Difficult Decisions

CHAPTER 7I Think I Know What I Think; Now What?

Hooray! You've read nearly an entire book – and you've spent countless hours unpacking your moral code, clarifying and considering the ethical context in which you operate, reflecting on your various roles (group, task, and socioemotional), and exploring the interrelationship among these. You are as ready as just about anyone can be to make a difficult decision.

But who said it's your decision to make?

Oh, and what are the rest of us supposed to do? Sit around and watch you make decisions and then live with the outcomes?

Enacting difficult human decisions is more than just a function of understanding where you're coming from, how you got there, and how to reconcile conflict among different aspects of your thinking and your stakeholders' needs. You also have to manage those stakeholders and their reactions to news that may or may not be fully welcome.

Most adults very much prefer that actions that affect their lives and realities are done with them rather than to them. That makes the process of influencing essential in seeing through the enactment of a difficult decision. Engaging people in a decision-making process leads them to feel empowered, but that sentiment can backfire if you're not actually intending to follow their recommendations. People who do not feel represented can and will withdraw their authorization – and your decision, no matter how well-considered or carefully thought-out it may be, will be compromised.