Making a Big Decision? - Use CPR

By: Jeff West

“Without reflection, we go blindly on our way, creating more unintended consequences, and failing to achieve anything useful.”

- Margaret J. Wheatley, writer & leadership trainer

Consequences. With every decision we make there are consequences. Many times, the consequences end up being the ones we’re after. Unfortunately, there are times where the consequences, in the best case, are a nuisance and in the worst cases catastrophic.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of linear thinking. If I do A then B will happen. While that may be true it’s the C, D, and E effects we hadn’t thought about that often jump up to bite us. The world is more systems based than we typically give it credit for being. It’s like a lot of rotating gears. You make a decision and sync up with the one gear you want to influence but give no thought to the other gears that are also connected and begin to whirl away. As our beginning quote states, without reflection we go blindly on our way, often leaving chaos in our wake.

So how to make decisions in a systems-based environment? An acronym I’ve found useful when working with my clients is CPR.

The C stands for Context. Context is defined as, “The circumstances in which an event occurs.” Take time to think about the systems in place that may also be affected by your decision. The current context is there because of a lot of decisions made in the past. Change to the system, the current context, is going to change that system. Giving some thought to what unwanted consequences may come out of your decision can often help avoid them in the first place.

The P stands for People. Who is going to be affected by this decision? We’re interesting creatures. We make a decision and think everyone will see it for the genius it is only to hear later how someone is mad about it, feels disrespected, is threatened by it etc. Decisions often challenge the status quo. If you were allowed to place a bet on your decision or the status quo winning, put your money on,,,,, well, you know. It’s not that people don’t want to do the right thing or make an organization better. But implementing decisions without taking people and their comfort level with the status quo into account is one of the most common unintended consequences I see. The subtlety of status quo is that it’s a known entity. People are comfortable doing something they already know how to do. You need to paint the picture of why your decision will make things better yet. Why abandoning the current way of doing things will be worth the discomfort of having to change how things are currently done.

The R stands for Relationships. This is a follow on to the people idea but bigger. What affect will your decision have on groups of people? One division in your company loves your idea. Another, feels left out or threatened. What will your decision mean for your relationships with your customers, your vendors, the community you’re in?

When you make a decision, you’re going to transform the system into a new system and the whole process starts over again because you’ve created a new context. A new system in which events occur.

If this sounds like it will lead to the old paradigm, paralysis-by-analysis I’ll argue it’s quite the opposite. Of course, decisions have to be made. It’s why you make the big bucks. But making decisions without considering the constituencies listed here often leads to more time spent patching up the unintended consequences and taking productive time away from things you should be spending it on. Take a little time and reflect on the CPR of your decision, have the appropriate conversations to get ahead of the consequences you don’t want and see if your life as a leader doesn’t become a little more rewarding.