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I don’t believe in taking right decisions: A fabulous inspirational quote by Ratan Tata talks about decisions in life and how we sometimes can get hung up in the notion of perfection. No decision will ever be perfect, we will always have something or the other to lose. The main point to remember in decision-making is the affordable loss. And most times, we don’t consider time lost in making decisions.

I don’t believe in taking right decisions. I take decisions and then make them right

Ratan Tata Inspirational Quotes

If you look deeper into this quote by Ratan Tata about decisions – I don’t believe in taking right decisions is referring to the time lost in the false perception of perfection. In some ways, it is better to identify a few parameters that you can be happy with and make a quick decision. Ultimately, your results lie in the actions you take and they have to be backed by good decisions. But these decisions can’t take forever.

I don’t believe in taking right decisions, I take decisions and then make them right

It sounds rather haughty when we read this quote. But I love the belief in this quote. Most times, we take too much time to decide because we want it to be perfect. But there’s no such thing as a perfect decision because our situation keeps changing. The best thing we can do in the interest of time is to make a good decision and not wait for the best decision. If we wait, it leads us to paralysis by analysis thus preventing us from making any progress at all. You may decide to follow the suite in this quote and not believe in taking the right decisions. Or you may decide to take a random decision and work hard to make it right.

The main thing to remember however is that we are responsible for the decisions we take. We have the ownership to take a good decision. We also have the responsibility to work hard to make this decision right. The accountability element for me takes a higher precedence because we owe it to the decision-making process, our commitment to the path we decide to take. (The steps in decision making)

Important factors to make the right decision

Having said the above, we have to rely on the following factors to make the most appropriate decision for us. It won’t be perfect but it will give us a good chance to succeed if we follow a few principles.

Speed of decision making: Time is of the greatest importance. You can’t afford to take forever to arrive at a decision. Quick decisions help us save time, get feedback and improve the quality of future decisions.

Perfection is overrated: A timely decision is more important than a perfect decision. Obviously we don’t want to make mistakes But also, these decisions can’t be pointless. They have to serve the timeliness element.

Learning from Decisions: Decision alone is not as important as our attitude and ability to learn. Good decision-making skills come from experience which usually comes from bad decisions. This reminds me of a beautiful quote from Terry Pratchett – wisdom comes from experience.

It will never be perfect, but it will be your decision to own and move ahead. Time is the biggest and most important resource. We can’t afford to waste that.

Did Ratan Tata say – I don’t believe in taking the right decisions?

It sounds completely uncharacteristic of Ratan Tata to have said this quote. At one end, I want to believe he said this because it talks about the power of conviction, belief and standing against the odds. On the other hand, his public presence has been of modesty, humility and simplicity which makes me question whether he said this. However, I was a bit relieved when I found this video of Ratan Tata talking about this quote – I don’t believe in taking the right decisions.

The most important take away for me from this video is the philosophy behind his decision making:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratan_Tata