Decision-Taking

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MTL: The Professional Development Programme
Decision-Taking
DECISION-TAKING
How good are your decisions?

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Decision-Taking
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Learn.
Decision-
Taking
Introduction: Managers, team leaders and their staff can take as many as a hundred or more
decisions in the course of a day, each day and every day. Many of these decisions are, of course, no
more than automatic responses to familiar situations in which they have to choose between two
or three options. However, from time to time, we all have to take decisions on which the course of
our future and that of others depends. Then, it is a question of making sure they are right. In this
topic, we’ll show you 7 principles to guide you in effective decision-making.

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Decision-Taking
1. TIMING
There are two traps when making decisions:
making them too soon and making them too
late. Some people make decisions too swiftly
because they are uncomfortable with the tension
that is created when a decision has to be made.
Other people delay making decisions because
they fear making a mistake. The best decisions
are hot-iron decisions: those that are made
when the iron is hot and the time is right.
Striking in the right place at the right time
Flickr attribution: /87106931@N00/14572111877/

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Decision-Taking
2. ALIGN
DECISIONS
WITH GOALS
The more decisions you make consciously, the
more you can align them with your goals and
purposes. Studies show that the average person
makes 612 decisions a day. Each one takes us
closer or further from our ultimate goals in life.
In a week that means 4,900 decisions. In a year,
254,800. Strategic thinking means looking at how
your decisions today affect your tomorrows.
When your decisions are in alignment with
what’s important to you, then life becomes
meaningful, productive and satisfying.
If you have too many goals, it’ll be hard to make a decision
Flickr attribution: /glacier_fed/5148744695/

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Decision-Taking
3. ACHIEVE A
BALANCE
There are three balancing acts to be aware of in
taking a good decision. The first is to care and
not care. Do all your worrying before the
decision and stop worrying after it is made. The
second is to avoid too much thinking at the
expense of action and too much action at the
expense of thought. The third is to look before
you leap and leap before you look. See the
possible risks of your decision but, once decided,
take the plunge with courage.
Weigh up every decision
Flickr attribution: /archeon/2941655917/

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Decision-Taking
4. THE FIVE
DON'TS
There are 5 "don'ts" in good decision-taking.
They are: DON'T make a decision unless you have
two or more equally valid options; DON'T make a
decision if it's somebody else's responsibility;
DON'T make a decision unless you have to;
DON'T make a decision about irrelevant matters;
DON'T make a decision if it can't be turned into
immediate action.
Get information before you decide
Flickr attribution: /ahnagi/14412077932/

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Decision-Taking
5. DECISION-
MAKING
MODELS
There are no guaranteed ways to make a perfect
decision. However, there are decision-making
systems that can help. One simple decision-
making system is to list all the pros in favour of
going with a decision on one side of a piece of
paper and all the cons on the other side and
then seeing where the balance lies. More
complex systems include models such as the Six
Thinking Hats and decision trees.
This way or that? A choice of two options
Flickr attribution: /ldejong/24943836736/

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Decision-Taking
6. BE READY
TO ACT
Eric Aronson tells this riddle: If 5 birds are sitting
on a wire and one of them decides to fly away,
how many are left? The answer is five. One bird’s
decision to fly away does not mean it did!
Theodore Roosevelt said that the worst thing you
can do when you have to make a decision is to
do nothing. Even if you make a wrong decision,
the very making of it and the learning from it are
steps forward.
Bird on a wire
Flickr attribution: /7490680@N02/4288513987/

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Decision-Taking
7. REVIEW
YOUR
DECISIONS
Decisions are a mix of what we currently want
(goals); what we currently know (information);
what we believe (outcomes); and what we can
do (actions). There is no guarantee that any of
these will stay the same or that they will come
right. No decision is perfect. This is because our
goal might change, the information might
change, our guess about the outcome might be
wrong, or our motivation might change.
We’re just having a think about it
Flickr attribution: /ingirogiro/119182013/

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Decision-Taking
This has been a Slide Topic from Manage Train Learn
AFinal
Word
Nobody who regularly makes important decisions affecting the lives of others will tell you hand on
heart that they get it right every time. Decision-taking is more of an art than a science. But
practice, and learning from our results, may at least take us closer down the road to a 100% strike
rate.

Decision-Taking

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