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9 Powerful Questions to Ask Yourself When Making Decisions At Work · Enhance.training

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of decisions you make at work are easy.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: Some stretch you and then others are really difficult.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: Making the best decision you can at work is a lot easier and quicker when you ask nine powerful questions in a sequence.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: These questions create the backbone to make better decisions a lot faster at work.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: The questions work with the easy decisions all the way through to the really tough decisions.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself these powerful questions or ask the questions to those asking you to make a decision.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: Good decision making is a highly priced skill in any organization.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Decisions create impacts.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: Decisions are the line between success and failure for individuals, teams and businesses.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: This adds a lot of pressure to become good at making decisions or not to make decisions if you don't feel confident in making a good decision.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: Wherever you are in your career right now, you have decision-making skills.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: We all make a ton of decisions every single day.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: When the decisions become more complex, with larger impacts, or only have bad choices available, the decisions themselves become much harder to make.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: The really good decision makers have a system or framework that they go through for every decision they make.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: A framework and their experience in using it makes them really good decision makers.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: The nine powerful questions to ask yourself when making decisions provides you a framework.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: Go through the questions in order, and you cover all the main angles to make really good decisions in the circumstances you face.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: The last question is often missed by managers making decisions, and far too often missing this creates a lot more problems and can be pretty embarrassing.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: The first question to ask when making decisions at work is what is the time frame?
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: Ask this question first because the time frame determines what you can and can't do before making a decision.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: For example, there is a lot you can find out in a day.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: There is not much you can do in five minutes.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: Very few decisions are needed immediately in my experience.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: When you dig into the reasons behind a person asking for quick decisions, you usually have more time than they are trying to give you.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: The bigger the impact of the decision, the more time you should demand before making it.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Always be clear about what the real time frames are to make the decision.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: The second question to ask yourself when making decisions at work is what specifically is the desired outcome?
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: What are you or the other person trying to achieve?
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: The more specific and clear your answer is to this question, the easier and quicker you'll find it to make a decision.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: When your goals or outcomes are vague, fuzzy and unclear, making a decision becomes harder and slower.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: It is also a lot harder to make a good decision.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: Invest the time to really understand what outcome is needed, why it is needed, and how aligned it is to the team and company goals.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: The third question to ask yourself when making decisions is what is the context of the decision?
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: The background or context for decision making is surprisingly important.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: Different contexts literally will change the decision you make.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Imagine if you were asked to approve the hiring of an additional staff member.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: If the business was trying to save costs and struggling to grow, you'd probably say no.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_00: If the business was growing strongly and short of staff, you would say yes.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: At worst, you might question if this was the right person to hire.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: The context will impact the decision that you make.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Keep asking questions or seeking answers until you understand the background and the context of the decision before making it.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: The fourth question to ask yourself when making decisions is what is the impact of this decision and who is impacted?
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: There are lots of different ways that you might consider the impact of decisions.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: Some examples.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: Or the impact on the cash balance of the company, or the feelings of individuals, or how the culture of the team might be impacted, or how clients or customers might respond.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: The financial impact of your decision is nearly always relevant at work.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: The financial impact of decisions often guides who and how many people are involved in the decision-making process.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Prioritize the different types of impact and whether short-term or longer-term impacts are more important.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: Getting good answers to each of these four questions is essential to improve the quality of any decision you make.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: The next five questions are very useful to improve how well you make the more complex and high impact decisions.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Jess Coles, and if you're new here, Enhanced.training provides resources and courses for you to build management expertise and confidence to lead any team to their best performance.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Do visit us at Enhance.training for additional resources to help you and your team make better decisions in less time.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: I'll add some links in the podcast description.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: The fifth question to ask yourself when making decisions at work is what data and insights are available?
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: Using performance data, whether financial, operational, or sales related, is incredibly useful to guide your decision making.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: Analysis and numbers help quantify the impact of each option you could choose.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: For example, if your company wanted to be more profitable, using financial information to choose the option with the highest profit would make the decision making a lot quicker and easier.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: Using data deepens your understanding of the impact of the options available.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: Data is also useful to check what you are being told is accurate and unbiased if others are asking you to make a decision.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: Seek out useful and relevant data to the decision that you need to make.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: The sixth question to ask yourself when making decisions at work is do I really understand the pros and cons of each option available?
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: The better and more deeply you understand the options that you are choosing between and how your decision will create impacts, the better your decision making will be.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: When comparing options, go through the impacts, the critical steps, how easy it will be to implement the decision, the upfront investment needed, the resources to implement, and any other sensible element for your specific decision.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: When you understand all the pros and cons of each option, making the choice between options is easier and quicker.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Invest time to understand the pros and cons of your decision options.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: The seventh question to ask yourself when making decisions at work is what am I communicating to team and colleagues by making this decision?
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: This question is really important for leaders of teams.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: Every decision you make is a communication to your team.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: Each decision will impact the expectations you set, their trust in you, their motivation, the team culture, and ultimately team performance.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: Align what your decisions communicate with what you ask from them, and you'll have a happy, productive team.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: If your decisions conflict with what you ask from your team, you will have a confused, uncertain team which will not perform as well.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: An example I had saw a few years back, a fellow leader publicly gave one of his team members a company prize.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: Two weeks later, literally, the same leader sacked that person for dishonesty.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: This complete U-turn left his team confused, shocked, and scared about being fired next.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: Always think through what your decisions are communicating to those you lead.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: The eighth question to ask yourself when making decisions at work is how aligned is my preferred decision with my values?
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Our values influence the decisions we make.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: When we make decisions that align with our values, we feel good.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: When in conflict, we feel uneasy, unhappy, etc.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: Our values rarely change quickly.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: To make consistent decisions, align your decisions to your values.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Your company's values are another set of reference points you should use to make consistent decisions that serve the best interests of the company.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: Again, company values should not change too quickly.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_00: The ninth question to ask yourself when making decisions is do we have the capability, support and resources to practically implement this decision?
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: In my view, making the decision is often the easy part.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Implementing the decision is the hard part.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Ask any company board about which was easier.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: You're deciding on the strategy or making their strategy happen throughout the business.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: To make good decisions which you can implement, be realistic about the capability within your team or business to implement the decision, i.e.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: what skills and bandwidth are needed and do we have them.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: Think about the support you'll need to gather to implement the decision.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: When decisions are aligned with company goals, for instance, getting support is a lot easier versus if they're not aligned to those company goals.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: Finally, think through the resources that you're going to need to implement the decision.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: Realistically considering the implementation challenges often changes the option chosen during the decision-making process.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: Always think through the capability and resources available.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: So, in summary, using a tried and tested framework will improve how well you make decisions, how quickly you make decisions, and how consistently you make good decisions.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: I strongly recommend you use a framework for making decisions.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: Our framework uses these nine powerful questions to ask yourself when making decisions at work.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: Firstly, what is the time frame for the decision?
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Secondly, what specifically is the desired outcome?
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: Third, what is the context of the decision?
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: Fourth, what is the impact of this decision and who is impacted?
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: Fifth, what data and insights are available?
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: Sixth, do I really understand the pros and cons of each option available?
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_00: Seventh, what am I communicating to team and colleagues by making this decision?
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: Eighth, how aligned is my preferred decision with my values and the company values?
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: And then ninth, do we have the capability, support and resources to practically implement this decision?
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: If you have any questions about the nine powerful questions to ask yourself when making decisions at work, please email me at support at enhanced.training and I'll get back to you.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: Do visit us at enhanced.training for additional resources to help you and your team make better decisions in less time.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'll add some links in the podcast description.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks very much for listening, and I look forward to speaking to you again soon.