Leadership hinges on the quality of decisions we make, and in today’s discussion, John Maxwell brings to light the traps that threaten our decision-making processes, such as procrastination and a tendency to say yes to every demand. It’s crucial to recognize that options exist in every scenario, and by maintaining this awareness, leaders can navigate choices with greater confidence and clarity.
Mark Cole and Traci Morrow underline the importance of seeking feedback, breaking down overwhelming decisions into manageable parts, and the necessity of staying focused on the ultimate goal to avert common pitfalls. In this episode, listeners will also learn strategies for managing the information overload and the requisite need for setting clear personal boundaries to guide their ‘yes’ and ‘no’ responses.
By engaging with these insights, you’ll be equipped not only to refine your decision-making skills but also to understand the relevance of tracking results and defining issues precisely.
Our BONUS resource for this series is the Making Great Decisions Worksheet, which includes fill-in-the-blank notes from John’s teaching. You can download the worksheet by clicking “Download the Bonus Resource” below.
Take the next step in your growth journey and become a Maxwell Leadership Certified Team Member. Click here to speak with a Program Advisor today!
Mark Cole:
Welcome to the Maxwell Leadership podcast. This is the podcast that adds value to you leaders, people that desire to grow and be better, because we know you will multiply value to others. My name is Mark Cole, and this week I’m joined by John Maxwell, Traci Morrow, and we continue part two on making great decisions. Now, if you’ve not listened to part one, it’s last week’s episode. Go back and listen to it. At some point you will pick right up, because last week, John talked about how you can prioritize decision making, and he gave us three ways to do that. It’s absolute gold. Those of you that have listened for the second time, I would love to hear how you did that whole priority exercise that we challenged you with in that podcast.
Mark Cole:
But this week, we’re going to talk about decision making traps. We’ll explore some of the common traps of decision making. And after John’s lesson, Traci and I will join to offer application for your life and leadership. If you’d like to watch this episode on YouTube, or if you’d like to download the bonus resource for this particular episode, all you need to do is visit MaxwellPodcast.com/decisions. All right, let’s continue with John teaching on making great decisions.
John Maxwell:
In decision making, I have also discovered that there are some traps that keep people from making decisions in your notes. Too often, leaders fall into Traci that cause them to make faulty decisions. They may not realize that their methodology is flawed or their thinking lacks the necessary precision. Here are some specific pitfalls that can sabotage your efforts to express yourself wisely and decisively. For example, number one, procrastinating, that is a major decision making trap. Every one of us have a tendency, especially on decisions we don’t want to make, to put them off. Or let me take a little survey here. How many of you here today would say, perhaps one time in my life, I procrastinated a decision, you raise your hand.
John Maxwell:
Oh, it’s 100%, folks. Now, there were a couple of people that I noticed didn’t raise their hand, but they were procrastinating. They. They just weren’t sure that they just didn’t get around to it. Okay, go to your notes. If you tend to dread the finality of taking a stand or calling the shots, you may be tempted to put off the decision. I describe that kind of a person that goes something like this. Ready.
John Maxwell:
Aim. Aim. Aim. Aim. Aim. Aim. Aim.
John Maxwell:
By the way, as I’ve been signing books here and you’ve been taking pictures, a few of you take pictures that way. Ready.
John Maxwell:
Aim. Aim. Aim. Aim. Aim. Aim.
John Maxwell:
Okay. It’s easy to find dozens of avoidance mechanisms that allow you to rationalize your unwillingness to decide. For example, that can wait. There’s no reason to rush. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. That’s not a settled issue. We need to see how events unfold before we face that decision. It’s such a tough call.
John Maxwell:
It can go either way. I’m just not sure. So I’ll reflect on it for a while. Or it’s a lose lose decision where someone’s going to get hurt regardless. So I put it off and postponed the damage as long as it’s possible. Why not put it off and postpone the damage as long as it’s possible? If any of those comments sound familiar, your challenge is to condense the time frame within which you make your decision. Although you may successfully con yourself into believing that it can wait, a cloud of worry will drift over you until you take the initiative to remove it. Let me give you another decision making trap.
John Maxwell:
Besides procrastinating, a second trap is surrendering. A lot of people in decision making, they just surrender. Exceptionally hard decisions can deplete so much of your energy that you finally cave in. But if you mentally crumble and cry out, I’m at wits end, you’ll magnify the problem to the point where it can haunt you. For example, I give up. There’s no way I can ever make this decision. Rather than surrender, break a big decision into its components. Isolate particular aspects of the issue, and address those segments bit by bit.
John Maxwell:
For instance, if you’re addressing whether to allocate a certain portion of your budget to a high risk but potentially high reward venture, try to examine each cost and benefit on its own terms. In other words, if you are tempted to surrender because you’re overwhelmed, break the project down. It goes back to a corny old joke. I mean, I’ve heard this joke a hundred times. It’s so corny, it’s so old. But in the United States, we have a question we ask each other once in a while, and that is, how do you eat an elephant? And the answer is one bite at a time. You don’t have corny jokes like that over here, do you? The third decision making trap is hiding behind information. I know for a fact that some people, when they don’t want to make a decision, they just say, well, I haven’t had enough information yet.
John Maxwell:
I need some more information. So let’s go to your notes. Many managers with exacting standards, a nice way of saying they’re limited by a perfectionist streak, tend to crave unending stacks of data before rendering a decision. The more facts and figures they accumulate, the more they still want before they feel ready to decide for some issues or problems. A manager may feel a need for an unrealistically high degree of information sufficiency that’s driven by the risk associated with the issue, says Ron Evans, co author of Headshue Win. This type can get into analysis paralysis syndrome, where the constant perceived need for information overtakes the reality of what information is really necessary for them to make a decision. I think this is very true. This next statement, the man who insists upon seeing with perfect clearness before he decides, never decides.
John Maxwell:
I read recently that one of the ways to handle that is for you to write down the questions you want answered before you make a decision. In other words, if you and I have a major decision to make, get a legal pad out. And if there’s five or six questions that you want to have answered before you make the decision, write them down. And then here’s what I would suggest. Go to another decision maker, maybe somebody in your company, maybe somebody outside of your company, but they’re a good decision maker. And give them the problem and say, if you were faced with this problem, what questions would you ask before you made the decision? Now I find this to be very helpful. And find out from them. Have them write down the questions they would ask before they made that decision.
John Maxwell:
Now you have your list of questions you would ask before the decision. They’ve given you a list. Probably if you have five, each three of them will be the same, and there may be a couple that he or she would think about. You wouldn’t add their questions to your list. And now you have two good decision makers talking it over. You have a good list of questions. Go from there. Don’t add anymore.
John Maxwell:
Number four, the fourth decision making trap is saying yes to everything. When you and I say yes to everything, we will not make the decisions that we need to. You’re not making true decisions if you’re always giving the go ahead or thumbs up. A Nobel Prize winning scientist at Bell Labs told Fortune magazine, indecision is somebody who can’t say no to anything, a kind of intellectual nymphomaniac. It’s somebody who says, yeah, I’m interested in that and I’m interested in that and I’m interested in that. When against one’s will, one is high pressured into making a hurried decision, the best answer is always no, because no is more easily changed to yes than yes is changed to no. Now, I also listed some other decision making, Traci, that we won’t take time to talk about today. Number five, not defining the issue.
John Maxwell:
I think that’s a real mistake. Before you ever make the decision, you got to define what the issue is. Number six, ignoring feedback. If you’ve got good people around you and they give you feedback, listen. Number seven, short sightedness. A lot of times we make a decision just based on what we can sense or what we can feel today. Number eight, losing sight of options. Don’t make decisions that will put you in a corner.
John Maxwell:
Number nine, a tendency to plunge in. In other words, a tendency just to go in without thinking. And finally, number ten, not tracking results. When you make a decision, track the results. The results will always tell you, probably within a few months, if you made a good decision or not.
Maxwell Leadership Certified Team:
Hey, podcast listeners, many of you listening right now would probably love the autonomy that comes with owning your own business or becoming a coach that helps other businesses succeed. Well, we have a phenomenal strategy where you are 100% in control of your own business, earning income on your own terms, and have access to the people, tools and resources you need to build a thriving leadership development business. When you become a Maxwell leadership certified team member, you join a global community of entrepreneurs led by our expert team of mentors and faculty, including John C. Maxwell. You’ll also get one of the top leadership certifications in the world next to your name, giving you the boost you need to get started. Visit us online at maxwellleadershipcom jointeam to find out more.
Mark Cole:
Hey, welcome back, Traci. I certainly enjoyed last week with you just processing how to prioritize decision making. And this week, as I was listening to John, I went, oh my, I wish he had time to teach five through ten. I need more because there are so many times that I fall into the trap on decision making, as I’m sure many of you do. So, Traci, let’s do our best to help our listeners today.
Traci Morrow:
I agree. And traps. Boy, do I recognize myself in so many of these. And I just love that. That’s why we have the podcast, right? It’s so that we can grow through them. It’s not like we want to fake that we don’t have them. We want to fully expose what our traps are and how we are falling into them and hopefully talk through them. So starting with procrastinating.
Traci Morrow:
I’m just curious, Mark, do you struggle with procrastination? Have you ever struggled? Or is it linear? Is it in certain areas or how do you push yourself to act when you do procrastinate, if you do procrastinate?
Mark Cole:
Yeah, I do procrastinate. And first let me say this. I am convinced that I procrastinate way too much. In fact, I’m convinced I procrastinate way more than I do. And I have found as a very self judging, self condemning leader that I am. Then we could unpack that on the couch of my counselor for a long time. But I have found that I do, as John has told me many times, Mark, you’re way too hard on yourself because of that. I do believe that some things should be done quicker and should have been done yesterday that are not where I really lean on.
Mark Cole:
How much I’m procrastinating is with my inner circle, people around me that go, Mark, you’ve been talking about this decision for a long time. Nothing has changed, and you are still not making the decision. What’s up? And I have found when I start getting that kind of conversation with women and men that I trust around me that it’s bubbling up, that I have fallen into the trap of procrastination so important.
Traci Morrow:
It just shows how important it is to have people close enough to you but also not having an ego, that you close your ears when they say, hey, what’s going on? That you say, nothing’s going on. I’m taking this time on purpose and also then leading right into surrendering that trap of where you just lay down and just, oh, my gosh, this is so stressful. So in a surrendering time where the weight of it can be so overcoming at times which every leader feels that, what does that look like for you and how do you overcome that?
Mark Cole:
It’s so funny. Our friend and thought leader Tim Elmore wrote a book called Paradoxes of leadership. And he just goes through seven or eight paradoxes of, you can look at it this way or you can look at it that way. And a lot of times it’s timing and situational in the decision that needs to be made. I look at one, procrastination and two, surrendering kind of as a paradox. There’s sometimes that you are sitting back waiting and you have justified yourself, that you’re waiting because you don’t have peace, that you don’t know what to do. You’re waiting. And really it is that you are not clear and have not done the due diligence to make a decision.
Mark Cole:
And you need to stop procrastinating yet. Isn’t it true that sometimes we hold on to things so tight as if we’re the only ones that can make a difference here. And if it’s going to happen, it’s up to us. And there’s something very nostalgic with that, but there’s something very almost psychotic with that, too, to where you think that it is only you that can bring results. And so I really would challenge our podcast listeners today when you go and listen to this procrastination and how John helped us, and then you come into what do you need to surrender? Make sure you’re clear on what the difference in your leadership is between procrastination. I’m just not going to do it because I don’t want to, and surrender because I just want to do it and do it unhealthy. And there is a fine line there that I love that John has tackled this because I do believe that both of them are decision making.
Traci Morrow:
I agree. I agree. The next one that we come to, I think a lot of people are going to identify with this and that is hiding behind gathering of information. I think every leader could raise their hand that they have team members like this. Or maybe you are that person. I was trying to think, Mark, if I would qualify as a person on the other side of you experiencing necessarily, because this is really a perfectionist personality. And while I do think that you love excellence, I would not say that you have a perfectionist personality. Do you think that you have a perfectionist personality?
Mark Cole:
I don’t, but I think I am borderline anal in the way that I look at things and want things done.
Traci Morrow:
Sure.
Mark Cole:
Like John cracks up every time he looks in my computer bag and he sees all my little wrapped cords right where I want them to be in my backpack because I want to be able to pull it out, plug it right in. I may be late for a zoom. And so everything is done intentionally in my backpack. And then he just has them wadded into this one little case and he’s gluing through them and he’s looking for them. And we just kind of laugh at each other. And I go, man, I don’t know how you do that. And he goes, man, I don’t know how you do what you do. And we just have this deal.
Mark Cole:
So perhaps I’ve got a little bit of that perfection going on. What I do have that I’m really passionate about and I’m having to learn this. I really have a passion to learn on the go, not learn in the silent or in the waiting in the break. I think lessons are better learned because you can illustrate them when you’re on the move. I believe they’re better applied because you’re on the move dealing with new stuff. I think it’s much harder to apply and to illustrate when you’re sitting still waiting. So what I do love is the messiness in the movement of learning and applying as you go, rather than trying to. Best case scenario based on the data that you have and the information that other product streams are going.
Mark Cole:
I would agree with John on that. The data is very, very important, man. Organizations are making millions off of clearly communicated data. I’m also, as a leader, really passionate about moving at the speed of opportunity and letting the data clarify as we move, with the flexibility to adjust depending on what the data says.
Traci Morrow:
Yeah, I think it is interesting because of your little cord analogy that it shows that you can understand a person who has a perfectionist mindset. Because I think it takes an understanding, I would say, from knowing John as I do. And you even know him even more so. He’s a fascinating person in the fact that he doesn’t understand how you can be frozen because he wants to launch anything. He wants to launch something just to get it in motion because he wants to massage it and work it in the motion. Like you talked about his cords. It reminds me that’s how my cords are actually. Funny story.
Traci Morrow:
At Christmas time, after Christmas time, after the new year, I went to my mom’s, she’s 84 years old, and I was putting away her Christmas lights for her, and she has a box that they go in. And I took the cord and I just bundled it all up and shoved it in, and she so gently said, how about we just wrap it gently and put it in this little. And I thought to myself, oh, yes. Oh, I forgot. We have two very different brains when it comes to that. But it just goes to show that when we are working with someone else, we need to be mindful of how they’re wired, pun intended, but how they are wired, because it makes the whole process run more smoothly. So on this whole point of information, because I think this is a big one for teams, what do you do when you have a teammate who is frozen by. We need more information.
Traci Morrow:
We need more information. The person who John describes is just trying to get the right picture, get the right angle with the camera. What do you do when you have a team member who is stuck with information gathering and John talked, know going to talk to a person and getting their input, but sometimes they are even frozen on who is the perfect person to ask for this perfect feedback. What do you do with a team member like that?
Mark Cole:
I love this question because it really fits to what all of us as leaders deal with. We have somebody or some people on our team that get slowed down by the abundance of information or the lack of information. And I love the story that John tells about many years ago. He was traveling, Margaret was with him, and he went to go get a Diet coke. And he loves ice with his Diet Coke. And he went to a convenience store and they didn’t have ice. So he went to a McDonald’s and he ordered, well, he bought the Diet Coke, and so he had his Diet Coke, but he just needed some ice. They didn’t have ice at the convenience store, so he went into a McDonald’s and said, hey, I would love to order a cup of ice.
Mark Cole:
And the lady just looked, he said, for a full two to 3 minutes. She just looked on a register trying to find a cup of ice. This was many, many years ago. And she came back, she says, I don’t have a cup of ice. Well, John said, well, can you ring up a diet Cole, but just hold the Diet Coke and give me a cup of ice, because I already have my Diet Coke. She says, I don’t, don’t think my machine lets me do that. And he looked at her and he said, hey, look at me. Look at me.
Mark Cole:
You can get me a cup of ice, I give you permission. She said, okay, and went and got him a cup of ice. Didn’t charge her for it, gave it to him. Here’s my point in that funny analogy, that John tells as many times our data people needs to be told it’s okay we don’t have enough data. The data is not quite what you want it to be, but it’s okay. The data matters, but we’re going to move and then be watching the data as we go. They just need you as a leader to step in and give them permission to move without the amount of information they want.
Traci Morrow:
That’s important to know. And rather than waiting for them to feel ready, because they aren’t ever really going to feel ready because there’s not enough information to gather. So I think that’s important for leaders to hear that. Okay, moving on to number four. And that’s really the last one where he lands on. And so I want to talk on that one. But then I’d also love for you to pick one of those last ones, just to give you a heads up of where I’m going with this. So he said, saying, yes to everything is a trap.
Traci Morrow:
And boy, has that been a trap for me, John, on other podcasts or other times where we’ve heard him talk, he talks about having a hatchet committee, where he has a team of people who help him say no because he is a yes man. He likes to say yes to things. I can relate to that, because when I’m in a meeting or if I hear something that needs to be done, if I can do it, I love to say yes. I love to be a joiner. I love to be a part of the solution. I say yes. And then I come back, and my husband, Casey, so many times, he’s like, you said yes to that. You know, you have to follow through and actually do it.
Traci Morrow:
There are so many things you have said yes to. How is that going to fit into your schedule or into our schedule? And so I now have what I call lovingly my board, who they tell me, Traci, you can’t say yes until we tell you you can say yes. And they kind of created themselves as the board. Do you have a board or do you have a hatchet committee? And how would you recommend that to other leaders who maybe have a problem saying yes too much?
Mark Cole:
In full disclosure, as John was teaching that, saying yes to everything I was saying, oh, yeah, he is preaching to himself right now because I am on his hatchet committee. And right now, two other members of his hatchet committee are saying, is John even bringing things to us right now? Is he just saying yes? So, in full disclosure, all of us type a driven leaders that have instituted a hatchet committee or a no committee or a not yet group of people, people that say, not yet, it’s not no, but not yet. It’s extremely hard to not become our own worst enemy again. It takes ongoing daily discipline and daily commitment to the discipline. And so I just want to. In full disclosure, it sounds really good. We teach it because we do live it, but, boy, we abuse it and misuse it and forget about it just all at the same time. Yes, I do have a hatchet committee.
Mark Cole:
My situation is extremely unique in the last 14 years because I’ve been really clear to what success looks like for me, and it is availability and proximity to John. So there have been days that I would have said no or my inner circle would have said no, that the confidence of my purpose, the confidence of what it’s going to take to get to the envisioned future that I have is in check with me giving myself too much ability to say no. Now I’ve got to be careful teaching this, because too many of you are allowing everybody else to drive your agenda and not yourself. That’s not what I’m saying. I am saying that John Maxwell has a ton of latitude in my life on what I say yes to now. You can’t ask me to violate my morals, my principles, my values, violate my family. He can’t do that, nor would he ever. But as it relates to driving my work agenda and driving my focus, I just have become really clear in my life, my life purpose and what it’s going to take that he gets a lot of latitude there on the things that does not involve John’s request or John’s desire.
Mark Cole:
My hatchet committee absolutely gets the final word. And most days I hope Kimberly’s not listening to this podcast. Most days, I live that pretty well. And so John for years lived that well with Linda Eggers, his assistant. I think it’s really important.
Traci Morrow:
And for those of you who are new and don’t know who Kimberly is, that’s Mark’s head of his hatchet committee, his executive assistant and head team partner, Kimberly Wessel. And she will be the real person. Maybe you should get her on.
Mark Cole:
Yes, exactly. Let’s not how you’re not.
Traci Morrow:
So I am going to kind of set you free. We have just a couple of minutes left, and so we have five through ten of decision making traps, defining the issue, ignoring feedback, short sightedness, losing sight of options, tendency to plunge in, and not tracking results. So I’m going to set you free to pick one and land on that as one that you think is something that can really add value and something that you can speak to personally for our podcast members.
Mark Cole:
Yeah, it’s so funny. Again, as I reviewed these, I mentioned earlier, I could love to hear John teach on all six of these because all of them have been prevalent in my life and leadership at different times. I think probably in 2023, I found myself losing sight of options way too much. I felt like that there were options being handed to me and I didn’t have the ability or the flexibility to get creative around them. And so I’m relearning that option mentality. And I know why I did this and it’s too long to belabor here, but I got out of the practice of bringing John problems and options to solve the problems. And therefore, by getting out of that practice, it does not scale and remind me to do it throughout the rest of my leadership and organization. And so I would tell you that the losing sight of options.
Mark Cole:
I love what John says. He says there’s always an option. An entrepreneur, a leader, knows there’s always an option. And she or he also knows most of the time, there’s multiple options. And I think just remembering that applying that is really important to my leadership and hopefully yours as well. Hey, we like to highlight a book every week on our podcast. Today’s book has sold over four and a half million copies. It’s the 21 laws of leadership.
Mark Cole:
If you’re listening to this podcast and you’ve never heard this book, or never heard of this book or ever read this book, where are you? If you have read it but it’s been some time, ground yourself, pick it back up and let it help you. Many of you, it’s sitting on your shelf at home. Pull it back out. Some of you need to give a brand new leader that book and let them understand kind of the foundational principles of the book. If you order that in the show notes, we’ll give you a 15% discount on that book. Dennis said this about listening to the podcast. Whatever price tag you put on you is the price tag you’ll put on how much you invest in you. Venice, I remember making that statement, and it is a powerful statement.
Mark Cole:
I’ve watched John live it. I’m trying to live it. And Venice, I hope that you and all of our podcast family are trying to live that as well, because everyone deserves to be led well.
