Today’s Focus: Which door is the wrong one?

Decisions can be overwhelming, but they don’t have to be.

Written by

Jonathan Dunnett

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Jonathan Dunnett is the CEO of Enable Leaders, a curated executive coach matching service. With decades of experience in leadership and leadership development, he’s passionate about helping emerging and senior leaders find the right executive coach for them, all at no cost for the match.

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You’ve got a big decision: what are you going to do about it?

Recently, I saw a post from Pepper Wilson (who is someone you SHOULD follow) that talked about the concept of indecision.

Here’s what she shared:

You’re at a crossroads. Head says left, heart says right. You decide not to decide.

Indecision is the silent killer of progress. As a leader, your hesitation becomes your team’s bottleneck.

Waiting for all the facts? You’ll be waiting forever. The best data comes from doing.

—-By moving forward, you—-
– Build resilience
– Gain real-world data
– Learn to balance head and heart

At minimum, every decision teaches you something about your decision-making process. That alone has immense value.

Your job isn’t to have all the answers.

It’s to make the best choice with what you know and adjust as you go. That’s not just decision-making. That’s leadership.

Quick reflection:

-What decision have you been postponing?
– What opportunities are you missing by not deciding?
– What’s the worst that could happen if you choose ‘wrong’?

Here’s what I found missing:

Indecision can be a problem: but, that has certain assumptions included:

Something absolutely has to be done in the moment;
Speed is always an asset;
You have all the relevant information;
You’re not missing anything;
And many other factors, too…

Of course, bureaucracy kills, and you have to be cognizant of that force that can demoralize and demotivate people within your organization and within your team.

That said, “now”, “later” or “never” are all perfectly fine choices to make in the moment as well.

What you want to avoid and what I think Pepper highlighted very well is that you don’t want to get stuck. Good decision making needs to be deliberate and strategic, but that tendency to get stuck for some people can overwhelm them (understandably).

What I highlighted to pepper in my response was to consider a different mindset and a different model that actually comes from Jeff Bezos:

I often hear this sentiment and I want to respectfully disagree with it, at least in part.

“Indecision is the silent killer of progress.” What some people think when they read this or have these thoughts is that I have to make a decision this moment: that’s not true.

Sometimes, this comes back to prioritization, and in other cases, it’s perfectly valid to say that I’m not going to make a decision on this, and that I will come back to it later. Of course, you need to understand the ramifications of not making the decision in the moment, but if you’re OK with that opportunity cost, it doesn’t mean pushing a decision back for a day, a week, or even three months is the worst thing. Context is everything.

In the situation, where you need to make a decision because it will actually hold back others and have major implications, I like to steal from Jeff Bezos to reduce some of the mental load: his concept of a two-way door versus a one-way door can be very helpful. If you can reverse the decision easily, that’s a two-way door. That means you can test and try something and it really doesn’t matter.

One way doors need the appropriate amount of time, context, and data to make the best decision possible.

What do you think? How are you thinking about what’s on your radar daily, weekly and quarterly?

Are you facing any big decisions?
How are you thinking about confronting them?
What is holding you back?
What has worked in the past?

I’ve love to hear from you on any of those questions!

John C Maxwell, author and speaker, in an executive portrait

John C. Maxwell:
“Life is a matter of choices, and every choice you make makes you.” Photo

Free Resources

to help you

Red weathered wooden doors with brass hinges and a stone frame

Jeff Bezos: Here’s how I make Amazon’s highest-stakes decisions

“There are two types of decisions. There are decisions that are irreversible and highly consequential; we call them one-way doors, or Type 2 decisions. They need to be made slowly and carefully. I often find myself at Amazon acting as the chief slowdown officer: ‘Whoa, I want to see that decision analyzed seventeen more ways because it’s highly consequential and irreversible.”