How do you decide? A self appraisal.

How do you decide? A self appraisal.

In business, we make decisions every day. Some of them will be right, while others will turnout to be wrong - however, what is important is that; we make decisions, when they are to be made & with the best available information.

To avoid making wrong decision or leaving decisions to chance, we need a systematic approach. With a systematic approach, each decision can be taken with confidence, no matter what type of decision one has to make.

The following short questionnaire helps you understand; your present decision-making skills & areas for improvement.

Statement/Situation		Not at all	Rarely	Sometimes	Often	Very Often
1	I evaluate the risks associated with each alternative before making a decision.	1	2	3	4	5
2	After I make a decision, it's final because I know my approach is good.	5	4	3	2	1
3	I try to determine the real issue before starting a decision-making process.	1	2	3	4	5
4	I rely on my own experience to find potential solutions to a problem.	5	4	3	2	1
5	I often rely on "gut instinct" when making decisions.	5	4	3	2	1
6	I am sometimes surprised by the actual consequences of my decisions.	5	4	3	2	1
7	I use a well-defined process to structure my decisions.	1	2	3	4	5
8	I think that involving many stakeholders to generate solutions can make the process more complicated than it needs to be.	5	4	3	2	1
9	If I have doubts about my decision, I go back and recheck my assumptions and my process.	1	2	3	4	5
10	I take the time needed to choose the best decision-making tool for each specific decision.	1	2	3	4	5
11	I consider a variety of potential solutions before I make my decision.	1	2	3	4	5
12	Before I communicate my decision, I create an implementation plan.	1	2	3	4	5
13	In a group decision-making process, I tend to support my friends' proposals and try to find ways to make them work.	5	4	3	2	1
14	When communicating my decision, I include my rationale and justification.	1	2	3	4	5
15	Some of the options I've chosen have been much more difficult to implement than I had expected.	5	4	3	2	1
16	I prefer to make decisions on my own, and then let other people know what I've decided.	5	4	3	2	1
17	I determine the factors most important to the decision, and then use those factors to evaluate my choices.	1	2	3	4	5
18	I emphasize how confident I am in my decision as a way to gain support for my plans.	5	4	3	2	1

If you answer "very often" to the question no:1 give yourself 5 marks. After answering all the questions calculate total number of marks you have achieved.

Interpretation of your marks is as follows;

Total marks	Your decision making style
18~42	Your decision-making is yet to fully mature. You aren't objective enough, and you rely too much on luck, instinct or timing to make reliable decisions. Start to improve your decision-making skills by focusing more on the process that leads to the decision, rather than on the decision itself. With a systematic process, you can handle any decision with confidence.
43~66	Your decision-making process is OK. You have a good understanding of the basics, but need to improve the process and be more proactive. Focus on identifying more options and identify more risks and consequences as possible you can. The better your analysis, the better your decision will be in the long term. Focus specifically on the areas where you lost points, and develop a system that will work for you across a wide variety of situations.
67~90	You have an ideal approach to decision-making! You are aware how to set up the process and generate lots of potential solutions. From there, you analyse the options carefully, and you make the best decisions possible based on what you know. As you gain more and more experience, use that information to evaluate your decisions, and continue to build on your decision-making success. Think about the areas where you lost points, and decide how you can include those areas in your process.

So you want to further improve your decision making process? lets meet to know more!

__________________________________________________________

With experience of two decades, read "How we help our clients" to improve business.