D is for decisive

I wonder how many would-be leaders would have had the courage to make a decision like Pete Carroll of the Seattle Seahawks did, when he passed over the “beast” at the one-yard line on the biggest stage in professional sports: the superbowl. You have to be very comfortable with yourself to make that decision as a leader! Could you have done it? Would you have?

How could you compare your day to day with such a big stage? A leader can take over for a moment. A leader can assess the playing field. A leader can accentuate the positive framework when it involves his team. However, a leader who is not decisive may not achieve the best results.

Could you have done it? What would it have taken for him to feel confident enough to make a comparable decision on his biggest stage, while under the lens of a high-powered microscope?

Confidence comes to mind. A leader has to have confidence not only in himself, but also in his team and his abilities. The team also needs to have confidence and trust in its leader. With the Seahawks, the team did everything they could to run the final play. There were no doubts. There was no half effort. Clearly, the team was confidently aligned with his leadership.

How do you gain confidence in your ability to lead and make decisions? Experience plays a very important role. We get better at making decisions, especially those in our area of ​​excellence, after making some that end in both success and failure. Many times, our best lessons come from our failures and skipping steps along the way. Every experience is a learning opportunity: analysis of failure is just as important as success.

But what if you have no experience? There are times when more is expected of us than our experience provides. Imagine it’s your first “Super Bowl” with a young team fresh out of college. Although both you and your team are lacking in experience, you still need to do your best to lead them to victory. To give your team the best chance, you would seek the advice and support of veteran and experienced assistant coaches. Although not all of us are professional soccer coaches, the people who guide us on the sidelines can help us make the tough decisions that are presented to all leaders. Here’s how a support group, mentor, coach, or trusted ally could be a good investment. We don’t always realize what we don’t know until we need to know it. Investing in your own self-awareness will pay even bigger dividends than just the pay raise that comes from climbing the corporate ladder.

Does your decision still seem too big to make? We can learn a good lesson from Jim Rohn, a highly successful man who came from middle ground to discover his fortune… “Sometimes it doesn’t matter which side of the fence you get off. What matters most is getting down. You can’t progress without making decisions”. Decide to be decisive. Grab that veteran to help you make the tough decisions—that’s what makes you the leader, not the follower.

Learn to lead. Be decisive in the process and let the learning from each experience shine through.