Quote of the day: getting decisions made

From Melanie Nelson's TinyLetter, a very good set of thoughts about decision making: 

...To keep projects on track, you have to know how to get decisions made. That is something that sounds simple but can be quite tricky, because what "knowing how to get decisions made" really means is "knowing what the decision maker needs to make a decision." This is not always obvious, even when the decision maker is yourself. I eventually realized that I needed some expert advice to make this decision, and now I have it.  

Based on that advice, I know I need to do a little more information gathering. Then, I'll need to mull it over for awhile (preferably while walking) and then by some magical internal process, I'll have a decision I feel good about. This fits my usual decision making process, which is "gather all the information and advice and let it stew a bit until my brain works out what to do." I'd tried to skip the "get expert advice" and "gather information" steps, and all the mulling in the world wasn't going to get me a decision without doing those steps.

It's funny to watch veteran decision makers make their decisions, because they won't even consider making decisions without the facts that they deem necessary.