How to Make Great Business Decisions

By David Savoie, CEO, LaCorp

Everyone in a management capacity makes countless decisions over the course of their careers. Have you ever stopped to think about your process for making business decisions?  

To the extent that traditional business school courses in management discuss the process of decision-making, they have traditionally focused on logic, such as listings of pros and cons, feasibility studies, etc., as the exclusive decision-making method. 

Recently, some of the nation’s leading business schools have performed additional research into the neuroscience of business decision-making. Dr. Tara Swart, a leading neuroscientist and faculty at the MIT Sloan School of Business, has created a model of business decision-making she calls “The brain agility model.”  

Swart identifies six ways of thinking used in the decision-making process: 

• Logic (or rationality)

• Creativity

• Emotions

• Motivation

• Brain-body connection

• Intuition

In her studies of the decision-making processes of hundreds of business leaders, Swart has found that while managers use various combinations of these ways of thinking, the vast majority rely on logic and motivation (i.e., a core mission statement) almost exclusively. These factors definitely must be relied upon heavily to make sound decisions, and she has found that leaders who combine some forms of intuition and creativity in their process are the most successful decision-makers. In self-rating the success of past decisions after reviewing results, most leaders give the highest ratings to decisions where they combine logic with intuition and creativity. 

So, as day-to-day business managers, what can we take away from this research? After you’ve gathered all the facts, done the analysis and weighed the pros and cons, take some time to mull it over and look at what your gut (intuition) is telling you, especially when the logical part of your process has identified more than one equally viable option. This isn’t ESP or magic; it’s allowing your subconscious mind, which contains more data than you can consciously recall, to weigh in on how your proposed decision compares against its vast database of every decision you have ever made or observed. 

Most executives rate creativity as one of their least used decision-making methods when, in fact, they employ various forms of creativity in their work each day. As a means of including more creativity in your process, leading neuroscientists recommend discussing current issues with people in various departments and functions in your business, even those not directly affected, to see if any reactions arise that you have not previously considered. 

Anyone who has been in a business management position for any length of time has proven themselves capable of making successful decisions. The latest neuroscience and the top academic schools of business are telling us that taking some time to examine your decision-making process and making a conscious effort to include some of the six ways of thinking that you may be neglecting can have a considerable positive impact on your own level of satisfaction with the results of your decisions. 

If you’re interested in reading more, I recommend Dr. Tara Swart, MD, PhD’s 2020 book, “The Source,” for an in-depth discussion of business decision-making.