Managing Decision Making
Managing decision making can be an art form in itself. And it’s not just people in important positions who have to know how to handle it, but ordinary individuals as well. Evidently, it’s not the same thing whether you have to juggle huge amounts of money and accounts or grocery lists and picking up kids from soccer practice. But to each person the decisions that they have to make are the most important of all so in that aspect being the CEO of a multinational conglomerate or a busy mum it’s quite the same thing.
So consider that paying more attention to the way you make your decisions and to the factors you include in the decision-making process may save you time, energy and spare your nerves in the long run. You have to read the following steps and start practicing them until they become a habit and you will do them intuitively.
1. Establish your goal. This is a fairly easy first step. You must have a very clear picture in your mind of what will be the ultimate purpose of your decision. What exactly do you want to achieve and why? Whether you want to fix a very urgent matter or just introduce a change in direction, asking yourself these questions is a good idea.
2. Do your homework. A secret of managing decision making is doing your homework properly: knowing that if you are in the decisive position, you have to gather all the useful information available in order to make an informed decision. You should also take into account which factors should influence your decision and which shouldn’t.
3. Prioritize your evaluation standards. This is a trickier bit of managing decision making, but it’s vital nonetheless. You have to know what conditions your final solution should fulfill and from which angles it should be considered a good solution. For example, if you need something that will satisfy your economic needs, you have to place the financial criteria at the top of the list.
4. Explore and find all the possible answers. This is one step in the process of managing decision making where you can be as creative as you like. In this stage, you don’t have to think of the restrictions your problem imposes. Just that you find as many different ideas as possible. If you are part of the company, you should have a meeting and brainstorm. As a benefit of the brainstorming technique, you will learn ideas from all the members in your group, no matter what position they hold. Remember that it is important as an inclusive strategy to hear all your employees’ ideas. After the brainstorming is over, you can put the vaguely similar ideas into groups, that way maybe you will combine two or more ideas to build a stronger, more optimal solution.
5. Put all your solutions through an objective filter. Managing decision making can also be a brutal process, especially in this stage. You have to take all the solutions you (and your team) came up with and analyze them in terms of all the consequences and implications they bring along. Don’t forget that your goal is to pick out of the bunch the best and most feasible answer possible so it is not a game with favorites. If you really like an approach, but it doesn’t fulfill all the necessary requirements, you can’t afford to be sentimental and you will have to dismiss it.
6. Choose the best solution. As a result of the previous process, you have to pick from all the alternatives which fulfill your conditions the best one. If you have a team of experts or colleagues, you should put the matter to a vote, but the final decision is still yours because you are taking full responsibility for it.
7. Enforce the decision. After all that preparation, your new revolutionary idea is ready to be put into practice. Before you do this, you should check one last time if it is entirely logical, if it will produce the effect you are anticipating and if it fulfills all your requirements. If it is still practical from all these viewpoints, you should make it into a plan with different steps and enforce it step by step.
As a final and mandatory step, you have to assess the outcome. As an invaluable component of managing decision making, you have to possess the courage to look back and evaluate all your decisions and initiatives. You have to be able to distinguish between good actions and bad ones and still assume responsibility for all of them. Always evaluating yourself will make you grow as a leader and develop help you develop your managerial skills. Remember that you need to learn from your past mistakes and that is precisely how you improve, by taking a detached view over what you have accomplished so far.
Incoming search terms:
No related posts.
