Decisions – How to Make Them Easier

It was a simple decision to make. Which of the three proposed marketing programs should the large IT Company spend their budget on? In spite of many meetings the combined brainpower of 10 smart people couldn’t come to an agreement. They wanted to, but somehow it was just too hard to achieve.

Two words popped into my head. The first word was empathy. I’d been there before and know how difficult these discussions can be. Sometimes the pain involved in actually getting a decision agreed makes visiting the dentist an appealing option. The second word that came into my head was familiarity. I seem to hear about an increasing number of situations where people take longer and longer to make decisions.

More decisions are getting delayed
Initially I thought that it was just my impression, but I soon found out that my view was quite widely shared. The more people I asked the more examples of delayed decisions I heard about. The marketing agency waiting months for their client to decide if the partner reward program should be based upon products sold or new customers acquired. The consulting company who said that their clients were taking at least a month longer to evaluate each proposal. The IT steering group at a financial organisation that still can’t agree on when to install CRM after 18 months of discussion.

Of course there have always been delays in making certain decisions. The difference now is that the delays are often extending and being applied to an increasing number of decisions. So what’s happening to cause this?

Here is an interesting fact. All of the organisatiions mentioned above have the following seven points in common.

The Serious Seven
1. “Disappointing” financial performance.
2. Headcount cuts have been made and potentially more expected.
3. Budget cuts are becoming commonplace.
4. Major cost controls are instituted.
5. Organisational changes are happening more frequently.
6. Closing as much short term business as possible is the top priority.
7. “Strategy plans” are put on hold for the next couple of quarters.

Re-reading the Serious Seven it becomes apparent that many other organisations experience some, or all, of the same conditions. Could it be that the Serious Seven are negatively impacting decision making? But this seems crazy. Why are organisations that need to be more agile to bring in short term business taking more and more time to make decisions?

How employees react to the Serious Seven
The start point is employees. It’s human nature to want to retain our jobs and in tough times we all tend to work even harder at it. Unfortunately this usually means that we tend to be more internally focused and seek to maintain the status quo wherever we can. These attitudes are further entrenched by frequent changes in organisation and funding arrangements. It gets worse. As a direct result employees lose motivation and self confidence.

Sounds like a great environment for decision making and getting things to happen doesn’t it? Without some significant changes the organisation will continue to struggle and perhaps even be mortally damaged.

It’s hard to change human nature - so don’t try
There is no instant fix. Resist the temptation to motivate by email. It doesn’t work. Just in case some readers were thinking about it, nor do big meetings, threats or even promises. Sorry. To get employees back on track with the kind of responsive decision making attitudes that the organisation needs requires turning human nature into an advantage.

In uncertain times people ideally seek certainty. If we can’t get certainty we will seek stability. That’s why we go for the status quo. We know that it’s not ideal but it’s all that we have. What we really seek is clear direction and guidance so that we can do the “right thing”. Doing something that you believe is of value is one of the best re-motivators. Being one of the people doing something positive whilst others are lethargic can help your career and employment longevity too. So a key to getting employees making decisions and doing the “right thing” is providing a framework for direction and guidance.

The Strategic plan
I remember discussing this subject with one organisation and when we got to this point a bemused look crossed the face of one of their VP’s. “But we already have a document to help employees understand our direction, it’s called a strategic plan” he said. After some sensitive questioning I discovered that due to concerns about confidentiality the 80 page plan was only circulated to senior management. Not one page ever went to all employees. As I’m not naming the company I can tell you that I also discovered that not one of the VP’s in the room had ever read the whole document. No problem with confidentiality there then.

The traditional, weight tested, (often content free), strategic plan is of limited or no value to help employees make decisions. It felt good saying that at last. So if the strategic plan is of limited value, and organisations are delaying producing them anyway, something else is needed.

The specification
The basic requirement is for a reference document that can be widely used, in whole or in part, to help employees make good decisions easily and confidently. It may be tempting, but don’t start writing it yet because the first step in creating such a document is not content. The first step is setting down the attributes of the document. These attributes act as a sense check to ensure that the document will be easily accepted within the organisation. My recommendation is that the document needs to have all 6 of the following attributes: short, simple, clear, consistent, logical and agreed. Strangely enough it takes longer to produce a document with these attributes than it does to produce dozens of rambling pages. So allow sufficient time and get help to make it shorter and tighter.

An essential component of the document is a limited set of metrics. It’s often said that if you can’t measure it, then it’s not a metric. I’d add that if you can’t understand or influence it, it’s not a metric either. All employees should be able to both understand and believe that they can influence at least one of the metrics by their actions. Finally, metrics must be customer centric because ultimately its customers who determine the health of the business. Customer centric metrics also have the added advantage of reducing employee’s tendency to be inwardly focused. This can only be a good thing.

Implementation experience
I’ve now covered why decisions get delayed and the basic requirement for a tool to turn decision avoiders into decision makers. At this point you might be thinking that it sounds alright in theory but wondering if it actually works. Good question.

Here is my experience. Recognising that several clients wanted to improve their decision making I created a methodology to help them. The start point was the above specification and attributes. The methodology is called Decision Director which sounds much better than keep referring to “the document”. The purpose of Decision Director is to help all staff make good decisions by providing them with a consistent documented point of reference.

In practice the output of a Decision Director study is 10-15 PowerPoint slides. (It totally fails the weight test). Once signed off most of the content can be shared in varying forms across the organisation.

In my experience the most important single slide is on metrics. They are vital. It’s also best to get at least the first draft of the metrics agreed early as they will drive the direction of the rest of the document.

Remember, the task does not finish when the Decision Director study has been completed and implemented. Top management needs to report on progress for each metric at frequent intervals ongoing. This action becomes a very powerful motivator as well as demonstrating leadership and commitment from the organisation.

In addition to improving decision making a tool like Decision Director also helps to provide purpose for many employees and their activities. The bottom line is that this type of approach works at several different levels.

Finally
So what are you going to do now? Time to make that first decision. You wouldn’t be the first to successfully build their own approach based on the content in this article and a few of their own ideas. So test it out and see if you and your colleagues recognise the decision making problem.

If you do decide to create your own form of Decision Director please remember that the most common problem is making things too complicated. Keep it simple.

Once you have made that first decision I wish you success. Lets all strive to make indecision a thing of the past. Don’t you think?

About the Author
Malcolm Wicks is the founder of Three Step Consulting who specialise in helping clients implement joined up marketing and to become more customer centric. He is the principle architect of the Decision Director methodology used to help organisations make good, consistent decisions.

Malcolm can be reached at:
+44 (0) 118 989 1107
Malcolm.Wicks@3sc.co.uk
www.3sc.co.uk