Shaken, Stirred, & Served Straight Up: Why You Want Shared Decision-Making

“No good decision was ever made in a swivel chair.”

-General George S. Patton

Read, “good” decision. This is not about the “best” decision. Whatever that means anyway!

A good decision is about making the most of the information available and getting buy-in across stakeholders. With buy-in, comes a commitment to execution (and/or, if not the right decision, the ability and willingness to pivot and go at it again!)

To get to “good” (ok – great!!!) you need to rely on your team. Decision-making has to be a team sport (to be clear I mean a group process, the final decision rests with ONE person, if you want to see more about the perils of decision by consensus https://www.k8carney.com/blog/final-answer-consensus-or-collaboration)

Get It Together

Go to the source. The truth of the matter is that the expertise, experience and information you need to make a good decision is spread across not only seniority levels, functions, department, and roles, but also external stakeholders, in some cases, like your customers.

By bringing together the right people and giving them the mic, the quality and outcomes of your decisions improve.  

All too often our decisions are colored by our own blindspots and bias. We assume a current situation mirrors a previous one and so we apply the same logic, we over-rely on a piece of information maybe because of who gave it to us, or we default to what others are doing.

As the founder or CEO, you must double-check yourself. One study found the that more power you have, the more confident you are in the accuracy of your thoughts and beliefs. Making sure decisions are debated and discussed will mitigate the potential to lead yourself astray. Yes, I want you to be confident – confident leaders are comfortable saying, “I don’t know what I don’t know” or “I might be wrong,” and asking for the input of others.

Once we nix the bias and uncover the blindspots, go get that buy-in. When you involve your team and truly listen to their opinions and ideas, they feel valued. This leads to greater employee engagement and engaged teams outperform. Hands down.

Bringing your team into the process will strengthen your influence and build greater trust which will support execution. 70% of new initiatives fail because of poor communication and a lack of buy-in. Group decision-making helps with both.  

When the decision-making process is jointly owned, that sense of ownership will lead to greater commitment to achieving the desired outcome.  Even if someone doesn’t agree with the final decision, being a valued part of a robust process means they are more likely to see how the decision is in the best interest of the company and its mission.

In the Room Where It Happens

Getting the right voices in the “room” is when the magic happens. Then, everyone has to check their title (and ego) at the door. Then what?

 Keith Ferrazzi, author of Leading Without Authority, talks about “co-elevation”, a commitment to go higher together as a team. He believes these co-elevating relationships are built through collaboration and team problem-solving.  

For a business-critical decision, he suggests making it the focus of a 60-90 minute meeting. Everyone comes prepared based on insights and data gathered from their team. For ½ the session, break out into small groups of 3-4 to discuss and report back.  He finds that groups of 3 result in greater candor and this commitment to go higher together, provides the psychological safety needed to engage in spirited debate.

Not to mention groups of 7 or 8 are susceptible to confirmation bias. Back to the B word.

Another approach - assign someone the role of devil’s advocate. The devil is in the details, right?  Go for it, question assumptions, poke holes, find hidden risks.  

Or, you can divide your group up into two teams, assigning one team to take one side of the argument – the advantages of an idea/decision - and the other team the disadvantages. Harkens back to my law school days.

Or you can take the “Xanax of decision-making” (yep that’s a thing) compliments of Gil Shklarski CTO of Flatiron Health. List out the costs, benefits, and mitigations for a set of options. Mash these approaches up and maybe one group is assigned costs, one assigned benefits, and both get in on the mitigations!

Go at it in stages. Gather individual opinions on an anonymous basis before anyone shares with a group. Circulate those opinions for feedback, again on an individual and anonymous basis. Then take it to a group.

At the end of the day, it’s a judgement call. Call this intuition, listening to your gut, or business judgement. Judgement can be defined as the “fusion of people’s interactions, knowledge, reasoning, experiences and creativity” – so why not multiply and amplify each one of those inputs by bringing together your team.