Things No One Teaches: Navigating the Evolution of Decision-Making in Entrepreneurship

Last month I wrote about making decisions and how they can feel more difficult as the business grows and becomes more complex. At the close of the post, I wrote about how decision-making is a practice. As our businesses grow, the decisions we need to make increase in complexity, and seem to be ever-changing. We need learning, frameworks, and timelines to help us keep moving forward and to keep our teams on track. Let’s dive into some of those and how they can help you.

Embracing Swift Decisions

Those “gut feeling” type of decisions seem to come around less and less. It’s funny how we don’t see certain eras of our business slipping away until they are truly gone. When was the last time you were able to decide purely based on gut? Sometimes we don’t notice things have changed; we just feel the grinding sensation that happens when things aren’t happening easily.

In the early days, we need to make quick decisions, so we can keep moving. It feels like a million things are being sorted out and decided upon (and they are!). The cost of errors is usually lower at this time in the business, so decisions don’t feel as risky.

When the weight of responsibility starts to feel heavy, and the pressure is becoming more than we want, it’s time to look at different ways of gathering data, leveraging experts, and giving ourselves a timeline to get those decisions moving once again.

The Shift to Data-Driven Decision-Making

Making the changeover from swift, gut-based decision-making to data-driven decision making doesn’t happen overnight. To start, choosing the decisions that seem particularly sticky or difficult is a good way to try things out. Maybe there’s a person in finance or marketing who can provide data to help out. There might also be an advisor or mentor that can talk it through. Taking some extra time and exploring the various ways to approach things is often worth it.

When we start incorporating data to help with these larger decisions, it can sometimes feel slower, sluggish. This is a difficult part for many entrepreneurs as their businesses grow and mature. It’s important to persevere through this time – it will get easier and smoother with practice. Suddenly, it’s less cumbersome, as the team is able to pick up and move quickly forward once decisions are made, with a clear mandate on how to proceed.

Decision-Making Processes

Whether we decide to embrace consulting experts, use a ranking system, or create a business case, if we combine these techniques with a good post-mortem process, we are well on our way to creating frameworks to help step through the process.

In Chapter 8 of my book, Big Gorgeous Goals, I delve deeper into these strategies and give practical tips and tricks to making them work for you. It’s filled with examples and stories that will help along the way.

Forgo Indecision and Embrace the Journey of Growth

Thinking big means standing confidently in the decisions we make. Not interminably sitting in them. This is not a “reach for the stars” way to go about decision-making. Finding the trust in yourself to decide and begin moving forward is a key step along the way.

Make sure that communication with the team is transparent as you make decisions, this helps to maintain trust and alignment within the team. Decision-making is a dynamic practice, and it needs to evolve as the business grows and circumstances change. Remaining open-minded to trying new techniques as we navigate the complexities of entrepreneurship, ensuring that we utilize any learning opportunities, frameworks or timelines that come our way.

Embracing the ever-evolving nature of decision-making is the best position for any of us to take. It allows us to hone our skills and refine as needed on our journey as entrepreneurs. Ensuring that the right process is in place, as well as our post-mortem evaluation to track progress.

Decisions aren’t going away – isn’t it time to make them more efficient, so they feel light and easy once again?