Here’s the scenario: a leader, who makes influential decisions on a daily basis, is suddenly uncomfortable about a particular decision they need to make. That ‘un-comfort’ could be a sense of knowing that something isn’t right, a niggling feeling that they’re missing something, or even a feeling of dread.
In the corporate world, we’re taught to squash down those sensations and follow a logical thought process: Have you considered the risks? ➡ Do you know the probability of the various outcomes?➡ Are you clear on the range of impacts?➡ Benefits of each option? = And this thought process works some of the time.
For quick decisions, we run through questions like this in our head and for more complex decisions we read board reports, request more data, get our team to invest time researching etc. But what I often see happening, is the leader in question will go through this process and completely ignore their gut reaction.
We’ve been taught not to trust our intuition.
That it’s reckless, not evidence based, or lazy.
And I 100% disagree.
The best leaders - the ones who feel fulfilled, inspire their teams and make great long term decisions are the ones who trust themselves. And trusting ourselves comes from being connected to our own physiology (where your sense of ‘knowing’ comes from).
I bet you’re already highly skilled at the logical parts of decision making, so the action this week is to notice if your intuition - your gut - is trying to add something to your thought process. Exceptional leaders harness both of these skills.
If you have been silencing your intuition, here are some ways to bring it back into your decision making:
Ask yourself whether the decision you’re making is congruent with your values
If you feel a physical sensation like ‘eurgh no’ or the fluttering excitement of a ‘yes’, pause and add that to your considerations
Calm your state. We’re not listening to our body when adrenalin is surging - we’ll miss the insight
Ask yourself, if I wasn’t scared, what would I do?
These are all ways to reconnect with ourselves and start to create trust again. I’ve ignored my intuition plenty of times and usually regretted it, sometimes I just wasn’t ready to hear what it was saying. I’d be interested to hear how this insight lands for you.
P.S. Logical thinking is for beginners. Real clarity comes from the ability to listen to our inner wisdom (intuition) AS WELL AS have an intelligent, strategic thought process.