Meet Rachel. Rachel is a programme manager with a bucket-load of projects to oversee. She is a well-respected senior leader in the organisation, with multiple line reports and matrix-managed responsibilities.
Every morning, Rachel arrives in the office to a deluge of emails and Slack messages asking for her thoughts and decisions on the company's latest projects and initiatives. Rachel is exhausted by all the daily decisions her colleagues expect her to make.
It's widely reported that an average adult makes 35,000 decisions every day.
Crazy, I know.
But making decisions day in and day out—whether as easy as picking an outfit for the day or as tricky as navigating a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic—can be exhausting and cause people to feel overwhelmed, anxious, or stressed.
This is known as decision fatigue, a psychological overload that can hinder our ability to make good choices and lead to avoidance behaviours such as procrastination.
Leading in a culture of followers
In his book, Turn the Ship Around!, L. David Marquet tells of his time as a nuclear submarine commander. He needed his crew to execute their jobs with precision in this high-stress environment.
One day the commander mistakenly issued an impossible order, and his crew attempted to carry it out anyway.
The prevailing culture was that 'management' knew best. Therefore, orders from the top were carried out without question, and crew members took no responsibility for making their own decisions.
Marquet realised he was "leading in a culture of followers", and they were all in danger unless they fundamentally changed how they did things.
I wonder whether you've ever found yourself doing something your boss asked, even though you felt it was wrong—assuming they had some divine insider knowledge?
Think back over the past week.
How often, without stopping to think, did you ask your boss what you should do when faced with a challenge?
And how many times did your team members ask for you to make a decision that they conceivably could have made for themselves?
Here are a few real-life examples I've seen recently:
"The annual salary benchmarking report won't be published before I set my team's salaries for the new year. What do you suggest I do?"
"A customer has ordered two products, but one is out of stock. What should I tell them?"
"There's a discrepancy between the data in one report and another source. What would you do?"
I take a stand whenever I'm asked questions such as these. It's in both my interests as a manager and the employee's interests as a developing leader to ask them to flex their own decision-making muscles—particularly with examples such as these, where the outcome isn't going to sink a submarine!
I bat the question right back by saying something like, “What options have you considered?”.
Empowering decision making
When employees feel empowered, they're usually more motivated because they love where they work and what they do. In fact, Gallup found that highly engaged employees are 21% more profitable than those who aren't because they're more present and productive.
Think about it: if something goes against your best judgement, but you must do it because your manager has said so, you'll feel frustrated, and you won't do your best work.
McKinsey & Company’s research found that organisations that successfully enable distributed decision-making develop leaders who are nearly four times more likely to make good decisions than those that don't. Not only that: they outperform their industry peers financially.
This is because empowered employees are more engaged, work harder, and become more loyal to the company. They know their managers trust they have the skills to do the job and will leave them to it.
So how can we create this kind of culture?
Three powerful words
There are three powerful words every existing and aspiring leader needs in their toolbox to create an environment where people can feel empowered and safe in making decisions:
“I INTEND TO…”
How this works in practice
Let's take one of the above examples and replay how an empowered decision-maker could approach the problem differently.
"A customer has ordered two products, but one is out of stock. I've spoken to Supply Chain, who advised that the missing item will be available in two weeks. However, I know the customer wanted the delivery urgently and that this is one of our highest-value customers.
"Therefore, I INTEND TO call the customer to offer to ship the in-stock product today, with the other to follow in two weeks with the delivery costs to be covered by us as an apology for the delay. Can you think of anything else I should consider?"
The idea is for the employee to explore the options, decide on the best course of action, and then justify their reasoning. The best examples cover all the bases, so all that's left for the manager is to say, “Great, sounds like you've got it covered. Well done!”
A vital aspect of empowerment, I find, is creating an environment where employees can 'fail safely'.
The 'I intend to' tool permits employees to devise their recommended solution to a problem while providing the safety net of a manager stepping in and coaching an alternative answer if they spot a massive flaw in the plan.
So what became of Rachel?
Rachel implemented the 'I intend to' tool with her staff.
Now she's required mainly to rubber-stamp solutions to problems rather than being asked to make the decisions herself, and her reportees feel a strong sense of ownership and accountability.
This change has also fostered a bias for action, especially when time is of the essence.
So decision-making is happening quicker, Rachel is no longer a bottleneck and feels less stressed, and overall employee satisfaction and motivation have improved visibly.
It's a win-win for everyone.
How will you use I INTEND TO this week?
Main image: Markus Spiske, unsplash