The Cost of Over-Analyzing

You will typically find me urging leaders to slow down and solicit input from their teams when making decisions. But that’s not my message today.

I'm not necessarily contradicting that advice, but I’m warning against the dangers of over-rotation in it.

Sometimes we get so focused on collecting more data and weighing perspectives that we can’t quite push beyond the analysis to make a final decision. This can feel extremely frustrating for a team. Yes, your team wants to be heard. And yes, they want to influence decisions. However, they also want to work for a leader who is confident enough to make the hard decisions needed to move the team forward.

If you struggle with analysis paralysis, this Two-Minute Tip is for you.

By the way, any time one of my tips involves my husband, I run it past him before posting. His response after previewing this one: “Glad I didn't move back." Me too…big time.

• Read the video transcript

  Okay, today's Two-Minute Tip is for all of my fellow over-analyzers out there. I get you, I am one of you. There's strength in it, and there are also some downsides.

  So many years ago, I'll tell you a story, many years ago, I was dating my husband, and when we first started dating, we were dating long distance. I lived in Seattle and he lived in Boise. We had both grown up in Boise together, but then I had moved away. So when we started dating, it was long distance. And we did that for a while.

  But then we decided, "You know, if we're going to see if this is really going to work for the long run, we better date in the same city for a while." And so he graciously sold his big truck, sold his dirt bikes, and moved to Seattle so that we could date in the same city for a while.

  And he knew after some time that he wanted to get married. And my tendency to over-analyze was just amped up and I could not make a decision for the life of me. And he was so patient.

  And after some time, I just felt like I should be able to make this decision. And I proposed to him one day. I can remember we were driving in the car. I said, "Well, maybe, maybe if you move back to Boise, that will just help me make a decision." How ridiculous and unfair is that, right?

  And he called me out on it. Right then, he said, "You know, babe, if I move back to Boise, this is done."

  Well, thankfully, I decided that, no, I did want to get married. And 16 years later, we've been married for 16 years, and I'm happy to report that it has been a great decision.

  So anyway, back to the over-analysis. You can see it can cause us to get stuck. It can cause us to miss out on opportunity. If you are a leader and you struggle with over-analyzing, I want to let you know that your team may be very frustrated with you. I know this from my own experience.

  Sometimes, even if our leader makes a decision that we aren't thrilled with, it's better than them just not being able to make a decision at all. So whether you struggle with making decisions because you just wanna gather a little bit more information to make the most informed decision possible or you struggle with it because you're a people pleaser and you don't want to upset anybody, you don't wanna ruffle any feathers by your decision, whatever the cause, if you tend to get stalled in decision making, this Two-Minute Tip is a reminder to you that sometimes, making a faster, slightly less informed decision is the best thing for your team and for you.