Most busi­ness envi­ron­ments are chal­leng­ing. Whether you are work­ing in an expand­ing or con­tract­ing mar­ket, there will always be crit­i­cal deci­sions that need to be made. How you respond can be a com­pet­i­tive advan­tage, or a stum­bling block. A leader’s inde­ci­sive­ness can par­a­lyze an organization.

Estab­lish the expec­ta­tion that all issues, chal­lenges, and oppor­tu­ni­ties will be clearly thought out, using all avail­able infor­ma­tion, and that your deci­sions will then be made quickly.

Take action. Then, if you are proven to be wrong, admit it, adjust, and move on.

Avoid Paral­y­sis

It is always valu­able to get the facts and do the proper analy­sis. This is crit­i­cal in effec­tive decision-making. But at the end of the day, deci­sions must be made and action must be taken. When is enough data enough?

Inde­ci­sive­ness is a killer in busi­ness. The right actions are often right before our eyes — we just need to know where to look.

In many cases, employ­ees already know what needs to be done. Yet noth­ing hap­pens. Some­times they are wait­ing for the leader to make a deci­sion, and it shouldn’t be this way. Lead­ers need to encour­age their peo­ple to speak up faster. They must con­tin­u­ally ask ques­tions and probe when nec­es­sary to bet­ter under­stand what’s needed.

Some deci­sions are more com­plex, and may require new think­ing. Don’t be afraid to fully explore dif­fer­ing points of view. The best strat­egy is most eas­ily iden­ti­fied in an envi­ron­ment where oppos­ing views are exchanged. List the pros and cons for each pos­si­ble action. Exam­ine the best and worst case result of each pos­si­ble decision.

With the use of crit­i­cal ques­tion­ing, a clearer pic­ture of the right action will start to emerge. Then, you’ll be able to take action with more confidence.

The bot­tom line is, don’t pro­cras­ti­nate. Check the facts, weigh the input, and decide.

It May Come Down to You

Harry Tru­man had a plaque on his desk pro­claim­ing “The buck stops here.” Some­one has to make a deci­sion, and the empha­sis is on “one.” Com­mit­tees are needed for many rea­sons, but there is not always an over­whelm­ing con­sen­sus. The path can be murky. It may sim­ply come down to the leader mak­ing the best pos­si­ble decision.

The clock is always tick­ing in busi­ness. Time is pre­cious. Too often, dol­lars and oppor­tu­ni­ties are wasted by inde­ci­sion. When you delay an obvi­ous deci­sion, you not only miss imme­di­ate oppor­tu­ni­ties, but you also can lose the con­fi­dence of the team and squan­der eas­ily obtained ben­e­fits. When you delay mak­ing harder or more com­plex deci­sions, you may miss great oppor­tu­ni­ties which can cre­ate longer-term issues with your competition.

Mak­ing deci­sions on behalf of your team is an impor­tant part of your role as a leader. Involve your team in the process, but don’t shirk your respon­si­bil­ity when it’s time to make the final call.

By All Means, Do the Right Thing

The deci­sions you make will not always be per­fect. There will always be room for improve­ment. But you have a bet­ter chance of suc­cess when you rely on your guid­ing prin­ci­ples. Good lead­ers place impor­tance on effec­tive exe­cu­tion and prof­itabil­ity. Another impor­tant guid­ing prin­ci­ple is to do the right thing.

Strong busi­ness cul­tures and teams are built by lead­ers who set clear guid­ing prin­ci­ples around eth­i­cal behav­ior, and fol­low them con­sis­tently. The leader must set the exam­ple in this area.

Some­times doing the right thing will cost you more than the alter­na­tive. Do it anyway.

You Can Always Regroup

When lead­ers make deci­sions, they want to get it right. But no leader makes the best deci­sion every sin­gle time. There will always be greater clar­ity with hind­sight. The facts may not have been cor­rect or com­plete. The busi­ness envi­ron­ment, cus­tomer needs, and indus­try reg­u­la­tions may have changed. Any num­ber of other fac­tors can yield results you didn’t foresee.

Don’t ago­nize over past deci­sions. Strong lead­ers rec­og­nize when it’s time to regroup and make changes, and they see this as a chance to make the orga­ni­za­tion stronger.

A num­ber of years ago I had the oppor­tu­nity to bring in Gen­eral Nor­man Schwarzkopf to speak to our man­age­ment team. He offered two prin­ci­ples of advice that he said helped him greatly:

Take action, and always do the right thing.

Solid advice for any leader.

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Tags: Action, Challenges, Decision Making

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