“Dad, what do you do at work?” my 12-year-old son Nate asked me recently. “I mean, I know your title, but what do you do all day?”
I smiled, hesitated for a few seconds, and then answered.
“I make decisions.”
“Wow. That sounds exciting,” Nate answered, with more than a hint of pre-adolescent sarcasm.
“Well, there’s more to it than that, son,” I said, thinking how I might gain his interest back. “Many days I’m like a field general, building plans, casting vision for the team and leading the charge to accomplish specific goals.”
“Well, that sounds more interesting,” he answered, and I could almost hear the video playing in his mind (complete with a horseback-riding cavalry storming into battle to take the desired hilltop).
When it comes down to it, making decisions does fill much of my work day. And I want to share with you now a valuable lesson I learned from a strong leader who was a colleague of mine for several years. I asked him at a lunch meeting one day, “How do you do it? You seem to make decisions so quickly.”
“It’s really not very complicated,” he said. “I don’t tolerate inactivity. We’re either moving forward or we’re stagnant. So when I have two or more options to choose from in making a decision, I first look to see if one is the obvious choice based on my knowledge or past experience. I’ll ask the person bringing the decision to me if they have a preference or recommendation. If two or more options still seem equal, I just pick one, and expect the whole team to support it wholeheartedly.”
“What? You mean you randomly make a choice and ask everybody to get in line to support it? What if it proves to be the wrong decision?”
“That’s the beauty of this approach,” he answered. “If the choice clearly becomes less ideal than another, I change my mind and go with the better option. I’m not afraid or embarrassed to change my mind and give new direction based on new information.”
He paused, smiling, allowing for this realization to sink in. Then he went on, “Only a fool continues to support a decision he knows is not the best he can do. Some people think that changing their mind or changing direction is a sign of weakness. I think it’s a sign of humility and strength for a leader to say, ‘I’ve discovered a better way; we’re changing to Plan B now.’”
In my experience, I have found that the biggest challenge to this approach comes from people negatively affected by a change in direction. To them, it can seem like you didn’t mean what you said in the first place, even if you were wholeheartedly committed to Plan A at the time. Worse, you can seem insincere or untruthful. But I hope to build a reputation for honesty and integrity even when changing direction, so that people understand and give me the benefit of the doubt, even if my change impacts them negatively.
If your social style is “Analytical,”* you may balk at this approach, because your style is to wait, gather the facts, avoid the risk and move forward more slowly and cautiously. (*Click here for a link to more information about social styles and decision making, courtesy of John Pearson.)
Whatever your level of responsibility or social style, do you struggle with making, announcing or supporting decisions once you’ve made them? Would taking this kind of approach serve you well, or would you hesitate to act on a decision that seemed “tied” with two or three others? Do you have my friend’s desire to keep moving, keep searching, keep advancing … even if you have to turn around and go a different direction at times?