How postponing or avoiding decisions can hurt your team, your project, your reputation, or your market position
We all know that making decisions is a crucial part of leadership and teamwork. Whether it’s about choosing a strategy, setting a deadline, allocating resources, or resolving a conflict, decisions shape the direction and outcome of our work. But what happens when we delay or avoid making decisions? What are the costs and consequences of indecision? Are there any benefits to delayed decisions? And what are the factors that prevent us from making timely and effective decisions?
The Anatomy of a Decision
Before we dive into the consequences of delayed decisions, let’s understand what a decision is and how it works. A decision is a choice among alternatives based on some criteria and information. To make a decision, we need to have a clear goal, a set of options, a way to evaluate the options, and a commitment to act on the chosen option. Sounds simple, right? However, in reality, decision-making is often a complex and messy process that involves uncertainty, ambiguity, emotions, biases, and conflicts. That’s why we sometimes struggle to make decisions or end up making poor ones.
Delayed Decisions – Really?
Let’s look at the actual example of delayed decisions. For example, the price of delayed decision can be seen in the case of Kodak, a company that dominated the film photography industry for decades. However, when digital photography emerged, Kodak failed to adapt and invest in the new technology, and instead clung to its old business model. As a result, Kodak lost its market share, filed for bankruptcy, and became irrelevant in the digital era.
Nokia is another example of missed opportunity to adapt and innovate. The industry disrupters like Apple, Google, Meta, and ChatGPT will seize the opportunities to fill the gaps for the consumers. The dominant players who delayed their decisions to innovate, and adapt, will pay the ultimate price.
There are so many examples of big corporations delaying decisions to adapt with new disrupters entering the market at that time, and today, we cannot find them on the top innovators or top seller’s map.
The Consequences of Delayed Decisions
So, what happens when we delay or avoid making decisions? Here are some of the possible consequences of indecision:
- Missed opportunities: When we postpone or avoid making decisions, we may miss out on valuable opportunities that could benefit our team, our project, or our career. For example, if we delay choosing a vendor, we may lose the chance to get a better deal or a higher quality service. If we avoid deciding on a new feature, we may fall behind the market or the customer expectations.
- Wasted resources: When we delay or avoid making decisions, we may waste precious resources that could be used more efficiently or effectively. For example, if we postpone setting a deadline, we may create confusion and uncertainty among our team members, leading to lower productivity and motivation. If we avoid deciding on a budget, we may overspend or underspend, resulting in poor financial performance or quality issues.
- Damaged reputation: When we delay or avoid making decisions, we may damage our reputation as a leader or a team player. For example, if we postpone resolving a conflict, we may create resentment and distrust among our team members, affecting our team culture and morale. If we avoid deciding on a strategy, we may lose the respect and confidence of our stakeholders, affecting our credibility and influence.
It’s Not All Bad News, Though
On the other hand, delayed decision can also be a benefit in some situations, such as when there is high uncertainty, complexity, or volatility in the environment. For example, Netflix, a company that started as a DVD rental service, decided to wait and see how the streaming market would evolve before making a major move. By delaying its decision, Netflix was able to gather more information, learn from its competitors, and then launch its own successful streaming service that eventually disrupted the entertainment industry.
Barriers to Effective Decision-Making
So, why do we delay or avoid making decisions? Here are some of the common barriers that hinder our decision-making process:
- Lack of information: When we don’t have enough or accurate information, we may feel uncertain or insecure about making a decision. We may seek more information or analysis, hoping to reduce the uncertainty or risk. But sometimes, more information is not better. It may lead to information overload, analysis paralysis, or confirmation bias.
- Lack of clarity: When we don’t have a clear goal, criteria, or process, we may feel confused or overwhelmed by making a decision. We may struggle to define the problem, generate alternatives, or evaluate options. We may also face conflicting or competing goals, criteria, or interests, making it hard to align or prioritize.
- Lack of commitment: When we don’t have a strong commitment, motivation, or accountability, we may feel reluctant or resistant to making a decision. We may fear the consequences, the responsibility, or the feedback. We may also lack the confidence, the authority, or the support to make or implement the decision.
- Lack of risk appetite: A conservative risk approach can stall the innovation efforts of the organization leading to a bottleneck in decision making and delaying outcomes. The decision-making responsibilities will sit with executive leadership rather than the teams responsible for delivering the outcomes.
The Solutions for Timely and Effective Decision-Making
So, how can we overcome the barriers and make timely and effective decisions? Is there a silver bullet? How do fighter pilots make decisions during combat? Let’s look at some of the key areas that can improve the timeliness and effectiveness of the decision-making process.
- Gather relevant and reliable information: When we need more or better information, we should seek it from credible and diverse sources, but also set a limit on how much and how long we need to gather it. We should also be aware of our own biases and assumptions and challenge them with critical thinking and feedback.
- Clarify the goal, criteria, and process: When we need more clarity, we should define the problem, the objective, and the criteria for making a decision. We should also establish a clear and transparent process for generating, evaluating, and selecting options, and involve the relevant stakeholders and experts.
- Build commitment, motivation, and accountability: When we need more commitment, we should focus on the benefits and the urgency of making a decision, and the costs and the risks of delaying or avoiding it. We should also boost our confidence, authority, and support by communicating, delegating, and collaborating with our team and stakeholders.
- Embrace risk-taking mindset and foster culture of innovation: Embracing a risk-taking mindset can significantly improve an organisation’s creativity capabilities through enhanced creativity, culture of innovation, and in-return, improving the decision-making processes. It will build the organisational resilience and confidence among the team members to experiment, fail and learn from good and not-so good decisions.
If Fighter Pilots Can Make a Decision in a Split Second, Why Can’t We?
Hasard Lee, in “The Art of Clear Thinking,” examines how fighter pilots’ decision-making frameworks enable rapid choices during combat. It’s intriguing that with a clear framework, choosing the lesser of two evils becomes straightforward. Yet, without such guidelines, even simple decisions like software purchases or AI deployment become challenging.
Making decisions is not easy, but it is necessary and rewarding. By understanding the anatomy, the consequences, and the barriers of decision-making, we can improve our decision-making skills and avoid the consequences of delayed decisions. Remember, a timely and effective decision is better than a perfect or no decision.