Top business leaders choose the right 'play' to make, the right 'players' to use and the right time
to use them to maximise their organisation's performance.
Recent events in business locally, HIH and OneTel, and internationally, Enron and WorldCom, would
suggest that sometimes business leaders get it wrong. Not only did the key decision makers in these
cases fail to make the right decisions for the performance of their organisation, but the many
individuals surrounding them, such as board members and other executives, failed to correct the
decision errors of their leaders. How is it that decisions with such adverse outcomes for the
organisation were made? Was it a failure of the decision makers? The process? The situation? Or
perhaps an interaction of all three?
These events are now of primarily historical interest. In order to ensure they are not repeated,
however, the question remains: What are the attributes of the decision makers and decision processes
that lead to good decision-making outcomes?
AFL Coaches as decision makers
AFL coach decision-making serves as an excellent model for executive decision-making. AFL coaches
like executives make decisions regarding strategy, tactics and personnel. They perform in
time-pressured situations, work with a coaching 'team' but hold ultimate responsibility, and are
removed from implementation of decisions and execution of performance. Examination of AFL coach
decision-making has the advantage of immediate and objective performance measures of decision
effectiveness, and greater accessibility than business settings. In addition the best AFL coaches are
easily identifiable and universally acknowledged. This allows for examination of the decision-making
of these best coaches for points of similarity or difference.
Decision-making Factors
A great deal of research has been conducted into decision-making in various settings. The
findings of this research have indicated three broad classes of factors as of particular interest:
The decision maker - What is the key decision maker's style - Extraverted or
introverted?
The decision process - Does the process fit the decision maker's style - When and
how is the preparation and planning done? When is information shared? How are decisions made?
The situation - The situation should be optimised by having a team or groups of
individuals who can trust one another and therefore ensure that the process and decision maker's
style work together most effectively.
The Decision Maker
What are the attributes of a good decision maker? Is it personality or leadership style? Research
has found that no particular personality predicts decision-making success. Leadership research,
however, has indicated that 'open' leadership styles are related to decision-making effectiveness.
Open leaders are accessible, encourage interaction with followers, and define a culture that
reinforces their style.
Recent discussions with AFL coaches suggest that information processing style, that is, the way
in which an individual likes to process/manage the information they receive, may be influential in
good decision-making.
There are at least two styles:
- Extroverted or external processing
Where a Head Coach keeps information in the external domain by a continuous
narration of the events on the field by calling out the commentary or asking for
the commentary from his team.
"Why is Scotty doing that?"
"We're disposing well, should we get Jim to move forward?"
This allows all relevant information to be available to all the coaching team and
invites a team contribution of real-time information.
The Head Coach in this case typically facilitates group decisions with the coaching
team. This allows for a rapid, high quality, creative decision-making process.
Whilst much planning and preparation has occurred prior to match day, this primarily
serves to share information and set predictable expectations whilst much creative
decision-making occurs on the day.
- Introverted or internal processing
Where a Head Coach likes to process information in a more seemingly controlled
fashion. For this style to ensure high-quality decisions, much planning and
preparation needs to occur in advance of the decision-making situation.
Introverts prefer to analyse internally, therefore they need time to receive
information, process it and then decide. Obviously in a fast sport such as
Australian Rules football, being an internal processor will require having much of
the processing occur prior to the game to facilitate decisions. Therefore it is
likely that such coaches analyse many scenarios prior to match day in order to use
models and frameworks determined in the pre-planning, to assist rapid decision-making
on match day.
The Process
The decision making process can be divided into two components, information and procedure.
Information refers to the search, amount, supply and use of the data required in the decision.
Procedure is the steps through which an individual or group progresses in order to make a decision.
In the information component of the decision, "more is better" has been the axiom in
both business and AFL contexts. In situations without time pressure this may be an acceptable
strategy, however, in time pressured situations excessive information can slow and stifle decisions.
Minimal data of high-quality and predictive value is likely to enhance the probability of decision
success. This requires the decision maker to know the value of data before entering the decision
situation.
The procedure can be deconstructed into three phases, Preparation, Facilitation, and Decision.
The preparation phase involves the sourcing, collecting, and analysing of data. It is here that the
value of data is determined. The facilitation phase involves drawing out the perspectives, opinions,
and options from group or team members based on their analysis of the data. The decision phase is
that in which the primary decision maker considers the options presented in relation to strategic
goals and environmental factors and chooses a course of action. For AFL coaches the preparation for
all decisions made during the game has been completed during the week, and each decision requires
only facilitation and decision phases.
How often does preparation precede facilitation and decision in your organisation, or do they all
occur at once?
The Situation
The situation consists of variables such as time pressure, acceptability, and group/team factors,
which make the decision task more difficult. Coaches operate within fairly narrowly defined
situations where most variables cannot be altered; they come with the decision territory. One
exception is the decision-making group or team.
In corporate settings we often find that executive teams are teams in name only and actually are
a group of individuals coming together to make a collective decision but aim to maximise their
individual goals. In the AFL, coaches form a team with high trust and a shared sense of purpose.
This allows certain advantages in leadership style and process over group structures.
Reflecting on your decision-making
Having unpacked decision-making, we can see it is possible that the pieces can go back together
in many combinations. Is there a single combination of decision components that leads to good
decision-making? The answer must be no. Good decision-making will result from the right combination
for each decision maker and situation! What must be present is insight into the decision maker's own
capabilities. Do you have an extraverted leadership style? How do you like to manage large amounts
of information? Have you constructed a process that optimises your processing style? Do your style
and the process fit with the situation in which you make decisions? Do you have a team of high
trust?
Finding the answers to these questions will help you make Premiership quality decisions. Gen
Group can help you find these answers leveraging on expertise and research.
Want to know more? Contact us at +61 (0) 417 711 711 or email us at
gen@gengroup.com.au
