“Why can’t my employees make decisions? Why do they always have to come to me?”

Busy clients ask me these questions frequently. Are their employees unwilling, incapable or simply indecisive? The following tips will not only answer those questions, they will also help you dramatically improve employee decision making.

1. Does the employee understand what decisions you expect him or her to make?

Don’t laugh. It is not at all uncommon for people to complain that someone is unwilling to do something they don’t realize they are expected to do. Unclear expectations are especially likely if you have been making certain decisions all along. Are you sure you have made it clear that you want someone else taking responsibility?

Even if you have been clear, your employees may not really believe you. If they don’t think you trust them to make the decision, they simply won’t believe you really want them to do it. “I know he says it, but he doesn’t really want us to go ahead without his approval.” 

2. Does the employee understand the factors important to the decision?

Every decision is governed by objectives, priorities and limitations. When people are reluctant to make a decision, it is often because they are unclear about these factors. They won’t want to make a decision, nor do you want them to make a decision, unless they understand:

• What are the most important considerations affecting this decision?
• What limitations – money, time, resources – restrict us?
• What are our priorities?

Discussing these factors with your employee is a great way to develop understanding of your organization. Another approach is to send the employee away to generate a list of decision criteria, rank them in rough order of importance, and then return for discussion and questions. Once the employee understands the priorities and limitations, he or she will be ready for the next step of decision making: identifying and examining the alternatives.

3. Is the employee capable of generating and evaluating the alternatives?

Decision making is a matter of choosing among alternatives. The ability to identify reasonable alternatives depends on knowledge, experience, and creativity. Alternatives that seem obvious to you may not even occur to an employee. And even you would likely come up with more good possibilities if you bounced your ideas around with your staff. Helping employees identify and think through alternatives is another excellent way to develop their knowledge of your business while you are also developing their decision making skill and confidence.

4. Does the employee have the skill, knowledge and resources needed to assess the potential risks of the best alternatives?

Alternatives may look fantastic at first blush, but the skilled decision maker will not rush forward without first considering the downside of the best alternatives. This step is often skipped. Surely you can think of a time when you “didn’t stop to think,” “didn’t stop to ask someone from that department,” or were dumbfounded by the decision of someone else, “what was he thinking?” Help your employees learn to pause long enough to consider what might go wrong before they get carried away by what looks like a great alternative.

5. Does your behavior discourage risk taking?

If your employees believe their happiness and job security are on the line whenever they make a mistake, they will be reluctant to make any decisions they can avoid. They would rather annoy you by asking your advice on every decision, than take the risk of making a bad decision. They need to understand the level of authority you are granting them and believe that this is not a no-win deal. If you don’t want them making million dollar decisions, this should be part of your discussion about limitations.

Each of these barriers to employee decision making provides an excellent opportunity to develop your employees, improve communication around critical issues, build self-confidence, and improve their decision making skills. Employees with strong decision making skill and the authority to use it can be invaluable to your organization.