Executive Leadership Briefing. Is the data presented to you, enabling a real choice?

This article explores why senior leaders need to develop skills to see past big noticeable loud noises and uncover small signals if we want to be part of a Board who makes the challenging judgment calls.

Decision: The action or process of deciding something or of resolving a question. A decision is an act of or need for making up one’s mind. Whereas Choice: Is an act of choosing between two or more possibilities. It requires a right, agency, or opportunity to choose.

The origins of the two words add context. The word decision comes from “cutting off” while choice comes from “to perceive.” Therefore a decision is more about process orientation, meaning we are going through analysis and steps to eliminate or cut off options. With choice, it is more of an approach, meaning there is a perception of what the outcome of a particular choice may be. Because of this, let’s run with choice rather than a decision.

A Decision is about going through analysis and steps to eliminate or cut off options. Choice is an approach, meaning there is a perception of what the outcome may be.

Does energy have a choice?

We are using energy as represented by a magnet field.

Two magnets, north and south. Irrespective of position, they have to attract. Do they have a choice?

Three magnets north, north, south. They have a more complicated relationship as of position and distance now matter as they influence the actual outcome. But there is no choice; the rules define the outcome.

At the majority of starting positions for the three magnets, there is only one outcome as such choice is predetermined. However, there are several situations when many magnets are sufficiently far apart and that there are only small forces at play (far-field). In this case, the result of movement may appear to be more random between possible outcomes. Any specific outcome is based on an unseen small momentary influence. The more magnets exerting small forces, the more random a positional change or choice may appear, as the level of complexity of the model increases beyond the rational.