The same is true of management teams. Often decisions get made perfectly well, while a handful seem to linger and resist all attempts to move forward. The topics may get discussed at one meeting, revisited at another, perhaps supported by a little more analysis, but somehow never quite reach a conclusion. And being human, often our natural response is 'when in doubt, hold a meeting' where we can discuss the decision some more. It feels like some sort of progress, but in reality, we are just treading water.
So, perhaps we need to look at this differently and rather than going around the issue again, we first need to ask why we haven’t been able to decide.
If an otherwise capable person or team repeatedly struggles to make a particular decision, that tells us something. And there is a small group of 'usual suspect' type reasons for that struggle: perhaps there really is important information missing. But perhaps the problem lies elsewhere. The people involved may be working towards different objectives, responsibility for the decision may be unclear, or the consequences of choosing one way or another may be genuinely uncomfortable. And, sometimes we are simply hoping that a little more time and analysis will turn an uncertain decision into a certain one.
This means that an inability to decide may not be the problem itself; however, it may be a symptom of something else. So, instead of simply asking “which option should we choose?”, we can use the fact that we haven’t chosen to explore what is getting in the way.
Here are five questions (one for each of the 'usual suspect' reasons) that can help probe what is happening and unblock the decision making.
'We need more information' is a common refrain, and actually, a perfectly good reason to delay a decision. But information is there to 'inform', and in this case, it is to inform the 'decision making' process. But part of that 'informing' is being able to make sense of the information, to visualise it, and to understand what it means and its relevance to our decision. More information is not necessarily the answer - although it often feels like it is.
So, yes, we could be waiting for an additional bit of crucial information - which will give us the insight we need. But there is nearly always more information we could gather. If we cannot say what is missing, where it will come from, and how it might affect our choice, then more information may not actually be what we need. And at this point we need to consider how we are making sense, or not, of the information we already have. Is it telling us what we need, or are we staring into the mist? What is the understanding we are searching for?
And then, at some point, information has done all it reasonably can and (expert) judgement has to take over.
Lots of people may need to contribute to a decision, and lots of people may be affected by it, but that doesn't necessarily mean they all need to make it. A large amount of indecision occurs because the boundary between consultation and responsibility is unclear. Everyone participates in the discussion, everyone has an opinion, but nobody is quite sure who has the actual authority and responsibility to say, “this is what we’re going to do”. The team's job is to ensure that all necessary information has been identified, challenged, and synthesised so that the identified decision maker has what they need to make the decision.
This is where an organisational or cultural issue can creep in. A business owner may become frustrated that their managers won’t make decisions, while those same managers have learned from experience that significant decisions will subsequently be questioned, changed, or overturned. On paper they may have authority; however, in practice, they have learned that waiting for approval is safer. Sometimes the blockage isn’t the decision. It is the way decision-making authority works around it.
We can have plenty of good information, clear ownership, and yet fail to agree. This can be because different people are judging the options against different criteria or they have different visions what they are trying to achieve. One person may be trying to minimise cost, another to protect customer service, another to increase capacity, and someone else to preserve cash. They can agree completely about the facts and still reach different conclusions about what should be done.
At that point, another spreadsheet probably won’t resolve the disagreement. Those multiple perspectives are great - and may be crucial - but in order to choose between the options, first we may need to prioritise and agree what matters most. And to do that we need to be clear about what outcome we are actually trying to create, and what are we prepared to trade to achieve it?
Some decisions are difficult because there isn’t an obviously good answer. This can range from a negative consequence of an otherwise good approach, to taking the least bad option.
There are often costs or negative consequences to decisions - that's the way it goes. Someone may be disappointed, a valued employee may be affected, we may have to give up one opportunity in order to pursue another, we may damage a relationship, spend money we would rather retain, or make a commitment that closes off other possibilities.
But these are real consequences, not failures of analysis. The danger comes when the understandable discomfort is mistaken for a need for more analysis, another forecast, or another opinion. Another meeting can feel productive while postponing the point at which somebody has to accept the trade-off.
Understanding why a decision feels uncomfortable does not necessarily make it easier, but it does help separate an information problem from a consequence we simply don’t much like.
There are decisions where the facts can eventually provide an answer, but there are many others where they cannot.
We can improve our understanding, test assumptions, and consider likely consequences, but there will still be uncertainty. We cannot know precisely how a market will respond, whether a new employee will succeed, how customers will react, or exactly what the economy will do next.
This is where decision making becomes a judgement call. The aim is not to eliminate uncertainty before acting, but to understand enough to make a reasonable choice despite it. We act and watch closely as the future unfolds, and adjust as we go along. But, if we wait for the uncertainty to disappear, we may discover that the decision has eventually been made for us by events, and we may not like that decision.
There is a useful test question that cuts across all five of these 'usual suspects': If we don’t make the decision now, what will be different when we discuss it again? This basically asks if our ability to make a decision will have improved?
Sometimes there is an excellent answer. Perhaps we will have those financial figures, or the customer will have responded, someone who needs to contribute will be available, or circumstances may genuinely become clearer. If this is the case, then waiting is not indecision - it is a deliberate part of the decision-making process.
But if nothing identifiable will be different, if we simply hope that another week, another conversation, or another meeting will somehow make the choice easier, then moving the decision down the calendar may achieve very little. Then it is time to dive into those 5 questions.
There is nothing inherently wrong with delaying a decision. But useful delay should have a reason: we should know what we are waiting for, why it matters, and when we expect to be ready to decide.
None of this means that every decision should be made quickly - some do indeed deserve considerable thought, consultation and analysis, particularly when the consequences are significant or difficult to reverse.
But when the same decision keeps returning, it may be worth resisting the temptation simply to discuss it again. Persistent indecision is a symptom - and useful information in itself. It can reveal missing knowledge, confused authority, competing objectives, uncomfortable trade-offs, or a search for certainty that simply isn’t available.
And once we know which of those is getting in the way, we have something rather more useful to work with. So, if a decision keeps coming back, perhaps it isn’t the decision that needs more attention, perhaps we need to investigate what is stopping us from making it.
Ad Futurum
Graham
/kcl-goes-green/HeaderLogo-60x300-ID-e065fb7a-094d-4fc6-d8c1-f4f88e7523f5.png)