When I sat down with three executives at a large international bank in London, I got an earful of frustrations. Determined, hard-working, ambitious people, who would like to accomplish more faster, are susceptible to frustration. It’s only natural. It is also the reason they were talking with me.

Interestingly enough, every one of their frustrations could be traced to an important decision that either had not been made or had not been communicated. Some of these decisions were strategic – direction, priorities, timing, permission to drop something. Others were operational – clarity of resource commitments, roles, and responsibilities. None of the frustrations were the result of difficult personnel issues or a fundamental lack of understanding about what or how to proceed. These executives were sharp and they knew exactly what they wanted to do. They were simply handcuffed by unmade decisions they weren’t empowered to make.

Without a decision, you are stranded at a fork in the road. By definition. Your progress is blocked because you don’t know which way to go. Of course, it’s frustrating

When you feel stuck, look for the unmade decisions. Progress requires zillions of decisions. After all, decisions are one of Latham’s Six Outcomes that constitute tangible progress. Some decisions are easy, some complex, but every unmade decision is capable of halting meaningful progress.

Some unmade decisions are outside your control. They may depend on your boss, the entire leadership team, another department, the board, a customer, or a supplier.

Others are yours to make. Have you decided on priorities, next steps, resource assignments, approach, methods, etc.? Even when the decisions are all ours to make, we can still get bogged down. Caught in a muddle of unmade decisions, incomplete plans, and frustrations. A lack of clarity. Disclarity!

One way to quickly reduce frustration is to focus on the decisions just ahead of you. Create clarity by identifying each one. If they aren’t yours to make, make a clear request for an answer from the appropriate party. If they are yours to make, tackle them by SOARing through Decisions.

My frustrated executives were handcuffed by less than a dozen unmade decisions. A clear and simple list of those missing decisions provides a roadmap to results. Make those decisions and the handcuffs come off, freeing you to fly. You and all your employees who were stuck in limbo.

Interested in creating this level of clarity for your whole team? Let’s talk. The power of clarity is simply amazing!