The decision before the decision

Leadership teams spend weeks comparing options. They rarely spend an hour agreeing what question those options are meant to answer.

That is where most strategic mistakes are made. Not in the analysis, but in the framing that quietly decides which options get analysed at all.

Three signs the question is wrong

Every option is a variation of what you already do. If the choice is between three flavours of the current plan, the framing has already ruled out the uncomfortable alternatives.

Nobody can say what would change their mind. A good question comes with a test. If no evidence could shift the answer, it is a ratification exercise, not a decision.

The question is about a solution, not an outcome. “Which CRM should we buy?” is a different question from “Why are we losing customers in year two?”, and it leads to a different, usually more expensive, place.

A simple discipline

Before the next major decision, write one sentence: We need to decide X, so that Y, by Z. Then ask each person in the room to write their own version without conferring.

If the sentences differ, you have found your real first problem.

It takes ten minutes. It routinely saves months.