Three Key Decision-Making Tips

Have you ever been in a meeting when you thought you were going to be part of making the decision, only to find out that the decision-maker only wanted your input? It’s not a great feeling. Now, think about how you handle decisions when you’re the formal leader.

As a formal leader, you make decisions every day. Some decisions you make on your own, some you make after talking with others, and some you make as a team. Putting aside how you decide which decision rule to use – consensus, vote, consultation – there are some steps you can take to ensure that your team members will understand the decision rule and any decisions you make.

Your mindset can be more important than the decision rule.

In some ways, your mindset can have more effect on your team members than the decision-making rule you use. If you decide to make a decision using consensus, the conversation will be very different depending on whether you use a unilateral control approach or the Mutual Learning approach. With a unilateral control approach, you think of consensus as trying to convince everyone to buy-in to the solution that you already thought of. But, if you’re using the Mutual Learning approach, your goal is to get all the relevant information on the table, including people’s different assumptions and interests, and jointly craft a solution that ideally meets the various interests. You aren’t committed to your solution – if you even have one. You’re committed to find a solution that works for the team, including you.

If you are going to make the decision after team members share their thoughts in a meeting, and if you’re using a unilateral control approach, you will quickly (either privately or publicly) dismiss points of view that are different than yours and you will focus on team members’ views that agree with yours. You may either withhold your own views or try to convince others to accept your views as they are offering theirs. If however, you use the Mutual Learning approach, you will be curious about others’ views when they differ from yours.

In short, if you use the Mutual Learning approach, your team members are likely to feel that their views have been heard and taken into account, even if you make the final decision. In contrast, if you use a unilateral control approach, your team members are likely to feel that their views have been discounted or ignored, even if the team nominally makes the decision using consensus.

Tell people early on what the decision-making rule will be.

Whatever decision-making rule you plan to use, tell people before you dive into the conversation. This allows people to participate appropriately and prevents them from being surprised. If you plan to make the decision yourself after a group discussion, say that. If you plan to have the group make the decision by consensus, say that, and be specific about what you mean by consensus. If you want to allot of set amount of time during which the team can reach consensus and after which you will make the decision, say that.

After you make the decision, tell people your decision, explain your reasoning, and check for any unintended consequences.

If you make the decision outside the team meeting, it’s important to follow up. Tell people your decision and explain how you arrived at it. If your decision doesn’t incorporate some interests or information that team members have shared with you, explain what led you not to incorporate it. Without your explanation, team members are likely to tell themselves stories about why you made the decision you did, and their stories are likely to be different from your explanation. It’s also helpful to ask team members if they see any unintended consequences of the decision you made, apart from ones they have already shared with you. This will help you avoid problems you may have missed.

Originally published May 2008