5 Rules for Leading Your Teams to Better Decisions

Leaders guide their teams to make good decisions. But first, you have to decide how you will make decisions as a team. Your strategy for team decision-making can create conflict and confusion within your team. Or it can provide clarity and camaraderie.

These 5 rules of decision making can help you provide clarity and camaraderie to your team. And they can lead your team to make better decisions.

(1) Decide the type of decision before you make the decision.

As the team leader, you wield tremendous power: the power to decide the type of decisions your team will make. But you need to make this choice in advance.

Dave Thiel, President and CEO of T Bar M Camps and former Triaxia Partners consultant, introduced me to the concept of 3 different types of decisions within a team:

• Consensus Decisions — when the whole team or a predetermined portion of the team agrees to a decision. In consensus decisions, everyone has a voice and a vote.
• Consultative Decisions — when the team leader makes the decision but gets input from everyone. In consultative decisions, everyone on the team has a voice but only the leader has a vote.
• Closed Decisions — when the team leader makes the decision without any input from the team. In closed decisions, only the leader has a voice and a vote.

Your team won’t use the same type of for every decision. But the leader needs to decide the type of decision before you make the decision.

(2) Communicate the type of decision to your team.

Team leaders can create a lot of confusion and frustration when you don’t let your teams know the type of decision that will be utilized.

Imagine the confusion when your team thinks they are making a consensus decision, but you are making a consultative decision.

Consider the frustration when your team thinks they can influence you through a consultative decision but you’re making a closed decision.

Communicate the type of decision to your team before they (or you) need to make the decision.

(3) Only change the type of decision to include more voices and votes.

You will damage your team’s trust for you if you change the type of decision to include fewer voices and votes. You cannot change a consensus decision into a consultative or a consultative into a closed decision. People will feel like you have stripped them of their voice and power to vote.

Leaders are tempted to change the type of decision when decisions either (1) take too long or (2) aren’t going the direction the leader wants to go. But do not make this mistake unless absolutely necessary.

There is one exception to this rule. You can reserve the right in advance to change decision types from consensus to consultative if your team cannot reach a consensus decision in the necessary timeframe. It would sound something like this: “Today, we have to make a consensus decision about ______. We will discuss this for ________ (set a time limit). If our team has not come to a consensus agreement by the end of that time, I will make the decision.”

If, however, you decide that you need more input on a decision, you can change the type of decision to include more voices and votes. You can make a closed decision into a consultative one. Or a consultative one into a consensus decision.

(4) Invite God into your decisions.

You are called to be a With God Leader — whether you work for a Christian organization or not. If you do not work for a Christian organization, don’t force your team to pray before every meeting. But recognize, as a With God Leader, that

• God is with you in every moment and every decision.
• God cares deeply and passionately about the decisions that your team makes.
• Everything you do has everything to do with Jesus Christ.
• Your first task as a leader is to discern where God is leading and join Him in it.

As you go into decision making, walk with God. Listen to God. Invite God to speak into your decisions. Commit to making your decisions with God.

(5) Cultivate a spirit of peace and calmness.

Making decisions can be stressful. It creates conflict and disagreement. As a result, decision making can make people feel anxious, rushed, or even aggressive.

None of these emotions lead to good decisions.

But you can cultivate a spirit peace and calmness because God is with you. You can walk with the Holy Spirit to a have a spirit of peace and calmness. Your emotions influence the emotions of your team.

[bctt tweet=”#WithGodLeaders create a spirit of peace and calmness while their team makes decisions.” username=”GarlandVance”]

Before you lead a decision-making meeting, remind yourself of God’s truth:

• The mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace (Rom. 8:6).
• The Holy Spirit produces love, joy, peace, peace, patience, kindness, etc. in you (Gal. 5:22–23).
• Grace and peace are lavished upon you grow in the rich knowledge of God and of Jesus (2 Pet. 1:2).

Give yourself time and space to feel calm and peaceful before going into decision-making meetings.

If you sense that some of your teammates are stressed, take time in the meeting for everyone to relax.

It is your responsibility as the leader to cultivate a spirit of peace and calmness within your team in order to make the best possible decisions.

One of the key roles of a leader is to guide your teams to make good decisions. These rules will help you make better team decisions.

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Questions: What is your default type of team decision making? Why have you chosen that type as your default?

photo by Samuel Zeller from unsplash.com