Ep 41 - Propel Your Business Forward with a 12 Step Decision Making Framework

Have you ever felt like you're at a crossroads in your business faced with a decision that could really change the future of your business? The stakes feel really high. The options are many and the pressure is on. Sound familiar as entrepreneurs. We've all been there, but what separates good decisions from really great ones? In this episode, I'm going to unveil a 12 step process to elevate your decision making game, ensuring that each choice you make propels your business forward with confidence and clarity. Let's dive in. Are you that driven entrepreneur who believes that working harder holds the key to your dreams? Are you drowning in the day to day task wishing you had more time to strategize and cast the vision for your business growth? Hi. I'm Donna Dube, your guide on this entrepreneurial journey. I've walked in your worn out shoes, burning the midnight oil, convinced that sheer hard work was the secret to success.

Just one more email, one more task, until I found myself on a one way track to burnout. But here's the twist in the tale. I discovered that success isn't just about working harder, it's about working smarter. It's about being intentional with our time. It's about steering our ship with focus because no team, system, or automation can outperform a lack of direction. In this podcast, I'm sharing with you all the strategies for business growth that it took me years to learn. If you're ready to step out of the daily overwhelm, so you can amplify your profits, then I'm ready to teach you. I believe the only limit to your business growth is the one you set for yourself.

Go grab a notebook, warm up that cup of tea, and let's do this. Welcome back to the podcast CEO. I'm so happy you're here. Now, if I know you, you're a determined entrepreneur who puts your heart and soul into your business. You've worked really hard to navigate this, shall we say, ever changing landscape of this online world and along the way some decisions you've had to make have been easy peasy, simple, and you can make them with almost no effort at all, right? Almost with your eyes closed but other decisions are much more difficult for you to make and weigh on your mind a lot more. Perhaps even keep you up at night. These decisions that you need to grapple with are usually related to some pivotal decision that could really redefine or change the trajectory of your business. Right? So maybe you've toyed with the idea of pivoting your service or your offerings.

Maybe you want to cater to a more niche market, but then you start worrying because the thought of leaving your comfort zone fills you with uncertainty and fear or perhaps you've considered expanding your business to reach a broader audience but then, you know, the fear of losing your unique identity and what makes you you kind of holds you back. There are very different kinds of dilemmas that we deal with as we navigate this journey of entrepreneurship and each option, you know, there's risks and there's rewards, right? And every time we look at a decision there's promises of what the rewards can be but then we also have to look at the risks and this can sometimes leave us feeling very torn between the safety of what we're familiar with and what we're comfortable with, but also the allure and the attraction of growth and operations. But, you know, here's the crux of the matter In this fast paced online world of business that we're in, standing still is just not an option. To thrive, we have to be willing to adapt and evolve, and even sometimes pivot, and that's exactly why making these decisions is hard. And most people I work with feel like they go through the decision making process almost intuitively and you know if you've been making your decisions for your business for years it'll feel somewhat natural and it's kind of hard to look inside our brain and break down how we actually make these difficult operations, but that's not the point. You make small decisions daily, and then the big ones that require more processing and feel more risky and more uncertain. Those are the ones I want to talk about today. Those are the bigger decisions that weigh on us, and those are the ones where this 12 step framework will help.

Now do not panic when I say 12 steps and you think, oh, that's too much already. I've broken it down into 12 very small bite sized pieces, but you can certainly put some of these steps together, and so you can get it down to much less than 12 steps. But for the purpose of the podcast I wanted to break it down so it'd be easy to consume and listen to. So when your business relies on you to make these strategic decisions, you have to think of it as an investment in this decision making process, right? And this 12 step framework, it's like a recipe to help you make better decisions And you ask me, well, is it really necessary? I've been doing okay so far, but what we don't realize is that we're often biased by factors that sometimes lead to poor decisions without even knowing it. So if a decision has some sort of emotional attachment to it we're susceptible to that. We're susceptible to confirmation biases and ideas from a past that we think things have to be a certain way. So you see decision making isn't just a skill. I believe it's an art, and like any art form, it requires practice.

It requires patience and some sort of proven process. And that's why I wanna take you on a journey through these 12 steps to help you make better decisions. You can think of this like a growth map. It's gonna guide you through even the toughest choices you're gonna have to make with clarity and with confidence. Alrighty, let's dive into these 12 steps growth down into small scale bite sized doable actions. So you've got a tough decision to make, you're, you know, waffling with it throughout the day, maybe your thing is still thinking about it at night when you're at the kids ballgame and maybe even it's waking you up or keeping you up at night stressing about it. So step number 1 is defining the problem clearly. So in other words, I want you to get to the root of the problem.

I don't want you to solve the symptom. I want you to solve the root because when you solve the root of the problem, do you actually solve the symptoms along the way? So when the problem is really crystal clear, so is the why behind the decision. So really defining the problem clearly and not just looking at the symptoms. Step number 2, gather information. Now, for those of you who know me, I am a high fact finder on the Kolbe index which means I love researching and gathering information and I must admit I can get stuck down this rabbit hole. So if you are like me, take this step with caution, set a timer if you need to. If you're the other way around, like many of the clients I work with who are visionaries and diving into the details and researching is not their strong point then this is a piece you're really gonna want to pay attention to. So gathering operations, I want you to collect relevant data, research any insights that you can on what this problem is, and I want you to use various sources to inform your decision.

The key to using multiple sources is even sources that you might not agree with, but this helps you give more depth. Right? It helps you expand beyond your current thought profit so that you can make the best informed decision possible. Alright, step number 3, consider multiple perspectives. Again, this fits in with the gathering information, but I want you to involve different stakeholders in this gathering of information and perspectives. People with different backgrounds and different experiences bring them in and this helps you get a really well rounded view. If you think about it, if you only speak to people who think like you, look like you, and act like you, you're only going to see what you want to see and I see this a lot of times with my clients which is wonderful. It's such a beautiful thing but again, my clients and I are usually very opposite. I'm a high fact finder.

I'm a high follow through, but I'm slower to process and put that new thing into action. My clients, on the other hand, are quick starts. They've got a 1,000,000 ideas coming at them really quickly and they want them all implemented yesterday, right? And so we actually balance each other out. It's like the yin and the yang because when they're trusting and when they bring me into helping the decision, I bring a different background, a different experience, a different viewpoint to what they're struggling with. And so I don't speak like them. I don't act like them. I don't think like them, which is exactly what you want to do in this situation. You want to bring people in to help you make this decision who can provide a different perspective than what you already know.

All righty, step number 4, evaluate the evidence. Again, my high fact finders out there, we love this part, right? But once you have the information and the perspectives, then it's time to start evaluating, put on your critical thinking hat, start looking for biases and gaps in the evidence. And if you find them, go digging a little bit more and see if you can find the answers and the and the, you know, close those gaps and biases. Number 5, identify alternatives. So here we don't want to limit ourselves to the first idea that comes to our mind, and you know, as humans we're guilty of this sometimes because the truth is we've been grappling with some big decision for a long time and when some kind of solution comes to our mind we just want to grab it and move on, right? Because the weight of grappling with this decision on our mind has been heavy and we want to to release that but I challenge you here to not just take the first idea that comes to your mind. The brain's tendency to stick with familiar ideas can really blind us to better operations. So continue to brainstorm operations and different solutions before you settle. Don't just take the first thing that comes to mind.

All right, number 6. See, we're halfway through already. Not so bad, right? Number 6. Weigh the risks and rewards. So once you have different options and different solutions in front of you, I want you to get clear on the potential impact I love SWOT because it's an internal and an external analysis, Right? What are the internal strengths and weaknesses and what are the external opportunities and threats to this potential option or solution. And you want to do that model with each one of the solutions that you came up with from your brainstorming, and you're gonna quickly be able to knock some solutions right off because there's not gonna be enough strengths there's not gonna be enough there's going to be too many weaknesses or too many threats right? So this will help you narrow down that brainstorming that you did in the above step. Okay, number 7, check emotional influences. Emotional influences, what in the world am I talking about here? I want you to be aware of how your feelings might affect your judgment.

What is the dominant emotion that you're feeling? Is it fear? Is it anxiety? Or on the opposite end, is it excitement at what opportunity lies ahead? So really name your feelings and help you create a little space, I I think I would call it, between your emotions and your actions, And this space allows you to examine the emotion and to acknowledge it without letting the emotion take over the decision. Right? So if our dominant emotion is fear, we want to name it. We want to label it. We want to acknowledge it, but we don't want it to take over the decision that we make. The same on the other way, if the dominant feeling is excitement, we don't want that excitement to just take over and and have the decision made for us. We wanna separate that emotion from the action that we want to take. All right. Step number 8, make a decision.

We're here. Finally, make a decision. So now we've worked through the analysis, we've thought of different ideas, we've gone through some strategic evaluation to assess the risks and the opportunities. It's time to make the decision. So you want to obviously choose the option that best aligns with your objectives and your goals, And this should now become easier because you have taken a broad sweep. You've removed your emotion from it. You've looked at different angles. You brought in different perspectives.

You've weighed the risks and the rewards. It's now so much easier to see which solution is gonna be the clear answer. And now you're gonna say, hold on a minute, Donna. You said there were 12 steps. We're at step 8. We've already made the decision. We're done. What's the other 4 steps? So once the decision has been made, the decision making process doesn't end.

See, steps 9 to 12 are what I call post decision actions, and this really matters. This is critical to how you're going to take future actions. So let's run through these 3 steps as well. 9, step number 9, implement and monitor. So, so important and so many entrepreneurs I don't see doing this enough. Put your decision into action, right? You made made your decision and then monitor its outcomes. Determine what the KPIs, the key performance indicators are, and monitor the results. Don't shy away from numbers as metrics because numbers cut through subjective operations.

Right? Numbers are objective. They don't lie and so really putting the decision you made to the test and seeing what is the outcome. Get the data, get the metrics, and know how that played out. It wasn't the way you expected. Number 10, reflect and learn. So as you're looking at the results, as you're observing, reflect on what worked well and also what could be improved. Right? Because this helps us tweak and adjust and pivot as we go forward. Step number 11, seek feedback.

You know this entrepreneurial journey is not one where you're alone. You need your tribe. So get input from others on how the decision was made and on its effectiveness feedback from your team members, your coaches, your consultants. Right? One of the most powerful actions I support my clients with is to pull things apart so that we can then connect new dots and reveal new opportunities that we can try moving forward. And last but not least, the 12th step is to adjust as necessary. Know that entrepreneurship is a lot of trial and error and be prepared to adjust based on new information on changing circumstances, whether it's you, whether it's your business, whether it's your team, whether it's the world, things are going to change and evolve and you have to be nimble and be prepared to adjust based on that. Alrighty, my friends, that's your 12 step, 12 step process. And I know that the decision making process isn't always straightforward, and it's especially true when you're making a decision both under risk and uncertainty.

Now, all decisions involve some sort of risk, but when you have certainty, making a decision is so much easier. Risk is when you're unsure what can happen, but you know the likelihood of the outcome because you have enough information to know the possible results of the decision. And in that scenario, making a decision when you have that certainty is much easier. But when the environment is uncertain and you can't predict the outcome because you don't have the operations, or the data isn't available, Then there's lots of uncertainty, and what do we do when there's lots of uncertainty? Well, this is what I know I've done, and what what I see happen is you end up cycling through those steps, number 2 to number 7. You cycle through those steps repeatedly. Sometimes in no particular order, you might choose to revisit a completed step already or go down and do a step out of order. This is what we do when there's uncertainty, because we're searching for certainty. And if this resonates with you, if you found yourself stuck in this loop of revisiting the steps over and over again, I view it really as a form of procrastination.

The only way to gain more certainty about the decision is to take action, to lean into the steps 9 through 12, what we do after we take the action, and listen to that evidence and then help that to guide us and inform us of our next steps. Alrighty. I hope that was helpful and that these 12 steps will help you when you have a big decision you have to make, run through these steps in order 1 through 8, make the decision, take action, and then follow through with steps 9 to 12. So just as a review, again, you can put some of these steps together. 1, to find the problem clearly. 2, gather information. 3, consider multiple perspectives. 4, evaluate the evidence.

5, identify alternatives 6, weigh the risks and rewards 7, check your emotions and 8, make a decision. After you've made the decision, we want to follow through with 9, implement and monitor, 10, reflect and learn, 11, seek feedback, and 12, adjust as necessary. I can't wait to hear when you put this 12 tip framework into action. Drop on over to the CEO Amplify Facebook group and let me know if this framework would be helpful for you and definitely let me know the next time you try it out Alright, I'll see you all next week. Thank you for joining me on this episode of CEO Amplify. I appreciate you being part of our thriving community of ambitious business owners. If you enjoy today's episode, I kindly ask you to share this podcast with a friend and take a hot minute to rate and leave a review. It would mean the world to me.

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