Tag Decisions

When It’s Time to Decide

Steve Keating 8 Comments

Every decision that needs to be made will be made. No exceptions!

If you’re responsible to make a decision and you fail to make it somebody or something will make it for you. If you think “waiting” to make a decision is a good idea you must realize that “waiting” is the same as making a decision to not make a decision. That is almost always the wrong decision to make. 

You can fix a poor decision once it’s made because you maintain some control over the decision. Failure to decide causes you to lose much of the control you may have had over a poor decision.

The only way I know of to learn to make decisions is to make them. You’ll certainly make some bad ones along the way but even those will teach you how to make better ones next time.

You must learn to make decisions because if you’re a person in a leadership position and you do not have the ability to make decisions then you will not lead, you will be led. You will be led by the unkindest leader of all, time and circumstance.

Time and circumstance will make the decision for you. That’s why you must understand that not making a decision is a decision. Deadlines will go whooshing past while you stand there pondering your next decision. The decision will, for all practical purposes have been made. Time will have made it for you. 

Once that happens your circumstances will be decided for you instead of by you. You will either drive the decision-making process or you will be driven by it. 

The time to decide is the moment, the very moment, when you have all the facts and information necessary to make an informed decision. At that point any delay is simply procrastination and procrastination is like poison to effective decision-making.

Occasionally time will force you to make a decision without all the facts you would like to have. In those cases you’ll need to rely on your past experience, the advice of other knowledgeable people, history and often, your instincts. Just remember, use all the information and facts you DO have even if you don’t have all the information you wish you had. 

Successful people decide, to lead effectively you must make the decision to decide in every instance where decision is required. It might not be easy but it is leadership!

Decisions, Decisions

Steve Keating 2 Comments

Decisions are the fuel of all successful endeavors. If you’re a person who strives to succeed you’ll need to make many decisions in your life. Try as you might, some of them will be bad decisions.

Some will be very bad.

I’ve written before about my thoughts on the importance of sound decision-making. Success requires not just decision-making but GOOD decision-making. Skilled decision makers use what I call judgecernment, the combination of judgment and discernment, to make the best decision possible. The most successful people don’t always make the best decision possible but they get many more “right” than “wrong” and the “bigger” the decision the more likely they are are to get it right.

But sometimes it’s the little ones, the quick ones, that when wrong, haunt you.

I’m truly fortunate to be trusted to speak in front of groups, often. It is an honor to be considered skilled enough and thoughtful enough to share my opinions and thinking with an organization’s people and in some cases, their customers.

Sometimes while “on stage” I’ll share some jokes too. I have this theory that if you’re in front of hundreds of people and you’re telling jokes then you are most certainly going to offend someone. No matter what you say, if somebody laughs then somebody else, at least one somebody, will be offended. No matter how “safe” the joke is, somebody will always be offended. I’m perfectly okay with that. So long as it’s not too many “somebodys.”

Last week in front of a very large group I shared a joke more suited to a barroom than a ballroom. I’d love to claim poor judgment but there would need to be at least a bit of judgment displayed in order to claim that it was poor. It was actually just a very bad decision.

I’m sure I disappointed some people with my decision. While I don’t want to seem cavalier about the feelings of other people because they do matter, I’m really not overly concerned about that.

Here’s what really made it a bad decision… I disappointed myself. I forgot for a moment the honor of being trusted in front of a group. While many people laughed (well, maybe not actually
many but some) and some more were even still laughing about the joke the next day.

Truth be told I’ve received little negative feedback from the joke but it doesn’t really matter because I was offended. I was offended by the fact that I failed to model the behavior I speak and write about every day. I got lazy and failed to look for a better, more appropriate joke. It’s a decision that will haunt me for awhile and frankly, it needs to. It’s good to be reminded that despite my skill and experience I can still make bad decisions that negatively affect other people.

Like I said, some decisions will be very bad.

So, you know what I did about that? I learned. Immediately. I committed to myself to make better decisions next time and then I made a whole bunch of decisions the very next day. They were all better decisions than the one from the night before though admittedly, I’d set the bar pretty low.

Successful people cannot allow bad decisions to prevent them from making decisions in the future. The failure to make any decisions, or to make decisions too slowly, can cost companies just as much as making poor decisions, sometimes even more.

Successful people learn from every decision, good and bad and they know that a person cannot learn from a decision that they refuse to make.

Making no decision is in fact a decision, it is a decision to do nothing and that is almost always a wrong decision. You can’t “fix” a decision until it is made. If you think you can avoid problems by not making a decision then you’ve just made the biggest mistake a decision maker can make.

So learn from your poor decisions, better yet, learn from the poor decisions of others and use the experience to grow as a leader and make better decisions in the future. It’s what successful people do.

And no, I won’t share the joke with you, you won’t be hearing that one from me again anytime soon!

Your Most Important Decision of the Day

Steve Keating 5 Comments

If you’re like me, if you’re human, if you have a pulse, then you make lots of decisions everyday. Most of them are tiny decisions, made with barely a conscious thought. Brand of gum to chew, water with lemon or lime, which color of socks should I wear today. Those are easy (I hope) decisions and they have little or no lasting impact on your future.

Some are more consequential, they shape your future and you likely give them a fair amount of thought.

Some are downright huge! The have long-range of even life long impact on your life. You do research, fact check, ask others for advice and struggle to be sure of your decision.

But one, one decision is the biggest of all. It is positively monumental!

It’s a decision you should be making everyday. In fact, it might be wise to make it several times a day. Yet most people never make it at all. Many people don’t even realize it’s a decision that is available for them to make. You may be one of them.

So, what is this monumental decision. It’s the decision on whether or not you’ll have a positive attitude.

YOU get to decide that.

EVERYDAY!

ALL DAY!

If you’re like most people you probably never even give that decision a thought. You just allow your attitude to be determined by the people around you and the events of your day.

If you’re like most people your attitude “reflects.” The attitude of successful people “radiates.”

The most successful people decide that they, and they alone, will control their attitude. Nothing and no one will rob them of the incredible strength, focus, and energy provided by a positive attitude. Sometimes they have to make that choice more than once a day, sometimes many times a day. But make it they do!

Attitude is contagious. It seems as if a negative attitude is the most contagious of all. The best antidote to a negative attitude is a decision. It’s a decision to choose, and choose positive.

It’s a decision that is yours and yours alone. All you have to do is make it!

Do you Know Who You Are?

Steve Keating 2 Comments

Wealthy people have valuables. Successful people have values and they have honor to go with them.   

Here’s a fact: you can have “it all” but if you came by any of it dishonorably then you may be wealthy but you are not a success. 

Successful people, truly successful people, not the ones who merely appear successful, have values. Core values. These values make them who they are. These values are the guideposts for their life. These values inform each and every decision that they make. 

Successful people will change their priorities. They will adjust their goals and they will compromise when compromise is called for. They will never never never sacrifice their core values for the appearance of success. 

Priorities and goals are based on wants, needs and life circumstances at any given moment. Core values are based on principle and they are rock solid, once determined they do not change. If you’ve given up or sacrificed what you believed to be a core value then it wasn’t a core value after all. 

Here’s another fact and it’s a sad one. Most people when asked can not identify their core values. They know there are “things” that are truly important to them but they just haven’t put enough thought into them to be able to verbalize them. 

If you can’t verbalize your core values then your core values aren’t guiding you. 

You are likely not living the life that you want for yourself. It’s possible other people are making decisions for you that have a profoundly negative influence on your life. Your life feels beyond your control. It doesn’t have to be that way. 

You were created for a purpose, your life matters. You are special. Unique. Valuable. You can make a difference. You may doubt that today but once you have identified your core values you’ll know it to be absolutely true.

Invest time each day to discover your core values. Reflect on your life, every part of your life, to determine what and who really matters. You’ll likely find that very few of the important things and people you hold so dear really matter. Once you’ve determined what and who really matter and why they really matter, you’ll be well on your way to discovering your core values.

Knowing your core values will make every decision easier. They will be your guide in good times and especially in tough times. Your core values will become your foremost counselor. 

Never measure success in terms of wealth; money can only help determine what someone is. True success is based on adherence to one’s values because it’s a person’s values that determines who they are.

So…..do you know who you are?

Encouraging Mistakes

Steve Keating 4 Comments

I’m not a big fan of mistakes. That might surprise the people who know me best since they also know I make a lot of them.

I make a lot of mistakes because I make a lot of decisions. Mine are mistakes of action and they can be fixed, usually with just a small adjustment. Often, people don’t even realize I made the mistake at all.

Some people believe they can avoid mistakes by not making decisions. They fact is, not making a decision is a decision, it’s a decision to do nothing and it’s almost always the wrong decision. Deciding to do nothing is a huge mistake, it’s a mistake of inaction and it’s often much harder to fix than a mistake of action.

The most successful leaders make a decision the moment that they have the facts required to make it. They make good decisions because they have made a lot of them and they learned as much from the bad ones as they did the good ones.

I get asked from time to time about the best way to help young leaders learn to make decisions. My answer is nearly always the same – let them make decisions!

No one can learn how to make good decisions just by watching someone else do it. If you’re a leader hoping to build future leaders then you need to let your people make decisions. Even some bad ones!

Get out of the way and let them decide. Let them be wrong and let them fix their mistakes. Let them learn from THEIR experience and allow them to build self-confidence by doing… and redoing if that’s what it takes. 

I’m not suggesting any leader stand by and let their people make decisions with potentially devastating consequences, but let them make small decisions and grow their way to bigger ones.

Lead by ensuring they find the lesson in every mistake they make and lead further by helping them develop a plan to make a better decision next time. 

The ability to recover from a mistake or a poor decision can be a great encouragement to your younger leaders. Authentic Servant Leaders don’t use mistakes to criticize their people, they use them to coach and encourage their people. 

It all comes down to this: as a leader, do you have a spirit of criticism or a spirt of encouragement? One forces compliance and one builds commitment. 

One works and one doesn’t. Which one are you? 

You’ve Chosen Your Life

Steve Keating 7 Comments

You’ve chosen your way to the life you have.

To those who would say they have not chosen their life, that their circumstances and events outside of their control have chosen their life I say to you: excuses, excuses, excuses.

The more you allow circumstances to control your life the less control of your life you have. If you’re allowing circumstances to control your life you’ve undoubtedly forgotten about the incredible power of you. You, like every other person on the planet can have more control over your life just by taking it.

Successful people control the circumstances of their life, they put themselves in a position to succeed. They use the circumstances of their life to their benefit, regardless of what those circumstances happen to be.

You make choices every day, and every choice has a consequence. It could be a positive consequence or it could be a negative consequence but no choice in life goes unnoticed.

Perhaps the most important choice you make every day is the choice of a positive attitude. A positive attitude makes everything in life easier. Some days you’ll need to make that choice more than once but never allow others to make that choice for you.

You choose the friends and people that you allow into your life and these friends and people have a major impact on the direction of your life. If you choose to spend your life with negative people, chances are you’ll be a negative person. If you choose to spend your time with unmotivated people it’s likely you won’t be motivated either. 

The people in your life are there because you allow them to be there, you may not realize this is a choice you’ve made but it is one of the most important choices you can make in life. Choose very carefully!

Victor Frankl, author of the life changing book, “Man’s Search for Meaning, ” says “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” When you accept that challenge to change yourself then you begin to control your life through better choices. 

I believe that we all are born with a purpose in mind. Something that makes our life worth living, something that makes our life matter. It’s something important. Once you have determined that important thing in your life you can live your life on purpose for a purpose. You no longer live your life just for today and take what comes, instead you make what comes.

You may not like where you are in life, but it’s your choices that have put you there. If you desire to be someplace else in life then make different choices because you choose your way to the life you have.

It may seem to you that others can force their choices on you but when you begin each day with the choice of a positive attitude you’ll have more choices than you could have ever imagined. No one, absolutely no one, can force their attitude on you. Frankl says that the choice of our attitude in the last of human freedoms, meaning “they” can take everything else from you but they can never take away your choice of a positive attitude.

Wherever you are in life today, your first step to being someplace else is to acknowledge that you put yourself exactly where you are. Acknowledge that you’ve done that, your choices have done that, the decisions you’ve made have done that. When you acknowledge that your choices in life have consequences, then you begin to control your life and it’s then that you begin to make your success.

Some days I’m happier than others and on the days when I can force myself to be honest about it I realize that it’s my choices that have determined my level of happiness. Successful people find a way to force that honesty upon themselves more days than not.

When you’re willing to accept 100% responsibility for who you are, what you are, and where you are then you’ll discover the power to change any part of your life that you desire.

You’ll also discover that you’ve had the power all along. Don’t waste another day of it! 

Do Leaders Really Need Good Judgment?

Steve Keating 9 Comments

There was a time when that question would never have been asked. It was a foregone conclusion that sound judgment was a prerequisite for effective, authentic leadership.

Today however there are some leadership “experts” who are in fact asking that very question. They point out, correctly I might add, that today we have terabytes, and megabytes of data. We have charts and graphs and grids with every color of the rainbow looking at every possible situation from every possible angle. All the data, some experts say, leads the leader right to the proper decision. No real judgment is needed.

I’m not sure I can say crap in this blog but let me tell you, that “expert” thinking is a load of crap in there every was one. Today, as in every other day in history and as in every day in the future, judgment mixed with discernment, or as I prefer to call it “judgcernment” is as vital as it ever was or ever will be.

The experts point out that using data takes the personal bias out of a leader’s decision making and thought process. Well isn’t that just swell; we no longer need a leader who thinks, they just have to be able to read a pie chart. That’s just crazy!

Data may provide facts but wisdom comes from judgment.

We need wise leaders. I want a leader who applies their “life lens” to a situation. I want a leader who uses their experience to make a decision. If the right person is doing the leading I even want them applying their own bias to the decision making process.  

Good leaders have good data but great leaders use their experience and knowledge to judge what data to believe. It might be possible to manage using pure data but people won’t be managed, they want to be led. When you attempt to remove the “human element” from leading human beings the result is utter leadership failure. I’ve never seen a person’s life illustrated on a spreadsheet but there are empty cells in everyone’s history. Judgcernment is required to fill in those blanks.

Is good judgment still a prerequisite for leadership success? Decide for yourself but know this; your answer likely will speak volumes about the authenticity of your own leadership approach.