Any Decision, Even The Wrong Decision Is Better Than None – Ben Horowitz

The Trick With Decisions!

I have always believed that decision making is one the most important challenges we all face, at any stage of our life. As I was growing up, someone said – “It gets easier with time”

In hindsight, I think they were just trying to make me feel better. I have never felt it become easier with time. But of course, the one good thing is that, we get better at handling the uncertainties of decision making. In one of our previous posts, “The 7 Important Steps to Make Better Decisions Faster” , we spoke about the various parameters involved in decision making – right from the fears, uncertainties to the positive spin offs in the form of responsibility, ownership to make decisions right and so on.

Key Message

The key deliverable in that post and even this one, is the speed with which we make decisions. I do appreciate the fact that we need to do our due diligence, understand the risks to take a decision. It is what we need to do, for something or the other is always at stake, or else decision making would have been child’s play. What we are trying to talk about is the hardship in actually arriving at one decision at the cost of another.

The mind somehow is tuned to look at things we stand to lose if we make a decision. And most of the times, it plays on the “Hook of Delay” on taking decisions. The mind makes us believe that it is ok to delay instead a wrong decision. The real question there is how expensive it tends to be in the end? And does a delay in decision making mean denial as well?

Caution with Wrong Decision

All along, we have been taught to be cautious with decisions, take our time, sleep over it for a while so that we can let the thoughts settle down, instead of acting in a rushed manner. I can see the merit in that and I I will be a strong proponent of doing that. However, we all do live in a fast paced world. More often than not, a decision has to be taken in a short span of time for there is a lot riding on it. The more we push it, the more we stand to lose.

If at all we arrive at such a place and realise that we are wasting valuable time with the aim of reaching the perfect decision where there is very minimal loss and maximum gain, then you can simply forget gaining anything out of the situation. You might as well give up and say that it is not going to happen. I know that it sounds harsh and blunt, then again, the decision or its effect are not going to wait for us to act in our own sweet time. Being swift, even if it means taking a wrong decision or a wrong turn can prove very useful sometimes. Of course, every rule has an exception, including this one.

Time is always of essence isn’t it?