How to Help Employees That Won't Make Decisions

Making decisions: not as easy as it looks.

In business, the ability to make decisions is an absolute necessity. While some positions (e.g. managerial) are more decision-heavy than others, the fact is that all employees have to make tough calls sometimes. For otherwise good employees who have a hard time making decisions, a bit of guidance from management can go a long way. To help such employees, you must listen to their concerns and lead by example.

Instructions

1. Review the employee's general performance record. Check the employee's stats on productivity, attendance and discipline. Remember that indecisiveness does not in itself make a bad employee. There is a difference between a solid employee who has a hard time making decisions, and an employee who is indecisive because he doesn't know what he's doing.

2. Approach the employee about your concerns. Vary your approach depending on the employee's performance. If the employee is a chronic underperformer, ask if he is having problems with the job and whether he thinks he needs re-training. If the employee is generally solid but having trouble with decisions, ask whether he understands the nature of the decisions he needs to make and whether he is wary of taking risks. If the employee is afraid of risk-taking, ask what messages from management are contributing to this feeling.

3. Start setting firm boundaries for decisions. According to corporate training firm Six Sigma, you should establish formal guidelines for setting due dates and reviewing decisions. Write out these guidelines, give them to the employee, and ask the employee to post them in his office or cubicle.

4. Take some time to clearly delegate decisions to employees. Tell the employee that while the ultimate goal is for him to independently make decisions, for an intermediate period you will delegate decision-making to him. Whenever this situation comes up, tell the employee that a decision needs to be made. Do not, however, give a hint as to which decision you prefer. Afterward, if the employee made a good decision, give him praise. If the decision did not work out so well, offer some coaching on what could have been done differently.

5. End the "coaching" period and let the employee go about his job normally for a few months. Monitor and evaluate the employee's decision-making throughout this period, but do not offer feedback on each one. Monitor how quickly the employee made decisions, how effective the decisions were, how willing he was to reverse bad decisions, and how well the decisions were implemented. At the end of this "probationary" period ("probationary" here means "to probe," it is in no way a punitive measure), give the employee a final appraisal of his decision-making. Type up this assessment in a few paragraphs, and meet with the employee to answer any questions.

6. Send the employee for re-training if his decisions are poor. Arrange a training session with the human resources department (or the training department if there is one), and ask the trainer to go over the subject matter in which the employee had a hard time making decisions. Tell the trainer where the employee was having difficulties so they can focus on those areas.

References

• Uncommon Clarity; Do your Employees Avoid Making Decisions; Ann Latham; 2008
• Six Sigma Online; Empowering Employees to Make Decisions; July 2009