Decision Making

Happy Day! 🥳

“We’ll never have a position in Amazon. I can say with almost certainty that they will come to a bad ending.” – Buffett, chairman and CEO of Berkshire to CNBC’s Squawk Box, 2018

Documentaries show how the Founders of Circuit City – the Wurtzel Family treated their employees almost like family and involved them in the decision making process. There was no formal hierarchy, but a lean management structure with people empowered to decide. That culture requires an element of trust because deciding on the spot often means using intuition as much as analyses.

As the company grew exponentially, however, more and more management layers were introduced and the employees voice got filtered out. Senior management became too distant from the sales floor where feedback about trends and customer preferences are gathered. Things started to take a negative turn when the company hired a new CEO.

He had absolutely no interest in the expertise or instincts of his employees, and he felt that knowledgeable employees were a costly item on the balance sheet.

He fired almost 3,500 experienced employees immediately and replaced them with inexperienced minimum wage staff.

It was an error from which the company never recovered.

On a smaller scale, I recently came across a start-up company that had just a few weeks of cash left. Most of the employees had been let go, and a skeleton crew of four senior managers worked in a huge, empty office building. The company possessed a technology it no longer used, but one that I felt could fit well into one of my projects. Respecting the company’s dire cash situation, I made a reasonable offer so management could receive cash immediately and the company be guaranteed to survive a few months more, perhaps long enough to secure the additional funding it needed.

I thought it was a no-brainer, and the transaction could have been completed in 24 hours. Instead, it took management two weeks just to find a date for us to meet. I lived only a few miles away and was available for a meeting any day. After we finally got together, they then held a private meeting to discuss the proposal. There was another two week delay before they called me with a decision.

I emailed a contract to them, one I have used a half-dozen times with much larger outfits. They hired a lawyer to wordsmith the clauses, which went on for weeks before I got so frustrated that I walked away from the deal. Their company went bankrupt a month later.

By the terms of the company’s intellectual property contracts, the technology I was interested in returned to the inventor who ran a single-person company. I contacted him the following day and within 24 hours we had agreed on a deal and executed a contract.

We have discussed already the need for adaptability in this information age and how traditional structures hamper it. Just as important is the start-up entrepreneur mentality. So many start-up entrepreneurs are indoctrinated in the old way of thinking that prizes data over intuition. Quick decisions often have to be made without all the facts to hand.

Intuition or Analysis?

Mentality is defined as a habitual reaction to outside stimuli. How we immediately respond to something unexpected defines our character.

In our regular careers most of us learned to respond to an unexpected business issue by calling a meeting of peers, employees and supervisors to discuss it. The traditional structure of business-hierarchy creates that habit. Rare is the company that empowers it employees to take ownership of an issue and make on the spot decisions. They do exist, but they are so uncommon that we learn about them in articles as the exceptions that prove the rule.

Wegman’s, the Apple Store, and the Ritz-Carlton hotel chain have reputations of excellence in customer care and customer loyalty. Other companies contact them regularly to learn their secrets, and in a 2012 Forbes article the companies claimed the secret for their success with customer loyalty is that they empower employees to make on the spot decisions.

Quick decisions often have to be made in the absence of all facts or data. Decisions become a mixture of logic and intuition, which for those who have spent a long time in the corporate world of decision-by-committee, can be a stressful experience.

In businesses, I have never hired executive teams. In fact, I never hired any employees because I felt my connectivity was strong enough to warn me of issues before they occurred and alert me to opportunities no one else could see. Some might call it a higher power, others intuition. I call it my Higgs sonar. All I know is it works and it helps tremendously. I ponder the problem, then closed my office door and take a walk.

To have those moments of insight means developing better interaction with – and connection through – the field of energy. It is that simple, but all too rare because we are taught to analyze, calculate, theorize, and then vote for consensus.

For success in a startup we need a set of solutions. For that we need to raise our vibration to a state in which we are prepared for success in business and in life. Here, I offer an additional technique that will help take you to places never imagined. The technique is described in the following ancient text and then I will add my modern day commentary.

Certain questions come with a force that compels an answer. They are like the mystic knocking on the door of the temple, they demand the giving of more light. For they come not from the brain-mind, but from the soul striving to understand the light flowing into it from the perennial fountains of divinity. Ask and ye shall receive, knock — and knock aright — and it shall be opened unto you. If the appeal is strong and impersonal enough, the very gods in heaven will respond. If the individual is earnest, the answer will come to them from within, from the only initiator that any neophyte ever has.

Meditation is a positive attitude of mind, a state of consciousness rather than a system or a time period of intensive brain-mind thinking. One should be positive in attitude, but quietly so. Positive as the mountain of granite, and as serene and peaceful, avoiding the disturbing influences of the ever-active and feverish mentality. And, above everything else, impersonal. Meditation in the better sense is the bending of the consciousness. It’s the raising of the mind to the plane where intuition guides, where noble ideas are native, and the holding of the consciousness in thought there. But one can also meditate on evil things and, alas, many do.

It is possible to meditate before falling asleep so that one’s soul ascends to the gods, refreshed and strengthened by its confabulations with divine beings. But it is likewise possible to brood before sleep so when the bonds of wakefulness are broken, and the brain-mind is silenced, the soul is dragged downwards, degraded and weakened. One should never sleep until one has sincerely forgiven all injuries done unto him. This is very important not only as an ennobling practice, but as a much needed protection. Fill the heart with thoughts of love and compassion for all and the mind with some lofty idea, dwelling on it calmly. Then there will be a rest of all the senses and quiet in the mind.

No one says ” You need a solution, take a walk, touch some trees.” “Feeling out of your depth? Then go watch the night sky for 15 minutes.” “Want to get out of the rut and make something of your life, then sit in a chair and do nothing for 20 minutes.” These tools are contrary to what we learn at school. School teaches us to go step by step and work on something until everyone is in agreement.

For success in a startup we need a set of solutions. For that we need to raise our vibration to a state in which we are prepared for success in business and in life. Here, I offer an additional technique that will help take you to places never imagined. The technique is described in the following ancient text and then I will add my modern day commentary.

Certain questions come with a force that compels an answer. They are like the mystic knocking on the door of the temple, they demand the giving of more light. For they come not from the brain-mind, but from the soul striving to understand the light flowing into it from the perennial fountains of divinity. Ask and ye shall receive, knock — and knock aright — and it shall be opened unto you. If the appeal is strong and impersonal enough, the very gods in heaven will respond. If the individual is earnest, the answer will come to them from within, from the only initiator that any neophyte ever has.

Meditation is a positive attitude of mind, a state of consciousness rather than a system or a time period of intensive brain-mind thinking. One should be positive in attitude, but quietly so. Positive as the mountain of granite, and as serene and peaceful, avoiding the disturbing influences of the ever-active and feverish mentality. And, above everything else, impersonal. Meditation in the better sense is the bending of the consciousness. It’s the raising of the mind to the plane where intuition guides, where noble ideas are native, and the holding of the consciousness in thought there. But one can also meditate on evil things and, alas, many do.

One should never sleep until one has sincerely forgiven all injuries done unto him. This is very important not only as an ennobling practice, but as a much needed protection. Fill the heart with thoughts of love and compassion for all and the mind with some lofty idea, dwelling on it calmly. Then there will be a rest of all the senses and quiet in the mind.

One reason for the need of strict impersonality, without the slightest thought of any destructive or morally offensive element intruding into the heart, such as hate, anger, fear or revenge, or any other of the horrid progeny of the lower self, is that when sleep steals over the body and the ordinary brain-mind consciousness drops away, the soul now released automatically follows the direction last given to it. Thus the practice of calming the mind before retiring can elevate the soul.

This is such a powerful ancient prose that it would be irresponsible for me to try to add to it. The additional technique is to lie in bed before falling asleep and make sure your last conscious thoughts are not just positive, but full of grace. Forgive anyone who you think ever did you harm. Forgive yourself for any mistakes you think you may have made. Then imagine your biggest, most fulfilling, balanced lifestyle dream as if it has already occurred.

For instance, your company has made a huge impact in people’s lives and is valued highly on the stock market. As a personal reward for your achievement you take your family and all your close friends by private jet for a two-week vacation on Necker Island. Something simple like that. Imagine the air and the sugary sand, and the amazing views and food and service. Then drift to sleep.

When you wake make sure the first thing you think are deliberate thoughts such as, ‘I am __________ and I am a hugely successful ____________ with a net worth of at least ____________ which I use for the highest good of all.’ Or something equally inspiring for you. No matter how you feel upon waking, do this quick affirmation.

No one alive today can really explain why meditation deepens intuition. Everyone who practices some technique, however, swears it does. For scientific validation we don’t have to look too far:

There are several things you can do to prepare for better, quicker decision-making:

As discussed in an earlier chapter, getting experience across many functions improves confidence in being able to understand issues and their implications. It provides fuel for your intuition.
Some of the scientifically proven benefits of a daily meditation practice are improved intuition and the ability to create more accurate solutions to problems.
Build close relationships with the client managers or representatives at all your vendors. In a traditional company structure the leaders of each function are often focused internally on their employee morale and protecting their own jobs. With vendors, their focus is on your company’s markets. They can give you a front row seat to view market trends and changes, but only if you develop strong bonds such that they care enough about your company to call you when they see something good or bad happening that might impact you.
Create a culture of empowerment within your virtual company. Permit vendors and their customer service personnel to make decisions on your behalf. This takes courage. Empowerment is an overly used word, and few managers I have met are hands-off personalities. Most are closer to being control freaks. In a virtual business model you work mostly with experienced contract personnel. They usually like to work without close supervision, which is one of the attractions of being a contracted worker in the first place. Of course, you can provide overall direction, but in a virtual model you do not have the luxury of walking down the office hallway to check on their progress. Studies show that when people perceive supervisors watching over their shoulder, their productivity drops as much as 50%. You must learn to let go of day-to-day management and instead focus on project management, timelines and benchmarks and then trust that the people you hired are smart enough to achieve them. If you try to micro-manage consultants they will likely not want to work for you again.
As politically incorrect as it might be to suggest sexist hiring, there is overwhelming evidence of the benefits of a balanced male/female ratio in leadership. When you are considering employee, contractor, or vendor candidates you should also consider that balance as it impacts your company. Certainly you want to balance the ratio among your network of contractors.

If I could distill and bottle women’s intuition I’d be the richest man on the planet!

As a man I have to work at improving my intuition. Even then I question it… when I know better than to do that. As a non-employer business founder intuition is critical because you don’t have the people or resources to analyze everything. You have to trust your gut. Easy or hard?