Last week I mentioned I would share a little tip with you to help you make quicker decisions.
It’s something I came up with during a recent coaching session.
My client, we’ll call her Trudy, had been given feedback from her boss that he was frustrated with the length of time it was taking for some of the projects he had asked for, to be completed.
Trudy was committed to the projects, however when she went to action them, her brain kept posing different “What if” questions. What if this happens? What if that doesn’t work out? What if so and so doesn’t like it? The list of What if questions was endless and it was preventing her from taking action.
As often happens when I’m coaching, I saw a picture. The picture was the Risk Assessment Matrix that is used to eliminate or reduce work health and safety risks. (See below.)
I shared the Risk Assessment Matrix with Trudy and asked her a “What if” question.
“What if, for every question you come up with, you ask yourself two more questions?”
She leaned in.
“What is the likelihood of this happening and what are the possible consequences if it did?”
“Wow!” she exclaimed. “That could really work.”
We tested it out on a couple of her “What if” questions, e.g. “What if John makes a mistake with the task?” (This was preventing Trudy from delegating.)
“What’s the likelihood of John making a mistake?” I asked.
“It’s possible”, she said, “but probably unlikely”.
“What is the consequence if John makes a mistake?” I asked.
“It’s not really a big deal”, she answered. “After all, he knows the software and uses it all the time.”
With that she made an instant decision to let go and let John do the work.
She was on fire. All she had to do was ask the two questions in the Risk Assessment Matrix to help her make quicker decisions.
It’s your turn. Have a go and let me know some of the questions you ask and what you decide as well as if it helped to make your decisions more quickly.
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