Sunday, November 14, 2021

Sleep on it Decision Making

 One characteristic of successful entrepreneurs is their ability to make decisions.  Often these need to be made without full information.  Entrepreneurs learn to not get stuck in analysis paralysis.  I am one such entrepreneur.  I make decisions quickly.

I tend to couple that decision making with speed of decision making.  More companies and people fail from perfection than fail from speed.

Good entrepreneurs also tend to stick to their decisions.  Bad ones change direction and opinion depending on the most recent things they heard or read or the most recent person they spoke to.  That said, true maturity is being able to change a decision.  So there is some balance.

One example of a decision I changed recently is a decision to sleep more.  I am embarrassed to say in my Time Management book (by the way - email me if you would like a free electronic copy of that - it is old) I essentially said "Sleep is for Wimps".  And I prided myself on my high work ethic...and the shortened sleep that went with that.

One of my new favourite books is "Why we Sleep" by Matthew Walker.  He makes a great scientific case for the value of sleep.  So much so, I think sleep will be the next focus of health - just like eating right and exercise are today.

One of my mentors constantly talks about HALT in decision making.  That basically says "do not make decisions if you are Hungry, Angry, Lonely or Tired".  Of course my problem is I am often one of those (this is partly where the sleep ties in).

There is a good article I read recently that takes that a step further.  This article suggest never make a MAJOR decision after a bad day,  at night, after a vacation, or when you are tired or hungry.  

I am buying into this pausing before making major decisions.  So what I would add is "if it will make little difference - sleep on it". And maybe not just for one day.