How do you know you have made a good decision? It is tempting to say, “By the results I achieve”. If only it were that easy. Consider this example: “How do you know you made the right career choice?”
Which results? When you achieve some great success? When you receive some award? Because you made some great friends along the way? Because you got to travel?
How will you account for the parts you don’t like? What about the days you hate what you’re doing? What happens if you get laid off? Does that mean you picked the wrong career?
Who gets to keep score? Different people see the same results from different perspectives. You might love your career, but someone close to you might hate it. You might think you did a great job on some project, but a colleague might not. You might hate what you’re doing but you could be making a profound difference to people you don’t even know.
Are you sure your decision produced those results? You made the decision but are you sure that your actions produced the results you are now admiring? Perhaps someone else made the key decision. Or maybe the results occurred because of a fortunate set of circumstances beyond anyone’s control.
Are you sure that’s what YOU decided? We have an amazing capacity to “re-adjust our internal dialog” to fit and rationalize our current situations.
We all want great results. It’s the whole point of making decisions.
The best answer to “How do you know you have made a high-quality decision?” is to have confidence in the quality of thinking that went into making it. It is the only thing over which you have complete control and for which you can take credit.