Your personal values are important as they are the things that guide you in life, particularly when you make choices. This YouTube video gives an introduction to how you can work out your top 3 values:
This video looks at 4Ps that can help understand and identify your personal values. These are:
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
Video: Introduction to The Right Questions Framework
What is The Right Questions Framework? The Right Questions is a conceptual tool to improve critical thinking, decision-making, problem solving and planning. Here is a short introductory YouTube video:
The Right Questions Framework Video Content
The video includes:
The story behind The Right Questions
Question technique using the seven main interrogatives
How the framework relates to decision-making, planning and better thinking
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
Here is a short introductory video about The Right Questions.
“Successful people ask better questions, and as a result, they get better answers.” Tony Robbins
Ask the right questions, get the right answers and become more effective at decision making, strategic planning and achieving goals.
The Right Questions (video introduction)
“A prudent question is one half of wisdom.” Francis Bacon
To make a good decision, whether, in a personal or business context, the first step is to correctly frame the challenge. Asking questions does this. ‘The Right Questions’ is a simple and memorable method to make good decisions and to create effective plans.
Philosophers identified the most important questions over two thousand years ago. But this first-principles approach has been somewhat lost in formal education today, partly due to the level of detail that is pursued in an increasingly complex world.
The information available via the Internet is seemingly endless but this has a downside. It is easy to become overloaded with data or miss out on important factors when making a decision. And there is a problem with some decision-making processes too; a lot of systems rely on jargon that is not memorable or straightforward to apply.
Interrogative Open Questions
Therefore we need an easy to access tool to deal with complex and evolving situations. The good news is that the core questions are actually embedded in language. The seven basic interrogative questions of what, where, why, when, who, how and which are the triggers needed to unlock any problem. It is then just a case of understanding their application.
The Right Questions methodology uses the seven core interrogatives and applies them to strategic planning, implement projects and achieving goals. It is a creative process, described as “deeply motivational”.
The Right Questions approach is used in coaching and consultancy as well as being a decision-making tool. Simon Ash developed the framework from his experience as a Bomb Disposal Officer.
“Ask the right questions, get the right answers, and be more effective.”
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
The initial questions of why (principles, priorities and passions) where (situation and vision) and what (mission, success criteria) provide the strategic framing for any plans we make. The quality of the options we develop to achieve success and the effectiveness of our planning depends largely on the development of the overall strategy.
The second part or stage is called the ‘reflection point’. In every decision making cycle you consider your options in the light of the situation, the risks and opportunities. This reflection point either takes you back to Stage 1, and a further iteration of refining the Strategic Framing, or onto Stage 3, Developing a Plan, where an actionable plan can be created for the chosen course of action, fulfilling the strategy.
The third section on planning uses the questions how, who and when to explore the detail needed to deliver on your desired course of action in alignment with your overall strategy.
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
The 10 Critical Core Competencies of High Performers
How do you stand out in the workplace? What core competencies must you have to be successful in business? Work in all sectors is increasingly dynamic, and in order to succeed, employees must have the ability to deal with complexity, identify critical information, make sound decisions, and collaborate effectively with people both inside and outside their immediate environment. The problem is, many people lack the skills that employers need to achieve their goals.
CEB, a member-based advisory company based in the US, has recently published research looking into this challenge and the results are of vital importance to employers and employees alike. As a consultant friend of mine noted ‘this is gold dust!’ If you are wanting to be hired or looking to hire people then you should be thinking about this list of core competencies.
But before the list, here is Conrad Schmidt, global research officer for CEB, who frames the problem in this way:
“Employees today have more ambiguous objectives and are working with larger groups of stakeholders, making both flexibility and the ability to collaborate ‘must-have’ competencies for companies seeking higher levels of performance. Important business decisions are also being made lower in the organization, putting an even higher premium on good judgment. Building the next generation of high-performers will require organizations to cultivate these skills within their employee base and to be keenly aware of the dramatic shifts occurring in today’s work environment.”
CEB looked at the performance of over 20,000 workers from across the globe, incorporating data gathered from more than 40 different organisations. The conclusion of the study was that there are 10 competencies that, when exhibited together, identify someone as a high performer. The core competencies are:
The Right Questions is a framework that can be used as a tool to address these core competencies. If you are seeking to improve in one of these areas then coaching can be a highly effective way to help you develop in these key areas.
Coaching, when done well, supports a client in achieving a specific personal or professional goal generally through facilitation of thinking. This creates an environment of learning for the coachee.
Coaching can be described as:
Unlocking people’s potential to maximise their own performance. (Whitmore 2009: 11)
Or
The art of facilitating the performance, learning and development of another. (Downey, 2003:21)
Research has confirmed that one-to-one coaching is the most effective and satisfying way to help people achieve their goals. This is compared to group coaching, teaching or self-coaching (Losch et al; 2016).
If you would like to find out more about coaching and how to find a coach then please do email me via our contact page.
Also, you might be interested in The Quest, which is an online virtual coaching course which leads on you a journey of self-discovery, improvement and success. Just sign up using the link below to try the first module for free:
Whitmore, J (2009) Coaching for Performance: GROWing Human Potential and Purpose: The Principles and Practice of Coaching and Leadership, 4th London: Nicholas Brealey.
Downey, M (2003) Effective Coaching: Lessons from the Coach’s Coach, 2nd London: Texere.
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
We need to be continually assessing our decisions and learning from our actions; especially from our mistakes. This goes for everyone, but particularly for leaders.
“If history repeats itself, and the unexpected always happens, how incapable must Man be of learning from experience.”
George Bernard Shaw
Bomb disposal: where mistakes can be costly
After a couple of years of experience in Bomb Disposal, I went to Africa with my unit. We were there to clear an area that was littered with bombs of various descriptions. My troops, with the help of some local tribesmen, scoured the bush looking for anything that might go bang. They would call me up when they found something. But, as there was no shortage of ordnance, they would stockpile munitions (if they were safe to move) so that they could be dealt with in one go.
On this particular day, I was with my Non-Commissioned Officers and we went together to sort out the latest haul. The Staff Sergeant and I had passed our training together and we got on very well, so it was a pleasure to spend some time working in unison. Today we had a pile of artillery shells to dispose of, a fairly simple task.
It looked like a good plan until…
And so we made a quick plan. We worked the explosive charge we needed to use, then all we had to do was light the fuse and withdraw to a safe distance. We had not been able to get the Landrover right up to the site, because of the difficult terrain. So, we chose a spot in the distance – a hill that offered some cover from the blast – that we could walk to. We then cut the fuse to the right length in order to allow us enough time to get there.
After checking our work we lit the fuse, checked our watches and set off towards the small hill. That was to be our protective cover. We chatted about important things, such as how many letters we had received that week and how much we wanted a cold beer. The funny thing was that the escarpment was not getting any closer; so we increased our pace. Still, we laughed and joked as we walked briskly along.
But, another look at our watches gave us some cause for alarm.
There was no longer laughing or even chatting. All that was said was, “We are not going to get there in time, do you see any other cover?” We spotted what seemed to be a series of gullies over to our left so we headed towards them. Upon reaching them our relief quickly turned back to anxiety. Even though the gullies were deep, the shallow angle of the slopes would afford us little cover. We ran on.
At this point in the proceedings, I sent up one of my most eloquent prayers. It went something like this: “GOD HELP!” We only had seconds to go and so we dived into a shallow pit. We had to crouch down with our backs to the sand to keep our heads below the parapet.
The explosion
For a few seconds, the only sound was our thumping hearts, heavy breathing and the noise of a nonchalant fly investigating my hat. Then we felt the explosion – a pulse through the earth and a punch through the air. We looked at one another. No words were exchanged but much was communicated. We were both thinking the same thing: that was a bigger bang than expected; we felt dreadfully close!
I was hoping that (from the way we had positioned the munitions) the blast would be mostly directed into the ground. But then there came a sound that made me flinch. It was like an angry hornet going past my ear, and then there was another, followed by little thuds and puffs of sand as the shrapnel came down around us. As the deadly rain struck the ground there was little we could do, so I opted to laugh and my colleague used a varied, colourful (but sadly unrepeatable) string of words to express his feelings.
Learning from mistakes
When our self-induced bombardment came to an end and it was obvious we were both not only alive but also unharmed. Therefore we spent a few precious seconds enjoying the quiet. After our short pause, we decided to walk back to the site and review our procedures before moving onto the next cache of weaponry. It was obvious that we had some important lessons to learn.
“It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.”
Bill Gates
We had gone through the whole process of making and executing a plan. Something had gone wrong and therefore we needed to reflect and learn from that. In this case, a good plan was undermined by simple heuristics. I used a ‘unit of measure’ heuristic to judge the distance from where we were, to where we needed to get to for our safety. Because of the lack of features in the terrain – things like trees that I knew the size of and could compare – I inaccurately estimated the distance we needed to travel, and therefore underestimated the length of fuse needed for our controlled explosion.
This usually good heuristic was undermined by those spatial effects and my own cognitive bias. I allowed what I thought I could see to affect my perception (a framing effect) and then allowed what I thought my plan should be to shape how I interpreted the data (confirmation bias). In psychological terms, my System 1 (fast) thinking undermined my System 2 (slow) thinking.
As I walked back, post-explosion, I knew that I had other demolition tasks that I had to go to. I reflected, realised my mistake, and that reflective process allowed me to learn from the experience and avoid making the same mistake again.
Building reflection into the decision-making process
Sometimes you just can’t help making mistakes. Hopefully, as in my case, you can survive and learn from the error. To enable this we should always build in time to reflect and learn. Fortunately, if you think of decision-making as cyclical, rather than linear, then it lends itself to doing just that.
The fact is that the process of planning, looking at options and making decisions does not ever stop. We may start with a more in-depth planning process but we will constantly be making new decisions, reviewing our progress and adapting our plans. This is why the cycle of decision making never ceases, as we see in the illustration below.
The trick is, as we move forward, to make sure we take time to pause and reassess our plans as we go.
Constant change requires constant reflection and improvement
The world and our situation are constantly changing. We need flexibility in order to adapt as we go. Sometimes this happens through subtle transformation, sometimes through more formal change management. However we do it, if we want to learn and be more effective, we need a process of reviewing our actions and decisions.
This can be just taking an objective pause to reflect in the decision-making process, as happens under the ‘which’ step within The Right Questions framework (number 4 in the picture above).
When is the best time for reflection and learning?
Some pauses may be longer than others. We need pit stops as well as the end of race review; time out huddles, as well as the big post-match, debrief. It is worth planning these in through the life of a project. Sometimes it is hard to stop to review because we feel we should be getting on with something. At times like this, we need to remember progress is no good if it is in the wrong direction. We need to take time to stop and check.
In the end, when we need a post-project review, it is easy to put it in the programme but requires real discipline to actually do it. It can be hard to enforce a time of reflection at a time when people just want to celebrate or they just want to move on it to the next thing. Once you have achieved a goal, especially when it goes well, the temptation is to skip over the review. Don’t. There are always important things to learn at this stage. If you discuss them and record them, then others can learn from your experiences too.
History may repeat itself because people fail to read history, but don’t be guilty of not giving people the chance to learn in the first place. Take the time out to share.
Whatever point in our journey we have reached, after a review we can decide which things in our plan need to change and which things remain the same. Most importantly we can identify success and plan to build on it.
Failing is just learning to succeed
What about things that did not go so well? We can be afraid of failure and afraid to admit it when we do fail, therefore we need to change the way we see things when they don’t go to plan. If something has gone wrong then we can turn it into a learning opportunity.
Thomas Edison, the great empirical inventor, knew the value of learning from apparent failure. He had thousands of attempts to create an effective electric light bulb, but those that did not work he did not consider failures, just as positive proofs of how not to make a light bulb! Even after his initial patent, he continued to refine his light bulb design for decades afterwards. His approach to reviewing and applying lessons was lifelong and contributed to him being the fourth most prolific inventor in history. Edison said:
“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”
Thomas Edison
And that is a good lesson to end with. Not to give up, never to give in, no matter what the challenges are. Take a moment to reflect and learn right now: which heroic failures have you learned from?
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
Why is prioritising the key to good decision making?
We have already seen, in the section on values, that our principles are at our centre and act as a compass to help guide us. This guidance becomes very practical in decision-making as our values help us prioritise.
Living in an age of choice
Being able to prioritise well, and therefore able to make effective decisions, is of ever-increasing importance today. Never before has there been so much information or so many choices for us to wade through on a daily basis.
In former times, people (especially academics) were valued for what they knew; the experts in their field were the gatekeepers to knowledge on any given subject area. But that power base has been somewhat eroded in recent years and the value of being a person who just ‘knows things’ has been diminished. What is the main reason for that? In short: the Internet. In the age of the Internet, we have more information at our fingertips than ever before in the history of mankind.
Internet by Birgerking via Flickr
We also have more choice than ever before. A supermarket is a dangerous place to go without a plan. Even with two simple staples, rice and sugar, you could fill a whole trolley with the various alternatives on offer in the aisles. When you go into a coffee shop you can no longer simply ask for a coffee; such a statement would bring consternation for the barista, impatience for other customers and shame for you! We all know that we need to practise our order while in the queue. We need to say “extra-large-double-shot-skinny-soya-latte to go” with confidence!
But all this choice and information presents a new challenge; people are overloaded with information and paralysed by the number of choices available. The challenge today is not about knowing things so much as knowing how to sift, analyse and usefully apply the tornado of data that sweeps around us. Want a lesson in irony? Type ‘information overload’ into a search engine and see how many results it churns out in a fraction of a second!
“Getting information off the Internet is like taking a drink from a fire hydrant.” Mitch Kapor
Our values aid us in the battle against information overload and potential analysis paralysis. This is important as time is spent over decisions and there is an opportunity cost even just in deciding to spend time deliberating an option. Many people today will spend hours pouring over the next gadget to buy and yet fail to give time to decisions that really matter.
Making a decision also relieves stress. The number of decisions we need to make, coupled with the importance of many of these decisions, can put us under real pressure. By reducing the number of decisions we have to make and actually committing, we can release pressure and reduce our stress levels. Introducing pre-planned systems, processes and delegation can also help.
One of the challenges that make decisions hard is that we are generally choosing between several good things. It is not just a choice between one good and one bad thing. This brings in a new challenge. As Jim Collins points out, the ‘good can be the enemy of the great’. Our limited time and resources can be used up on lots of good things but we could still end up missing the best thing.
Therefore prioritising is of critical importance. If we are going to achieve our best then we are going to have to make the right decisions. Our values will help to guide us and if you want help working out your values read:
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
What you prioritise, in your work and your leisure time, is important. It has a cumulative effect – for good or ill – over time. Therefore identifying and setting your priorities is key.
Every day we make decisions that reflect our values and priorities in life. Where we choose to spend our resources of time, energy and money reflect what we think is valuable.
What does it mean to have priorities?
I started playing the guitar in my teens but I had never really improved beyond a certain (and fairly basic) level. Why? Quite simply it was because I never practised enough. It was not that I did not like playing the guitar; it was just that I enjoyed other things more.
In my dreams, I could play like Jimi Hendrix. In my mind’s eye, I could see myself saving the day at a gig, strolling onto the stage to replace an injured lead guitarist and stunning my friends with amazing solos, my fingers a blur on the fretboard! But there was a big difference between successful guitarists and me. That difference went beyond just raw talent (of which I had very little).
Guitar legends such as Jimi Hendrix or Eric Clapton would pick a guitar up at the beginning of the day and would hardly put it down until they went to bed; it is like an extension of their body. I rarely picked mine up at all. When practising I got frustrated or bored pretty quickly. If I had the choice between practising for an hour or going to the gym I would generally choose the latter.
fretboard blues fender by johnbatliner
I realised that I did not have the motivation to be the guitarist I dreamed of being because I did not value it enough. It turned out that this dream was not one worth pursuing. Therefore, because I needed time to invest in other things I decided to sell my guitars and properly pursue other dreams. I did not want the good to be the enemy of the great.
How do you prioritise your time? Which things should you do and which things should you avoid? What principles or tools do you use to help you with prioritising?
Think about pastimes for a moment. How many things do you enjoy in your leisure time? I enjoy doing lots of different things: writing, reading, watching films, drawing, listening to music, keeping fit, playing sports and many more things besides. As time has gone on and more pressures are applied to my time I decided to take a good look at how I invested the finite time that I have. It was at this point I realised that there is no such thing as free time; you can spend it at will but you cannot pay to get any more, let alone claim a free top-up.
So I decided I needed to be more focused on how I spent my time. There were several things I read that particularly helped me here. Here are three recommended resources.
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People
Firstly I read Stephen Covey’s book, The Seven Habits of Highly EffectivePeople. This has a really practical way of prioritising tasks depending on their urgency and importance (also referred to as the Eisenhower Matrix). When analysing our time management it can be scary to see how much we spend on unimportant and non-urgent tasks. This can be surfing the web, or reading seemingly urgent (yet unimportant) emails that keep popping into our inbox. This challenged me so much that I now do not keep my email application open. I check it a maximum of a couple of times a day and prioritise the mail before I respond. I also turn off a lot of notifications on apps.
The Pareto Principle
Secondly, I read about the 80-20 rule, also known as the Pareto principle. This states that generally, 20% of our efforts produce 80% of the results. In other words, in business, 80% of profits come from 20% of your work. On the negative side, it is likely that 80% of your complaints come from 20% of your clients! Therefore, by identifying the most useful 20% of what we do (and who we work with) we can maximise that. By reinforcing success we can multiply what we can achieve. By cutting the dross we can also be more efficient.
Outliers: The Story of Success
Thirdly I read Anders Ericsson’s study (referred to in Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers: The Story of Success) that proposed that becoming really good at anything was more a matter of time than anything else, and around 10,000 hours of effective application was needed to excel at something (by the way, that equates to about 20 hours a week for 10 years – no small investment of time). I decided that I needed to identify my most effective gifts, time and tasks and concentrate on them. One simple application of this was how I use my day. My most productive time is in the morning, between breakfast and lunch. That is when I plan to do the bulk of my ‘productive’ tasks such as writing. The afternoon I reserve primarily for meetings, emails and things that require (for me) a slightly lower level of energy and concentration.
From my reading there are several prioritisation techniques and tools that I have adopted. I have written other posts about the ones I use most. You can read them by following the links below:
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
How To Make Decisions And Use A Decision-Making Process
When was the last time you made a decision? It was probably when you decided to click on the link and read this article! So, what decision-making process did you use? How much time did you think about it? One way or another you just experienced a decision-making process. And that was but one of perhaps hundreds of decisions you have made already today.
What is decision-making?
Put simply, decision-making is the process of considering, and making a choice between, various courses of action.
A decision can be defined as:
“Come or bring to a resolution in the mind as a result of consideration.”
or
“Make a choice from a number of alternatives.”
Lexico (Oxford English Dictionary)
Decision-making can be further defined as:
“The action or process of making important decisions.”
Lexico (Oxford English Dictionary)
But even these definitions, though useful, can be misleading as many of the decisions we make every day are unconscious. Also, we apply process – of sorts – even to non-important decisions.
Decision-making is a process, but it is actually something we do constantly. Whether we are conscious of the process or not, we are faced with a multitude of decisions to make every day. Estimates vary as to exactly how many, but, researcher Sheena Iyengar did studies of US adults showing they made around 70 conscious decisions on a daily basis.
And there are higher estimates. Researchers at Cornell University have shown that we make 226.7 decisions each day on just food alone (Wansink and Sobal, 2007). I am guessing my .7 decision was when I nearly had that extra cup of coffee…
And that is just for choices about food! Think about all the other decisions we have to make. For example, even as I type I am making a constant string of choices of which words to use in order to express what I want to say.
Some online sources estimate that we make around 35,000 decisions a day. This estimate is based on the number of thoughts we have per second. This is not an exact measure by any means. But, what is certain, is that we have to make loads of decisions! Many of these choices are conscious ones, and these require some sort of applied process.
“Time is like a river that carries us forward into encounters with reality that require us to make decisions. We can’t stop our movement down this river and we can’t avoid those encounters. We can only approach them in the best possible way.”
Ray Dalio
The Paralysis of Analysis
Have you ever stood in a supermarket and stared for an age, weighing up a choice between similar items?
Most of us will have experienced this kind of analysis paralysis to one level or another. It happens when the choice is too great, alternatives too similar or the choice is outside of our usual frame of reference. To avoid this paralysis we often rely on heuristics – simple decision-making tools, rules or hacks – to help us make informed decisions. For example, we might prefer one particular brand or product and just pick that so we don’t have to give it too much thought. This can be an effective heuristic – to save us time, ensure quality or save money.
Using Heuristics
But, knowing about psychology, it is also these sorts of biases and heuristics that marketing experts love to exploit. To understand more on this subject then I recommend you read Daniel Kahneman’s acclaimed book Thinking Fast and Slow. Kahneman is recognised as the world leader in understanding heuristics and bias.
As Kahneman demonstrates in his research, most decisions we make are actually unconscious ones. It would take too long to use a process or explore the pros and cons of every decision. We can risk paralysis by analysis if we spend too much time on a decision, as we can become overloaded by information.
Some decisions are relatively unimportant. This could include choosing which clothes to wear, what to eat for lunch or what to watch on television. For these decisions, simple heuristics – even flipping a coin or rolling dice – can be effective.
Some decisions are much more important, such as the choice of spouse, partner, career or work. Similarly, large purchases, such as buying a property, are significant decisions. We instinctively know that we should take more time and effort over the more important decisions. The problem is that we do not necessarily understand how we make decisions. Nor do we have the tools to help us make the best choice. So how can we do it better?
What was the last big decision you made and how did you make it?
We often think of decision-making as a rational process involving our logic to solve a problem. But decision-making is not just problem analysis (although they are linked). Also, a lot of decision-making is influenced more by emotion than by logic.
This is not necessarily a bad thing. Our emotions are very important and employing them does not necessarily make a choice irrational. Emotions and passions are connected to our experiences, preferences and values.
If we were purely rational we would operate according to Rational Choice Theory. This means we would always make the choice that offers the best statistical chance of success or reward. However various scientific studies have shown that this is not the case. We are not purely rational and can be heavily influenced, by ourselves, others and circumstances to make quite irrational decisions.
The psychology of decision-making
People don’t realise that they often influence and even fool themselves. Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber published a paper in 2011 that concluded we use our reason and logic, not to get to the truth or to make good decisions, but primarily to strengthen our position and persuade other people that we are right. This is confirmation bias, where we selectively choose data that supports our decision. This is just one example of cognitive bias.
Our circumstances also play a large part in our decision making especially if we are in stressful conditions. At the extreme level, we could be affected by the ‘fight, flight or freeze’ responses first outlined by Walter Bradford Cannon. These physiological responses have a direct influence on our psychology and may even completely override our conscious decision-making capacity.
Other people can also bias our decisions. This could be simple peer pressure or more manipulative influence employed by an individual. Our psychology can be exploited. As mentioned earlier, salespeople have long understood this, hence strategies such as creating the idea of scarcity or advertising using subliminal suggestion and product placement.
Being aware of the influences we have is very important if we want to make good decisions. Decision-making processes can help us as they encourage us to take a step back from our situation and assess it more objectively. This will not eliminate bias but it will help.
Decision-making processes also seek to identify the stages needed to make a decision so we can follow through on a choice in a logical manner. One common breakdown of the steps is shown below:
The 7 steps to a decision-making process
Outline the goal or outcome/analyse the problem
Gather data/consider factors
Develop alternatives/courses of action
Consider the pros and cons of each alternative
Make the decision
Implement the decision/take action
Learn from the decision
To some level, most people apply a decision-making process at some time, even if they don’t call it by that name. Making a list of the pros and cons of a decision is one of the simplest and most common decision-making processes. Related to this is the setting of priorities or by reducing choices by process of elimination.
One process we employ is giving our decision making to people and things. Acquiescing responsibility for a decision, as we do to our elected politicians, or delegating decision making to subordinates is a decision making process. Flipping a coin is a way of acquiescing responsibility to fate or probability (depending upon your view of the world) whereas there is also an increasing array of software that we can also use to support our decision making, or even to make decisions for us.
Why are decision making processes important?
How much training have you had, specifically on decision-making?
Despite the importance of decision-making and the general awareness of decision-making processes, very few organisations put much time and training into teaching people how to make better decisions. We gain a certain amount of critical thinking and problem analysis through our formal education but few people feel properly prepared to make important decisions in their work, especially when they may need to defend their position, demonstrate their rationale and persuade others to follow a decision.
Many existing processes within organisations support decision-making. For example, a tender process, where bids from vendors are received and reviewed, is a decision-making process. This sort of selection process takes into account factors important to a contract, such as cost, quality and the track record of a company. Voting in a meeting is another simple process. It is a democratic heuristic, testing not only how people think or feel about an idea but also then putting pressure on others to support a decision once votes are cast.
Teaching decision making
But few people – including leaders – are taught decision-making skills that can be used more generally. There are a few institutions that have recognised the importance of teaching tools and processes to their decision-makers, to equip them to make informed choices. The military and the medical profession are key examples of this. This is because those with responsibility in these professions are dealing with life-and-death decisions, often made under highly stressful and emotionally charged situations. In these careers, where people are held accountable for such weighty choices it is no surprise that a lot of thinking has gone into good decision making.
The Military Decision-Making Process of the United States Army) and the UK Military Combat Estimate Process (known as the Seven Questions are examples of these sorts of tools that share much in common and reflect the seven steps outlined above.
But the challenge I bring to leaders in all walks of life is this: even if a decision you make is not likely to be life or death, it can still radically affect the quality of people’s lives, as well as the success and profitability of an organisation. So is it any less important to make good decisions in other spheres of work?
What decision making processes are there to use?
The good news is, that even if you have not had formal decision-making training, there is help available. There are plenty of robust decision-making processes and tools around, it is just choosing the best one for you, your team and your situation.
A good starting point is understanding decision-making at its most basic and for this I would recommend looking at the OODA loop. OODA stands for ‘Observe, Orientate, Decide, Act’ and you can learn more about it in my post on The OODA Loop Decision Making Cycle.
My experience as a Bomb Disposal Officer, leadership coach and management consultant led me to develop my own decision-making process that I dubbed The Right Questions. This is a simple tool that uses the interrogative words of the English language as prompts for the steps you need to take and questions you need to ask when making decisions. You can find out more by reading The Right Questions Framework Guide.
Is decision making just for leaders?
Decision making is becoming of increasing importance to those not in traditional leadership roles. Organisations are becoming less hierarchical in structure and in today’s fluid and fast moving work place the best employees are those who can take the initiative, make and act upon good decisions.
Therefore everyone can benefit from understanding more about the way we make decisions and from learning simple decision-making processes.
And as we have seen, good decision-making is not just important in the workplace. We all have to make decisions that affect the direction of our lives. This is why as a coach I have found that processes, such as The Right Questions, can be equally as helpful in exploring the bigger questions of life.
Where are you heading? What do you want to achieve? How are you planning to get there?
Taking things further
You may want also want some help, improving your decision-making and becoming more effective at achieving your goals. I have the pleasure of seeing amazing, positive, transformations in the individuals and organisations I work with. If you would like some assistance too, in person or online, then please do drop me a line. You can email me via the contact page.
I look forward to hearing from you!
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
Considering how many decisions we make on a daily basis it is amazing how little training we receive in decision-making. Perhaps it is even more surprising that – despite all our advances in science and particularly psychology – quite how hard it is to capture the complexity of human decisions.
The capacity that humans have to make decisions, be that through intuition or rational thought, is something that sets us aside from everything else on the planet; be that animals or computers.
In an ever faster-paced and changing world, with growing access to information and choice, it is of growing importance to understand decision-making. If we want to become comfortable with uncertainty, risk and change; if we aspire to embrace learning, innovation and growth, then we need to be better at making decisions.
We all can make better decisions, but if you are a leader or manager, and your decisions affect the people and organisation you are responsible for, then this skill is of critical importance. It is no surprise that decision-making is recognised as a vital leadership skill.
How do we get better at decision-making?
To be more effective at decision making we need to look at questions such as: is intuition or rational thought better for making decisions? How do we make logical or ethical decisions? Can we even classify decisions in these ways? Can we override our biases and fallacies? When are statistics and decision-making models effective and when not? Which approaches and tools can help us? How can we think more effectively?
Here are some reviews and summaries of great books to help you on this journey. You will capture a glimpse of how amazing your brain is while getting a feel for its limitations. You will learn to embrace your innate ability to make superb decisions along with being more cognisant of the heuristics and biases we all harbour. Armed with this knowledge you can develop strategies, and choose the right tools, to help make the best decisions in the various situations you are confronted with.
If you like the look of any of the books just click on the pictures to link to their reviews on Amazon.
Thinking Fast and Slow is an international bestseller by Daniel Kahneman. Kahneman’s book is perhaps best known for his helpful and widely used classification of decision-making into system one; intuitive (fast) decision-making and system two; logical or rational (slow) decision-making. The book distils several decades of research on cognitive bias, prospect theory and happiness. It is highly instructive, especially in understanding the intellectual challenges we face when making decisions.
Malcolm Gladwell’s bestselling book Blink is all about our amazing ability to make fast and effective decisions. In other words, it is about intuitive thought and how we know things without knowing. At the heart of this book is the idea of keeping decision-making simple and avoiding the ‘analysis paralysis’ that can be the result of too much information. It is full of fascinating examples and insight and provides an interesting counterpoint to Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow.
In his book Thinking, John Brockman, publisher of Edge.org, brings together a selection of essays and transcripts in this book that explore various facets of thinking and decision-making from leading psychologists, philosophers and neuroscientists. The book is intellectually challenging and tackles diverse issues such as desire, intuition, morality, statistics, rationality and human nature. I found the content humbling, as it opens the door to the amazing complexity of the brain and how much we still have to learn. It does not serve particularly well as an introduction to decision making but if you are interested in the subject then it does expose you to some of the leading thinkers and ideas in this field of psychology.
In Time to Think,Nancy Kline demonstrates that the quality of our thinking depends largely on the situation provided for us to think within. In particular, Nancy shows the empowering nature of focused attention and how active listening enables us to think better. The concept of ‘The Thinking Environment’ outlined in this book can help to transform your work meetings and personal relationships. The book is a rallying call to improve not just the way we work, but the way we approach life. I found it inspirational, I think you will too.
Steve Peters is a psychiatrist and sports psychologist who has worked extensively in the field of elite sports, and most notably with British Cycling. The Chimp Paradox seeks to explain, in simple terms, how the mind works and how to manage thoughts and emotions in order to be more confident, effective and happy. Although the book does not set itself out to be about decision making per se, the mind management model – that compares the emotional ‘chimp’ mind to the logical ‘human’ mind – is very much related to Kahneman’s systems one and two thinking or intuitive and rational decision making.
The Decision Book is a highly practical guide to 50 decision-making tools that can be employed in various circumstances. It is broken down into four sections looking at; how to improve yourself, how to understand yourself better, how to understand others better and how to improve others. Even if you already know and use a few decision-making techniques you can guarantee that there are more in this book to challenge and inspire you.
Ciadini’s book Influence is one of the ‘go-to’ works on marketing and why people say ‘yes’. Ciadini’s research outlines the various ways we influence other people (and get influenced ourselves) when making decisions. Whether you are trying to impact someone else’s way of thinking or wanting to be aware of what sways your own decision-making, this is a must-read.
Nudge theory looks at our biases and how we can subtly influence behaviours to make better decisions. Thaler and Sunstein look at decision-making on a social scale and how changes in behaviour have large social impact. It is therefore no surprise that the book has been popular with policymakers among others. The book is a good companion to Cialdini’s book on Influence.
In The Black Swan, Taleb brilliantly, boldly (and somewhat brashly) puts forward arguments for the limitations of statistical analysis and how statistics are often very poor predictors of the future, especially in complex fields such as economics. Knowing this he puts out a rallying call that we should embrace uncertainty and leverage random opportunities as they arise. Prepare to be challenged!
Lateral Thinking is a classic text on creative thinking. De Bono explains how the mind works, and then sets out various inventive methods to inspire lateral thought. This is essential reading on problem solving and compliments other approaches to slow thinking. The book champions divergent thought as opposed to purely vertical, convergent decision-making methodologies.
Just like Spinal Tap, our top ten goes all the way up to 11 with the inclusion of The Dice Man. This cult classic by Luke Rhinehart is controversial but worth a look. A fictional premise of a man who gives over every decision to a throw of a dice. It is not there to tell you how to make better decisions (such as the non-fiction titles above) but it will certainly get you thinking more about your decisions!
And if you want some good ideas for audiobooks then click here.
If you want the right answers you have to start with the right questions
About The Right Questions
The Right Questions is for leaders who want coaching towards greater clarity, purpose and success. We are all leaders (whether we know it or not) as we all have influence. So the question is, what are you doing with your influence?
Wherever you are on your leadership journey, I hope that you find resources on this site to help you on the next leg of your quest. Even if that is just the inspiration to take one small step in the right direction, then that is a success. If you can take pleasure in learning and travelling as you go, then so much the better.
I love to serve people, helping them unlock their potential, empowering them as leaders, and coaching them to achieve their goals. Please get in touch and let me know how I can support you!
