Owning and running a business is the most fulfilling feeling one can experience, bettering people's lives while also creating jobs. This position does not come without its share of responsibility, enough of which can make decision-making and advancing the vision difficult. The toll this takes on business owners will wear them out over time if they take on the responsibility alone. As well, It’s hard to make decisions as a leader without frustrating others in the organization. For these reasons, it is extremely useful for leaders to have a support system that will guide them and the organization to success.
Constructing a support crew to assist your ability to lead the team effectively involves surrounding yourself with the right people. You don’t want these people to be ones that just simply agree with what you say and don’t provide a lot of feedback. You want individuals with edge, experience, people who are going to challenge you to think differently.
A common mistake of leaders is not being open to feedback, as a result, they involve people who would be classified as a “yes man”. Openness to feedback is the only way anyone can improve at anything, unfortunately, many associate critiques with negativity. The position of a CEO, President, VP, etc, requires decision-making to be based on applying systems that can be trusted to benefit the organization.
Analysis of what works and doesn’t work can only be identified by individuals directly working with the systems in place. For this reason, it is best for all business leaders to have an open-door model where those working for them can freely voice their opinions.
Now, the decision-making process should not be left solely up to the one person in charge, they need a crew to weigh options and outcomes. This is not to say that every decision made should be left up to the top of the chain, it is best to give responsibility down the chain when necessary. Different situations require situation fitting responses from leadership to assist.
With that being said, let's look at how leaders can involve others to assist with decision making:
Involve The Right People
Analyze the situation, identify the key stakeholders as well as those who will be involved in carrying out the task. With these individuals having heavy involvement in the situation, their opinions will come from having worked directly on the front line. It is not useful to make decisions without weighing the opinions or needs of the people being impacted by these decisions. They will tell you what resources they need and a timeline of when the task can be completed.
Analyze The Input
Once everyone has expressed their feedback, leaders can weigh the risk, potential benefits, and logistics behind the requests. Leaders must take into account the level of resources available to them (budget, time, team size, etc). Remember to communicate when and if requests cannot be fulfilled, decisions should be made in the best interest of the organization.
Mitigate Risk
Identify the areas of risk, review them with those involved in the task and prepare them to be able to handle issues that may arise. This can be done by scenario-based training where individuals run through simulations of a problem arising and practice handling them. Using situations that are likely to occur whether it be an upset client or a resource failing, managing their quick response time will be beneficial. How they do in the simulation will help leaders to decide who to put in what position when executing the task.
Of course, it is impossible to anticipate everything that will or could go wrong, but preparation nonetheless will translate into readiness for other situations.
Post Task Review
After the team has completed their task, hold a debriefing and highlight what went well and what needs improvement. This will be a useful tool for leaders the next time they go into a task to see how their decision-making benefited or limited the team. It will also help leaders evaluate which of their team members to delegate certain tasks to. Input from employees can only help so much, experience-based outcome analysis is the cherry on top for leaders' decision-making development.
Conclusion
Making decisions is the main duty of leadership, these decisions of course are to guide the organization towards a collective vision. To be successful in doing so, leaders need the help of those working for and with them. This is to ensure that everyone in the organization is capable of doing their best work with all the necessary support.
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