Think Smarter: Critical Thinking to Improve Problem-Solving and Decision-Making Skills

31 Who, Need, and When

Whose Decision Is This, Anyway?

You've worked hard in getting clear on a headscratcher and concluding the best solution for it. Everyone on the team is ready to go, but there's one more potential issue: you may need someone else's approval to proceed. Although you likely have authority to make some decisions, not all of them are your call, perhaps because you need additional budget, resources, or capital expenses that are beyond your authority. Maybe you need approval to shift priorities enough to begin. If it's not your decision, you go to your manager for approval. He or she too makes many decisions, but unfortunately, his or her response is sometimes, “Oh, that's not my call. We'll have to ask my manager.” Then sometimes, the next response is, “Oh, we need several people to approve this.” Sometimes, it gets even worse in a large company. Then the response might be, “Gee, I'm not sure who needs to approve this.”

In most cases, a single person is responsible for the decision. Others, such as peers or staff, may be consulted for opinions and concurrence, but at the end of the day, it's usually up to one person to decide whether something is a go or no-go. Some organizations have voting committees, and decisions need a majority—or occasionally even unanimous—affirmative vote to get approval. For example, a steering committee's purpose is to control a company's direction. It accomplishes this by saying yea or nay on projects and initiatives and by setting priorities. ...