How to Make Successful Decisions

Even if one cannot actually decide once and for all whether to stay in a certain profession or not, there a number of simple principles one could fellow to ensure that one appears decisive.

1.         Mentioning any one decision frequently, over a long period, always in the same terms, soon leads people to believe you to be indecisive.  Never say ‘I can’t decide’.  Say ‘I haven’t decided yet’.   Statements like these give the impression you are working to a plan, rather than aimlessly pondering.

2.         One should not discuss his decision with everyone he knows.  This is a mistake.  Reserve serious discussions about  a decision for people who can truly help you to make the right decision.  Ask people only those questions they can reasonably be expected to answer informatively.

3.         After taking someone’s advice, you should not go over the same ground again with other people.   Not only will this kind of behavior make you appear indecisive, it will also annoy the person whose advice you first took.  Unless you make it clear that their advice has contributed to your understanding and moved you on to the next stage of decision-making, they will ask the same questions over and over again, and if you must go over exactly the same points with more than one person, do it discretely.

4.         If you know you have not make up your mind yet, don’t allow people to take action as if you had.  Be clear and honest.  Say ‘Don’t do anything about this yet- I will let you know when I’ve finally decided’.  People understand that some decisions take a long time to make.

5.         There is no need to go public on a decision prematurely.  People are nearly always less interested in the details of your life than you imagine them to be.

6.         Discriminate explicitly between more and less serious decisions.  If you treat deciding whether to paint the living-room green or blue with the same weight as deciding whether to move house you will quickly acquire the reputation of a ditherer.

7.         Vary the confidence with which you announce your decisions.  If you always claim your decisions to be definitely right, you will be discounted, quite rightly, as arrogant.

8.         If you really need to change your mind, try to represent the change as progress, rather than a simple U-turn.  Say ‘I’ve just thought of a slightly better way to tackle this or ‘Let’s not only do such-and-such but also so-and-so’.

9.         It can be better to make a possibly bad decision decisively and move on rather than spend lots of time debating it. People’s memories are short, and provided you do actually move on and don’t spend time on postmortems and regrets you will usually carry them with you.

10.       Finally, if you are sure you have made a mistake, don’t sacrifice your happiness or security just for the sake of appearing decisive.  All other things being equal, to appear decisive is a good thing, but if you have left home and heartily wish you had not, if you have given up work to look after your children and it is driving you crazy, or if you have booked a holiday you know you won’t enjoy, then other considerations than how decisive you appear are paramount.  People who acknowledge they have made mistakes are respected.  It’s just that people who make too many are suspected of bad management.