The Wheel of Indecision: 10 Real Costs

Decision-making skills are crucial at all levels of the company, but many companies get caught in the revolving door of indecision. It is often assumed that CXOs and key decision makers have good decision-making skills, but too often team-oriented decision-making and action-taking are confused with the ability to make decisions and make plays from within. a somewhat less involved position. Delegating, deflecting, or hinting at a plan without assigning actual tasks and following through are disguised ways to delay. The costs of indecision are plentiful and high, including more paperwork and workflow nightmares as things get lost in confusion and forgotten. Avoid the endless barrage of indecision and take the reins again by identifying what kind of decision maker you (and the key players in your company) are.

Which one are you?

Progressive and prosperous companies have it all figured out. They know when to act and follow a linear decision-making process. Rarely do important initiatives drag on for months with little or no follow-up because someone didn’t make a call or didn’t complete a task when they said they would.

This is how it is supposed to work:

1. An idea or problem is proposed or presented
2. The appropriate team of people meets to discuss
3. If a solution or course of action is suggested, action items are assigned, deadlines are given, and progress updates or follow-ups are made in a timely manner.
4. If the development of a solution or course of action requires further discussion, a follow-up is scheduled and everyone involved knows what is still needed and does their part.

And of course all of this is well documented and shared with stakeholders. You may be saying, “yes, in a perfect world,” but isn’t that what we should all strive for, at least most of the time? Apathy is not good for business, and the sad reality is that a visit to 9 out of 10 small and medium-sized businesses would reveal gaps or problems in the previous workflow, where lack of identification of action items, indecision, inaction , failure. to incorporate accountability measures, and further delays are much more common.

There are many reasons this kills production, some obvious and some not so obvious. In companies where the carousel and seesaw approach are normal, one of the subtler implications is that people don’t take their work, or each other, seriously. This lowers morale, hampers progress, and slows down productivity. In the case of the hamster wheel scenario, indifference breeds like bacteria. What is someone’s real motivation to do something when poor follow-through and lack of accountability are accepted as the norm?

The 10 real costs

The costs of indecision, lack of timely follow-up, and inaction at the core of company affairs are numerous, but the price doesn’t have to be high. Let’s take a look at the 10 real costs of ongoing, widespread indecision:

1. The steps required to achieve business goals are postponed in all areas.
2. The paperwork, workflow, and process nightmares become overwhelming as things get lost in confusion as they are endlessly recapitulated, reprogrammed, and reworked.
3. Teams dissolve as coworkers start pointing fingers and take a more passive approach
4. Morale declines as people begin to feel drained, exhausted, and unimportant.
5. Time is wasted searching, reiterating, and holding meetings on previously discussed material that has not been acted upon.
6. Opportunities are lost
7. Communication lines get clogged and expectations are misinterpreted
8. Communication is abandoned as workers begin to feel that their efforts are being ignored or not heard.
9. People stop trying hard and trying to be creative or pursue bigger projects.
10. Customer service and the ideal of the company are compromised as employees become less motivated and interested in their work.

And actually, there is potential cost number 11, if the problem becomes so pervasive that it transcends the 4 walls of the business: You can get the reputation of being a company that is difficult to work with, and the associated companies, the suppliers or the Customers can start trying to steer clear of doing business with you.

Basically, indecision patterns cause companies to deteriorate from the inside out. Apathy and indifference can permeate the very fabric of a company and affect each and every member of the team. Some people may try to promote change, but if leadership revolves around the wheel of indecision, there will be no real change until the company addresses its weaknesses from the top down.

What can you do?

There are software solutions that can facilitate transparency, tracking, and more efficient workflows, but they only fix a small part of the problem. Technology will not repair interpersonal relationships or bring about the return of the right attitudes. Don’t let your business stagnate and get a reputation for being difficult to deal with. It all starts with embracing, and enforcing, a culture that, at its core and as a whole, is responsive, engaged, collaborative, enriching, responsible, and fast-acting, top-down.