Decision Making Process for Leaders (Infographic)

How to Use This Decision-Making Process

A diagram is only useful if it changes how you decide. In this section, you’ll see what each step means in practice and how to run a live decision through the 7 steps.

Step 1 – Decide How to Decide

This first step is the meta‑decision.Before you decide what to do, you choose how the decision will be made.

That means being clear on:

• Who is involved
• What data you'll need
• How reversible the choice is
• What timeline are you working to

As a leader, notice when everyone is already arguing options but no one has agreed the process.

Questions, as ever, make the difference. Always ask: "Have we agreed how we’ll make this call?"

Step 2 – Widen Options

Every either or choice is a red flag.

It warns you haven’t given enough thought to the options.

Pause deciding. First, find more options.

Challenge your team:

• Adjust scope (smaller test, phased rollout).
• Change timing (delay/bring forward).
• Mix options (partial hire, pilot market).

Another way to find alternatives is to ask: "If this choice vanished, what would you do instead?"

Step 3 – Gather Intelligence

Step 3 is where you gather real intelligence to test your options. Most leaders jump to “Decide” and miss the proof.

Step 3 has four parts:

1. Brainstorm – generate intel sources  

2. Explore – scan broadly  

3. Test – prove assumptions  

4. Narrow – cut weak intel/options

Brainstorm: Generate intel sources quickly. Ask: “What do we need to know? Who has the data?” Talk to customers, sales, competitors. Review past decisions.

Explore: Scan broadly but shallowly. Collect data from multiple angles. Talk to people outside your team. Review history.

Test: Run small experiments. Scenario analysis (“What if revenue drops 20%?”). Pre-mortem (“Why will this fail?”).

Narrow: Remove intel that doesn’t hold up. Cut options that fail basic tests.

“What simple test would make you more confident in this choice?”

Step 4 – Make the Decision

Step 1 gave you the how. Now choose the what.

Use the criteria you agreed earlier. Weighted decision-making helps score complex trade-offs objectively when departments have stakes.

Uncertainty will always remain. Not deciding is still a decision—and often the worst one. Every choice demands trade-offs.

“Given what we know now, what are we actually choosing—and what are we saying no to?”

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Step 5 – Implement the Decision

A decision isn’t real until it’s moving. Implementation turns choice into action.

Start with the first visible step.

• Who needs to know?
• What’s the first concrete move?

Use the RACI matrix to assign clear roles. It prevents the “everyone thought someone else was handling it” problem that kills 70% of implementations.

- Responsible – who does the work  

- Accountable – who owns the outcome  

- Consulted – who gives input  

- Informed – who stays updated

Define success signals upfront. What will you measure in week 1? Month 1?

“What’s the first action that makes this decision real?”

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Step 7 – The Learning Loop

Outcomes are noisy. Good decisions can have bad results. Bad decisions can work out.

Your job isn’t to judge the outcome. It’s to capture what happened and what you learned.

What actually happened?  

- Did results match your prediction?  

- What surprised you?  

- Where did intel/intuition hold up or fail?

A decision journal makes this systematic. Record the decision, outcome, and insights. Over time, patterns emerge—biases, intel gaps, timing issues.

This learning feeds Step 1 of your next decision.

“What will you do differently next time because of this?”

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Walkthrough – One Decision, Start to Finish

Most leaders get no decision-making training.

When pressure hits, they end up not making a decision.

I saw this recently. The ERP system was failing, but no one could decide what to do.

Now, here’s how the same ERP decision could have played out using this decision-making process.

Decide How to Decide

Most decision-making starts badly—because teams skip the meta-decision.

The board could have agreed up front:  

- Goal: Replace ERP by Q3, under £2m budget, zero service disruption  

- Criteria: Cost, speed, risk tolerance  

- Roles: Who decides (CEO), who executes (CTO + finance)  

Clear constraints would have stopped scope creep and endless debate. Timelines and ripple effects become visible from the very first day.

This one step would have changed everything.

Widen Options

They denied, then displaced, and then became desperate for a solution.

Widening options after the meta-decision could have meant:

• Scope – integrate old and new ERPs, easing pressure on the legacy system.
• Timing – shift low-risk teams to the new system sooner to reduce load.
• Approach – run a small pilot in one region before a full rollout.

None of these options was discussed until the crisis forced a choice.

Gather Intelligence

The legacy ERP was more like a haunted house than software. No one knew how the parts connected.

What should have happened:  

- Map system with every department (Brainstorm → Explore)  

- Test key functions, benchmark vendors (Test)  

- Narrow to must‑have requirements (Narrow)  

Instead, they skipped intel gathering entirely.

The vendor was chosen first. Developers had to reverse-engineer the old system as they built the new one.

Months later, they created a “gap spreadsheet”—a humiliating list of functions the new system couldn’t handle. By then, they were locked in, paying millions to fix problems they should have spotted up front.

“What intel gaps are you assuming away right now?”

Make the Decision

With clear requirements, a weighted decision table would have made vendor selection objective.

Vendor A: cheaper but riskier implementation.  

Vendor B: higher cost, better integrations.  

Vendor C: proven track record, longest timeline.

The table would have revealed the trade-offs upfront. Instead, subjective preferences won. They picked Vendor A and paid for it later.

“Given what we know now, what are we actually choosing—and what are we saying no to?”

Implement the Decision

Desperation forced an urgent response. But urgency is a poor substitute for structure when you’re implementing a critical system.

A simple RACI method  would have made the ERP rollout clear:

- IT – Responsible for technical cutover

- COO – Accountable for business impact

- Finance and Operations – Consulted on timing and risks

- Wider teams – Informed about changes and support

With roles and check‑in points set, issues could surface early and be fixed before they became crises.

“Who is actually responsible for making this decision real?”

The Learning Loop

The ERP rollout hurt. Projects overran, teams were exhausted, and trust suffered a setback.

This is the moment most boards turn the page. But it’s also the best chance to learn.

A simple decision journal can close the loop by forcing you to write down:​

• What you expected from the ERP decision
• What actually happened—good and bad
• Where your process broke: no meta‑decision, no widened options, weak intel, rushed implementation

This is reflective decision-making in practice, not theory. It turns a painful project into a playbook for the next one.​

The learning loop feeds Step 1 of your next big decision—better criteria, better questions, better pacing.

“What will we do differently on our next system decision because of this one?”

Use This on Your Next Decision

Pick one decision you’re facing right now. Print the infographic or sketch it on paper. Walk it through the 7 steps before you act.

Here’s how to start:

• What decision are you facing this week? Write it down in one sentence.
• Where are you stuck? Meta-decision, options, intel, or execution?
• What’s your first action? One question, one test, one conversation.

Your next decision doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to be better than your last one. Start the loop now.

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