Decision Making: How do you do it?

Thank you for your visit.

This page and site has been moved to TalkingStory.org

NEW LINK: Decision Making: How do you do it?

Comments

[Lee Iwan]

I "write to think", handwritten is better than keyboard, and use a lot of mind mapping to clarify or determine what I am missing. This applies to business and personal decision-making.

Tough decisions are then analyzed, short vs. long-term results and risks taken into account. The idea is to take emotion out of the decision making process.

Always sleep on a decision before implementing it.

When asking others about possible solutions I look for their frame of reference or process, and not their final advice or recommendations.

All decisions are not logical, in order to innovate I will also analyze the possibility of using a disruptive decision in order to mix things up, criteria here is a investigation of a "worse case" scenario...how bad could it possibly be?

Brilliant theme, thanks for inserting this into my Sunday!

Lee

[Rosa Say]

What a fabulously meaty comment Lee, mahalo, for I could respond to almost every line of it as I compare our best practices!

Just as one for instance...
I know what you mean about "handwritten is better than keyboard," however when I am truly on a roll I write too slow and feel so clumsy. So I will draw or mind-map and flow chart instead, but usually I have a Word doc opened too for the detail I want - I am a much faster typist.

[Lee Iwan]

Forgot to mention that it helps to break out of my "normal" workspaces at times.

The airport, coffee shop or other spaces allow me to include other stimuli and to challenge or refresh "tried and true" established patterns.

Lee

[Rosa Say]

A good add Lee: Our environments and sense-of-place connections can be a big influence.

I also think we can all learn from comparing how our process might change when we decide on our own, and when we are purposely trying to come to a collaborative decision - say in a team, in our work contexts, or with a mastermind group.

[Lee Iwan]

Very important differences re: group vs. individual decisions. I have genuine difficulties making collaborative decisions, much more time consuming.

Many times the solutions/decisions must be negotiated which is an essential yet exhausting process. Always wishing the others had the same "aha" flash of understanding that led me to my decision.

When clear hierarchies are present, much easier, facts presented and questioned, recommendations made, decision taken.

It all gets muddier when there are no clear hierarchies and structures (also more interesting inter-peraonal and creative dynamics). Dangerous if there is a dominate personality that prevents interaction and dissent.

[Timothy Johnson]

Hi Rosa - great stuff here! Like with most things in life, I view decision-making like another system (there is no wing at the Betty Ford clinic for systems thinking addicts, by the way).

The inputs are the decision variables, including the need for making a decision in the first place and the data available.

The throughput (or transformation process) is our decision-making process, or how we convert those variables into...

The output (the decision itself), the outcome of our thought process.

The feedback loop of our decision-management (follow-through on this decision as well as other related decisions) helps lead to other decisions' inputs.

Great discussion... I've always been fascinated by how people make their decisions.

[Joanna Young]

Rosa - "I'm not entirely sure" would be the honest answer to your question.

In my previous management job - by a mixture of listening, analysis, trusting my own judgement, calculating the time available to think/decide, then setting a clear course and working out what needed to be done to take us there.

Life decisions are always more difficult, messy, and murky (in my experience anyway!), they take longer, seem difficult and uncertain, take a lot of agonising over, are eventually determined by... intuition.

Not always accompanied by certainty or no regret. Would that it were so.

But once on my way... all the other decisions about how, process, time... well they fit fairly easily into place, and I probably do them on an on-going basis (but not in the organised / documented way you describe... more as I go along)

Does that answer any of the question?

[Rosa Say]

Coming to a group decision will always mean a more difficult blending Lee, but that can also mean a success with reaching a collaborative decision that is all the sweeter! The kind of ‘hard work’ that feels so good when we know we have given it our very best, getting to true collaboration versus settling for cooperation or consensus.

Ah Timothy, you are so good for the more logical affirmation of all of this! I absolutely love it when I can get good systems-thinking aligned with my more trust-in-your-gut sensibility for things. I do admit that in my case, that first bit – “the need for making a decision in the first place” can largely come from pure instinct —at least urgency/priority-wise it always seems to be talking to me loudest!

Joanna, as with my response to Timothy, I’m a big believer in one’s intuition: I am certain we have an innate wisdom for what ultimately is best for us in personal decisions most of all. I guess ultimately the question is just about if you feel you need to further explore your own process or not, and I like to explore processes like these for two main reasons: First for their self-attuned affirmation (as you know, that is part of aloha spirit-spilling for me) and second because I want to be sure I duplicate what I know works for me, encouraging the habit-forming patterns of my best behaviors.

[Timothy Johnson]

Hi Rosa - intuition is every bit as part of a decision input as facts and data. Intuition is really just our experiences and knowledge stored by our subconscious, but that makes it no less important. A great decision maker will look at both facts and data AND intuition and gut. My best decisions have used both.

This discussion is so critical at helping people dissect this very important and life-changing skill. Thanks for bringing it up.

[Rosa Say]

I like your definition of intuition Timothy, and I do think it includes our emotional intelligence too.

[Lorraine Rinker]

Hi Rosa - What a fascinating theme to reflect on. You are receiving wonderful responses and I appreciate the opportunity to participate.

Ideas don't become "real" for me until I've written them down. I get a visual in my mind of what the end result will look like and typically need to translate it to "paper" in order to commit it to memory. I keep a business journal for daily streaming of ideas - - the bigger the decision, the more intense and fluid my writing and drawing becomes.

I've always been a "big picture" person, I believe this is where most leaders excel. Connect the Dots was my favorite game to play when I was a kid. I found such joy in revealing the hidden picture, bringing it to life by simply drawing lines from one dot to the next. Today, connecting all the dots (systems thinking, collaboration and community) to create the picture (revealing the true potential in all of us) is still my favorite thing to do.

I look at my approach to decision making as a combination of analytics and art. Balance and alignment is key - - words and images, left and right brain, the heart and the head.

Mahalo for giving us a moment of clarity. Best/Lorraine