70% Rule: Bias to Action

I have a client who spent six months researching the perfect project management software. 

Six. Months.That’s enough time to gestate a human or learn conversational Italian. She wasn’t moving forward, she was just polishing her research skills. Meanwhile, her team was drowning in email chains, missed deadlines were piling up, and she was losing sleep over projects that kept slipping through the cracks.

When I asked her what she was really afraid of, she got quiet. What if I pick the wrong one?  What if there's something better out there that I didn't find? (What if aliens lands tomorrow with the perfect software.)

Here's the thing about waiting for 100% certainty: it’s a unicorn. Nice in theory. Extinct in practice. There is no perfect software, no flawless strategy, no decision that comes with guarantees attached. There are only choices that move you forward and choices that keep you stuck.

The 70% Rule

The 70% rule is about understanding that excellence and perfectionism are not the same thing. Excellence moves forward. Perfectionism stays in the garage, polishing the same hood ornament forever. There's a difference between making a decision with 70% of the information and making a bad decision. The question isn't whether you have enough information to guarantee success. The question is whether you have enough information to take an intelligent next step.

Pilots take off with 70% visibility. If they waited for blue skies and no turbulence, every plane would still be parked at the gate. They understand something most leaders forget: The cost of waiting for perfect information is often higher than the cost of fixing a less-than-perfect decision.

The Questions That Break the Paralysis: 

• If you had to decide today, no more research, no lifeline to a friend, what would you choose?

• What's the cost of not deciding? Indecision is still a decision. It's choosing to let circumstances decide for you.

• If this choice doesn't work out, can you course-correct? Most decisions are written in pencil… or at least editable in the settings menu.

When Good Enough Is Actually Perfect

Some decisions deserve the strategic pause we talked about in last week’s blog. Others deserve the courage to act with incomplete information and the wisdom to know the difference. The pilot doesn't wait for perfect weather to decide to take off. Neither should you.

What decision are you over-engineering right now? What would happen if you just…took off?