Factor I: Strategic Skills Cluster B: Making Complex Decisions
I – B
No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account
not only the world as it is, but the world as it will be….
Isaac Asimov – Russian-born American-Jewish author and biochemist
Unskilled
Goes first with quick solutions, conclusions and statements before analysis
May rely too much on self—doesn’t ask for help
Making decisions may trigger emotions and impatience
May not use orderly decision methods, models or ways to think
May jump to conclusions based on prejudices, historical solutions or narrow perspective
Doesn’t take the time to define the problem before deciding
May have trouble with complexity
May wait too long, agonize over every detail to avoid risk or error
May go for the big elegant decision when five little ones would be better
Select one to three of the competencies listed below to use as a substitute for this competency if you decide not to work on it directly.
SUBSTITUTES: 5,12,24,30,32,46,47,50,51,53,58
Skilled
Makes good decisions (without considering how much time it takes) based upon a mixture of
analysis, wisdom, experience, and judgment
Most of his/her solutions and suggestions turn out to be correct and accurate when judged
over time
Sought out by others for advice and solutions
Overused Skill
May see him/herself as overly wise or close to perfect, as someone who can’t or doesn’t make
mistakes
May be seen as stubborn and not willing to negotiate or compromise
May get frustrated when advice is rejected
May not relate well to less data-based people
Select one to three of the competencies listed below to work on to compensate for an overuse of this skill. COMPENSATORS: 2,5,12,16,30,32,33,37,45,51,52,58,61,63
Some Causes
Arrogant
Excessive emotionality; avoiding risk and exposure
Faulty thinking
Impatient; don’t wait for the data
Narrow perspective
Perfectionist; wait too long for all of the data
Prejudiced; preconceived solutions; rigid
Want to do it all yourself; won’t ask for help
Leadership Architect® Factors and Clusters
This competency is in the Strategic Skills Factor (I). This competency is in the Making Complex Decisions Cluster (B) with: 30, 32, 51. You may want to check other competencies in the same Factor/Cluster for related tips.
The Map
Life and work are just a series of big and small decisions followed by action in line with the decisions. Good decisions are based upon a mixture of data, analysis, intuition, wisdom, experience, and judgment. Making good decisions involves being patient enough to collect the available information, being humble enough to ask for other people’s opinions and thoughts and then coldly making the decision. No one is ever right all the time; it’s the percent correct over time that matters.
Some Remedies
1. Attitudes in play? Know your biases. Be clear and honest with yourself about your attitudes, beliefs, biases, opinions and prejudices and your favorite solutions. We all have them. The key is not to let them affect your objective and cold decision making. Before making any sizable decision, ask yourself, are any of my biases affecting this decision? Do you play favorites, deciding quickly in one area, but holding off in another? Do you avoid certain topics, people, groups, functional areas because you’re not comfortable or don’t know? Do you drag out your favorite solutions often? Too often?
2. Making hasty assumptions? Check for common errors in thinking. Do you state as facts things that are really opinions or assumptions? Are you sure these assertions are facts? State opinions and assumptions as that and don’t present them as facts. Do you attribute cause and effect to relationships when you don’t know if one causes the other? If sales are down, and we increase advertising and sales go up, this doesn’t prove causality. They are simply related. Say we know that the relationship between sales/advertising is about the same as sales/number of employees. If sales go down, we probably wouldn’t hire more people, so make sure one thing causes the other before acting on it. Do you generalize from a single example without knowing if that single example does generalize?
3. Do you do enough analysis? Thoroughly define the problem. Figure out what causes it. Keep asking why. See how many causes you can come up with and how many organizing buckets you can put them in. This increases the chance of a better solution because you can see more connections. Look for patterns in data, don’t just collect information. Put it in categories that make sense to you. A good rule of thumb is to analyze patterns and causes to come up with alternatives. Many of us just collect data, which numerous studies show increases our confidence but doesn’t increase decision accuracy. Think out loud with others; see how they view the problem. Studies show that defining the problem and taking action usually occur simultaneously, so to break out of analysis paralysis, figure out what the problem is first. Then when a good alternative appears you’re likely to recognize it immediately.
4. What’s your track record? Consider your history. Do an objective analysis of decisions you have made in
the past and what the percentage correct was. Break the decisions into topics or areas of your life. For most of us, we make better decisions in some areas than others. Maybe your decision-making skills need help in one or two limited areas, like decisions about people, decisions about your career, political decisions, technical, etc. 5. Eager to act? Hold your horses. Life is a balance between waiting and doing. Many in management put a
premium on doing over waiting. Most could make close to 100% good decisions given all of the data and
unlimited time. Life affords us neither the data nor the time. You may need to try to discipline yourself to wait just a little longer than you usually do for more, but not all, the data to come in. Push yourself to always get one more piece of data than you did before until your correct decision percent becomes more acceptable. Instead of just doing it, ask what questions would need to be answered before we’d know which way to go. In one study of problem solving, answers outnumbered questions 8 to 1. We jump to solutions based on what has worked in the past. So collect data to answer these questions, then shoot. More help? – See #51 Problem Solving.
6. Hesitant? Find one more alternative solution. Play out the consequences in your head to see how the decision would play in real life. Test out a number of decisions. Some research says that the best decision isn’t always the first or even the second solution you think of. The highest-quality decisions are somewhere between the second and third decision you come to. You may be hesitating because your little voice in your head is telling you something isn’t right.
7. Can’t decide? Sleep on it. The brain works on things even when you are not thinking about them. Take some
time, do something completely different, and get back to the decision later. Let a night’s sleep go by and return to it in the morning.
8. Need input? Use others to help. Delegate the decision. Sometime others above, aside, or below you may be in a better position to make the decision. Create a group or task force, present the decision and all you know about it, and let the group decide. Or set up competing groups or find a buddy group in another function or organization which faces a similar problem or consult history—surely this has happened before. Up your odds through others.
9. Have a guru in mind? Study decision makers. Whom do you admire? Bill Gates? Winston Churchill? Read the biographies and autobiographies of a few people you respect, and pay attention to how they made decisions in their life and careers. Write down five things they did that you can do. For example, Churchill always slept on important decisions no matter what. He initially only asked questions and tried to understand the problem and argument as given. He kept his views to himself until later.
10. Know someone effective at making decisions? Go to a model decision maker. Find someone around you who makes decisions in a way you think you ought to and ask how he/she does it. Go through several decision processes. Try to figure out with the person what questions he/she asks, and what principles are being followed. See how much he/she relies on advice, consults history for parallels, checks in with various
constituencies and how she/he gets familiar with unfamiliar areas.