are going to make a decision to (2) allowing them to make the decision themselves. Between those two extremes are such options as selling the decision to them, getting them to gather pertinent information for you, and soliciting suggestions and recommendations from them.
In any case, keep in mind these two truths:
- People tend to support what they help to create.
- Most people want to be involved in designing the systems that affect them.
It’s better to err on the side of getting too much participation throughout your decision-making process than too little. Of course, the amount of time available to make the decision can’t be ignored and may play a role in how much of a choice you actually have to involve others as you’d like
Set Clear Criteria For Your Decision
The quality of decisions too often suffers for lack of clear, pertinent criteria. Here’s a straightforward method you and your group can use to keep important considerations — including your goals and values — from falling through the cracks:
Ask your team: When we have a good decision, what will be true in these four areas for our customers, for the team and for the organization as a whole?
1. What will we be preserving? List what’s true now that you want to remain true.
2. What will we be eliminating? List what’s true now that you no longer want to be true.
3. What will we be adding? List what’s not true now that you want to be true in the future.
4. What will we be avoiding? List what’s not true now that you want to continue to keep from being true.
Check the items you list under each heading against your goals and values, what you and your organization want to become and what you stand for. Then write a “+” before those criteria that clearly advance your goals and values, a “?” before those that advance them in only a minor way, and a “–” before those criteria that clash with or are irrelevant to your goals and values.
If you don’t have your goals and values written out, do it. Making a decision is far easier when you have criteria based on clear goals and values.
CHOOSE
1. Brainstorm For Options – Brainstorm and list as many ways as possible you could frame your decision.
2. Rank Your Options – Check each option against your most important criteria and put an “X” before those options that meet all or most of the criteria.
3. Settle On An Option – This is the step that takes courage. You may have had a great deal of input from others, but now the decision itself is on your shoulders. Even if you have allowed a group to come to consensus on what the decision should be, you are still accountable for it.
But don’t worry. If you’ve gone through the process outlined so far, you’ve acted as a responsible decision maker. Your decision may not be perfect — few leaders’ decisions ever are — but it will no doubt be a good decision. Go for it!
DO IT!
Implement Your Decision
Your decision will have value only if you implement it. If you’ve had a group participate in shaping and
choosing an option, then implementation is a natural next step for them. Get the group to come to consensus and take action on:
- The steps required for successful implementation
- Who will be responsible for completing each step
- Dates each step will be completed
- Who needs to be informed of each step
- A follow-up process to make sure the decision “sticks”
Two Ways to Enhance the Quality of Your Decisions
1. Get an Outsider’s Perspective – Remember the story about the large truck that is about three inches taller than an old underpass on a city street? The driver, unaware of the danger, hits the underpass at forty miles per hour, severely wedging the truck. Wreckers and bulldozers push and pull for hours, but can’t free the truck.
Finally, a little girl who has been watching the spectacle says quietly to a nearby police officer, “Maybe if they’d let some air out of the truck’s tires, it would get unstuck.”
Sometimes our intimate knowledge of our own line of work keeps us from seeing some options that are obvious to the outsider. Ask a child or a next-door neighbor what he or she would do in your situation. You may get an answer that leads you to a breakthrough or, at least, to a new perspective.
2. Listen to Your Intuition – Some of us have a tendency to discount the value of intuition, that “gut” feeling we sometimes get about a person or situation. When we fail to trust our hunches, our intuition, we are dismissing a powerful tool. Master Decision Makers listen closely to their intuition for the knowledge and insight it provides, even though with no apparent rational basis.
Relax for five minutes and just get in tune with your inner voice. Or, if you’re in a hurry and have to choose between two options, flip a coin. As the coin is on its way down, does a voice in your head say, “I hope it comes up tails”? That’s your intuition talking to you. Trust it to guide you to a sound decision.
Filed under: Shared Spirit
