Every day, business executives and managers make decisions which are key to the business growth and so should be taken a lot more seriously. Since no business has it in mind to be stagnant, the thirst for wanting to improve makes it imperative for the business leaders to meet more often. The outcomes of these meetings are new strategies for growth and expansion as well as decisions that the leaders collectively agree to be the way forward. But the major question faced in decision making is on what basis we arrive at such decisions. People are more convinced with decisions that show logical reasoning, like linking data together and showing trends on graphs. No one wants to hear that the next big decision of the company that can make or mar the business is based on what a person feels.
Studies have shown that most of the decisions we make, both in our personal lives and large-scale decisions are made based on emotional feelings. There is no scientific reasoning yet to that finding, but it is evident. Managers and executives come out of the conference room, after a long time deliberating the right step to take. After the meeting, you hear them say words, “We feel…”, “We think…”, and other forms of statements that show uncertainty. The only thing wrong with following your guts is when it is not backed up with sufficient evidence.
Analytics shows trends that may be useful to your business. The age we are in today has a surplus of data flowing around, although the amount of data is too much for the human mind to reason out, there are now statistical algorithms, complex programs available to make sense of the data. For small scale decision making, within the office or other trivial decisions, you can decide to follow your guts and do whatever feels right without having to bother about having sufficient evidence. But for large scale office decisions, like growth plans for the new fiscal year and other important decisions, executives should contemplate and review trends intensely before making major decisions.
Every business has a competitor. You cannot afford to be at your worst performance at any time because your competitor is most likely always at his best. If anything, you should always assume that your competitors are way ahead of you in all areas. The strategy most winning business use is leveraging on available data in their decision making. The data could be figures -showing the trend in the market, the trend in the company growth in terms of sales and market share, the trend in the market size and the likes. A number of decisions can be made from these trends, but at this point, there really is no good or bad decision. A statistical algorithm or machine learning algorithm that fits the problem statement may then be put in place for prediction of likely outcomes of each decision. These predictions can now be deliberated on and the one with the best outcomes will be chosen.
According to Socrates, “The unexamined life is not worth living,” this also implies in decision making. Do not implement unexamined decisions, for decisions made by feelings alone have more chances to end in doom than that which is backed up with enough evidence.
Blog
