Action Hero; Decision Zero!

Some time back I was part of a leadership assessment for 20 young professionals of an organisation in the experience range of 8-12 years. They were all accomplished engineers, consistent best performers and were shortlisted from 200 probable candidates. It was like performing a second assessment test on those who already cracked the IIT or IIM entrance exams and won their admission on merits. Common sense logic would suggest that if these are already the chosen few brilliant professionals a further assessment is of little use. Unfortunately life is testing us repeatedly almost every day against new standards.

Coming back to the context of the leadership assessment, one dimension on which majority of these brilliant professionals scored very low was being ‘decisive’. This puzzled me a bit as some of these people I knew for quite some time and they were highly appreciated within the organization and by the clients. Therefore, I did not want to believe the test scores without further validation. I held personal meetings with these professionals and checked if this finding is in fact true in their real professional context. All those who had low scores on being ‘decisive’ agreed that they indeed make few decisions at work. When I checked whether they make decisions in their personal lives all of them said they do make decisions quite frequently and often quickly. That appeared a paradox.

Why do mid level managers in organisations hesitate to take decisions?

a.      In some organizations decisions are taken at significantly higher levels and hence the mid level managers have fewer opportunities to take decision. The authorization protocol would clearly indicate a few senior positions to say YES or NO. The rest of the organisation can make proposals, recommendations or present data.

b.      It could also be that in some organisations the decision support systems and critical data do not flow to the mid and lower levels. A publicly listed company shares a lot of data with the public, some of them before the event and many of them post facto. However, even in such companies most of the mid level managers get to know much of such information along with the public and seldom ahead of them, notwithstanding the grapevine. Unlisted companies may not be any better.

c.       Many companies promote a ‘first time right’ policy which prohibits anyone to attempt a possible decision with some probability of failure. Mid managers dread failure and they delegate all decisions upward. Risk mitigation and compliance orientation drive organisations to restrict decision levels.

d.      Often decision making in companies involve multiple rounds of consultations and the more the number of people involved the longer the decision cycle. Therefore, mid managers who want a quick decision jump the queue and go straight to the top boss or his trusted lieutenant so that he gets a decision fast and he is not accountable for any negative consequences. Cool and nice!

e.      Performance appraisals often tend to showcase ‘what is done’ or an ‘activity list’ rather than how one’s decisions impacted positive outcomes. Outcomes could be intangible and not always instant. Hence, most employees stay in ‘activity-obsession’. People seen as ‘doing things’ and ‘available’ are appreciated better and rated higher.

The paradox vanishes. Decisions in private life often involve fewer people, fewer rules and the reward or punishment accrues to oneself. In movies we like action heroes. In organizations those who take decisions often travel to the top faster. It would be in the interest of the managers to climb the decision tree regardless of the organisational environment. Taking decisions is taking risks and being accountable. Good decisions demand thinking and choosing from competing or even friendly options. Organisations take time to change; individuals can choose a fast track.

         “Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.”                                                               - Peter F. Drucker