Decision Making: Let Your Team Choose - Lessons from Parenting

Overview
The author shares a personal story about dressing his son and draws parallels to managerial decision making. He argues that micromanaging decisions stifles creativity, learning, and motivation, and proposes using policies and clear goals to empower teams.

Key Takeaways

• Micromanaging decisions reduces staff creativity and leads to burnout.
• Allowing staff to decide provides learning opportunities and increases motivation.
• Policies that define the "why" behind decisions help teams make better choices.
• Applying concepts from Ackoff, Kohn, and systems thinking can improve decision frameworks.

Who Would Benefit

• Engineering managers and technical leaders seeking to improve team autonomy.
• Product owners and project leads looking for better decision structures.
• Anyone interested in applying systems thinking to management practices.

Frameworks and Methodologies

• Ackoff's policy decision model.
• Kohn's motivation theory (choice and autonomy).
• Theory of Constraints (TOC).
• Systems thinking approaches.