There is only one certainty in life that it is uncertain. However, there are times in business when a decision must be made, and while every leader strives to ensure they have all the information required to make a well-informed decision, chances are there will be times when you must make a difficult choice. But even if you don’t have all the facts, the worst thing you can do in this sort of situation is freeze up.
Leif Babin is a former Navy Seal and author of the best-selling business tome, Extreme Ownership. He knows a thing or two about making tough decisions but admits “you’re not going to have all the answers, and if you’re going to sit there and wait until you have all the answers until everything’s clear, then you’re going to get your ass kicked. Because the enemy is going to manoeuvre on you… and you have to be able to act decisively”.
While those in leadership positions certainly feel pressure – especially if decisions are required to be made that will affect employees’ salaries and families – Babin operated in a war zone. His decisions had less to do with profits and losses, and more to do with getting a member of his squad killed in battle. Today, he looks at the world of business through the eyes of a warrior – and had distilled decision-making down to three key lessons.
The first is to stay focused on what you ultimately require. “If you get emotional, you can’t make good decisions,” says Babin, “you’ve got to be able to take a step back, prioritise and execute. What’s the strategic picture? What’s the highest priority? Let me get the team focused on executing in that priority order”. He goes on to admit, “In combat as in life; the outcome is never certain; the picture is never clear. There are no guarantees of success. But in order to succeed, leaders must be comfortable under pressure and act on logic, not emotion. This is a critical component to victory.”
The second important insight from Babin is how important it is for leaders to support the decisions of their team. If you want to move quickly, in business or a war zone – make sure your team fully understands the outcomes you seek, and then support them – even when mistakes are made). If a junior member of your team takes all the heat when they make a mistake, this teaches them early on to fear making important decisions. Instead of taking charge themselves, they will bump every decision upwards. This breeds inefficiency and leaves your company vulnerable to fast-moving competitors.
Instead, Babin urges leaders to train the most junior members of their teams on what the most important three outcomes are, and support them as they do their best to accomplish the overall mission. Even if mistakes are made, they should be able to explain why they thought that decision would take the company closer to achieving its mission.
Only when you are the fearless team leader who can both empower and support the needs of the business, can you be expected to make the kinds of decisions that will affect each member of the team.
The final lesson from Babin is that there are no bad teams, only bad leaders. Ownership comes down to taking full responsibility for the challenges your team faces. While pointinging fingers and blaming people is the lazy option, it’s far harder to ‘own it’.
Daniel M. Europe is the founder and CEO of Arreglado, a company specializing in thought leadership and mental logistics. arreglado.com