Episode 848 - Why We Make Bad Choices

0:04 Helping leaders motivate their people to a higher level of performance through strong human relations, team building, and goal achieving. This is the 7-Minute Leadership Podcast with your host, Paul Falavolito.

0:22 Hello, everyone, and welcome to the 7-Minute Leadership Podcast. It's episode 848. Why do smart people make bad choices? Why does an experienced leader send the email they know they shouldn't send? Why does someone hire the candidate they had doubts about during the interview? Why do we keep an employee too long, spend money we shouldn't spend, ignore a problem we know is getting worse, or make a decision at 4.45 in the afternoon that looks completely ridiculous at 8 o'clock the next morning? We like to think bad choices come first. from bad judgment. Sometimes they do. More often, bad choices come from very normal human behavior. Your brain is constantly trying to make life easier for you. It

1:13 looks for shortcuts. It uses previous experiences. It responds to emotion. It tries to protect you from pain, embarrassment, loss, uncertainty, and conflict. And sometimes that system gets it wrong. Leadership puts you in a dangerous position because your bad choices rarely affect only you. You make a poor hiring decision.

1:40 Your entire team lives with it. You avoid a difficult conversation. The behavior spreads. You make an emotional financial decision. The organization pays for it. You ignore a small operational problem and eventually someone inherits a big one. Decision making is one of the most important parts of leadership. My own leadership work has always been heavily influenced by environments where decisions have immediate consequences. So why do we make bad choices?

2:15 One reason is because we confuse what feels good with what is good. Imagine you have an employee who has become a problem. You know a conversation needs to happen. You know exactly what you need to say. And then you start negotiating with yourself. Maybe today isn't the right day or they seem stressed or we're already short-staffed. Maybe the problem will work itself out. I don't want to destroy morale. And so you postpone the conversation and immediately you feel better. That feeling is dangerous because your brain has learned something. Avoiding the problem produced relief. That doesn't mean avoiding it was the right decision, it means avoiding it felt better in the moment. And leaders do this

3:03 all the time. We trade long-term organizational health for short-term emotional comfort. Another reason we make bad choices is because we fall in love with what we have already invested. There's a psychological concept called the sunk cost fallacy. You've spent $ 50, 000 on a project that isn't working. Someone says, we can't stop now. We already spent $ 50, 000. That money is already gone. The real question is whether the next dollar should go into the project. We do this with people, too.

3:40 We've invested months training someone. We've coached them, given them chances, changed the schedule, moved responsibilities around, and eventually somebody says, we have too much invested in this person to give up now. Maybe... The better question is this. If the person walked through the door today knowing everything I know now, would I hire them? And that question can get uncomfortable very quickly. We also make bad choices because we become emotionally attached to being right. And this one gets leaders into trouble. You announce a decision, and then new information comes in, and now you have a choice. Change your decision or defend it. Changing it might mean admitting you were wrong. So some leaders start collecting evidence to support

4:33 the original decision. They stop asking what is true, and they start asking, how can I prove I was right? That is confirmation bias. And once we believe something, our brain becomes very good at finding evidence that supports it. This happens when we hire people. You like a candidate. Maybe they remind you of someone successful. Now every good answer confirms your opinion. The warning signs get explained away.

5:03 You say things like, ah, they're probably nervous. And then six months later, everyone else is wondering how this person got hired. And here's another reason we make bad choices. We make permanent decisions during temporary emotions. Anger is temporary. Fear is temporary. frustration is temporary, exhaustion is temporary. The email you send can become permanent. The resignation you accept can become permanent. The employee you fire can become permanent.

5:37 The contract you sign can become permanent. This is why experienced leaders develop decision discipline. There are decisions you can make quickly. There are decisions that deserve time. Knowing the difference is leadership. In emergency services, aviation, and other high consequence environments, we use systems because human beings are imperfect.

6:05 Checklists exist because memory is imperfect. Protocols exist because judgment can become distorted under stress. Crew resource management exists because one person can miss something. These systems are not designed because people are stupid. They exist because smart, experienced people can make terrible decisions under the wrong conditions. And business leaders need their own version of this. So here's something I want you to try. Before making an important decision, ask yourself a few questions. What problem am I actually trying to solve? What information do Am I missing? What emotion am I feeling right now? Would I make the same decision tomorrow morning? And my favorite one, if someone else brought this exact decision to me, what would I

7:02 tell them to do? That last question is powerful because we are often better advisors than we are decision makers. We can see someone else's situation clearly. And then we look at our own situation through a windshield covered in emotion. History, ego, relationships, fear, money, and pressure. Sometimes you need to mentally remove yourself from the decision. Pretend you're the consultant. Pretend you were hired this morning. No history, no politics, no friendships, no bruised ego.

7:36 Look at the facts sitting on the table. What would you recommend? And there's another rule I use that I think every leader should consider. Never make an important decision because you want the decision to disappear. That's when people sign bad agreements. That's when leaders accept bad terms. That's when organizations promote the wrong person. That's when someone says, fine, let's do it. Those four words have probably cost businesses billions of dollars. Fine, let's do it. That isn't decision making.

8:12 That's surrendering to decision fatigue. When You are tired of thinking about something, tired of hearing about it, tired of negotiating, or tired of dealing with the people involved. Recognize what is happening. Your desire for closure is beginning to influence your judgment. Go home, eat dinner, sleep, come back tomorrow.

8:34 The problem will still be there. Your brain might be better equipped to solve it. The goal of leadership isn't to make perfect decisions. That leader doesn't exist. You will Make bad calls. I have. Every experienced leader has. The goal is to build a process that makes bad decisions harder to make. Slow down important decisions. Ask better questions.

9:00 Invite someone into the conversation who is willing to disagree with you. Separate emotion from evidence. And when new information proves you wrong, change direction. Changing your mind because the facts changed isn't weakness. That's disciplined leadership. Leadership is a series of choices. Some are enormous. Most look insignificant when we make them. Who gets hired? What gets tolerated? What gets funded? What gets ignored? What gets addressed? And what gets stopped? And eventually, all of those choices become the organization.

9:43 So the next time you're facing... A major decision. I want you to remember this. Your first instinct deserves attention. It doesn't automatically deserve control. Give yourself enough space. to see the decision clearly. Ask what you know, what you don't know, and what might be influencing you because great leadership isn't measured by never making a bad choice. It's measured by becoming better at recognizing the conditions that create them.

10:16 This has been the 7-Minute Leadership Podcast, and I thank you for listening.

10:21 For more Paul Falavelito podcasts, visit paulfalavelito.com.