What is a Decision-Making Template?

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You don’t need to be a world leader, famous CEO, or tech wizard to realise that each decision we make takes time and mental energy. Check our post on decision fatigue to find out more.

There are countless stories about famous names who pared down their wardrobe to a choice of two simple outfits. Barack Obama limited his tie and shirt choices to two colours, Mark Zuckerberg is known for his trademark grey T-shirts, and Steve Jobs was rarely seen in anything but a black jumper and blue jeans.

Many smart people find ways to simplify their choices to make it less likely that they will suffer from decision fatigue. Later, we’ll investigate some popular decision-making systems, like grid analysis, and find out how they work. We’ll discover how they can help you think more clearly and make wiser choices.

First, though, let’s find out what a decision-making template is and why you might use one.

What is a Decision-Making Template?

In its simplest form, a decision-making template is a list of pros and cons. The problem is, in today’s world, full of budget constraints and project deadlines, this is often insufficient. We need templates designed to help us make informed, accurate decisions.

Decision-making templates help narrow your choices, pinpoint what matters, and make complicated decisions simpler.

Why Use One?

There are a multitude of reasons to use a decision-making template. Consider using one to help you:

• Validate a decision you’ve already made, and explore some of the possible outcomes,
• Find out whether the decisions you’ve made led to the outcomes you wished for.
• Make complex decisions easier to manage.

What is a Decision Matrix?

A decision matrix is something that is used to help us in the decision-making process by evaluating various choices and criteria. A matrix is used to compare choices, highlight pros and cons, or make the best possible choice we can. In business, they are used to organise information to make the decision-making process more efficient. They can be used to:

• Track sales over time.
• Track consumer behaviour to spot patterns
• Manage your time more effectively. Check out our post on ‘How to Improve Your Time Management Skills’ for more.
• Keep tabs on production levels so you can see where and how you can improve operations and maximise efficiency.

An excellent example of a decision matrix is grid analysis, which we’ll explore in more detail soon.

Let’s look at some examples of decision-making matrixes, processes, and templates.

Common Decision-Making Templates and Processes

Decision tree analysis and grid analysis are both popular templates for project management to help make things run smoothly and make sure the people involved remain motivated and productive.

Let’s investigate each in turn.

Decision Trees

A decision tree is a representation of a workflow chart that shows a set of decision rules. It is made up of:

• Nodes – which represent an event or decision.
• Branches – which illustrate the possible outcomes of a decision or event.

Decision trees can help predict the outcome of a series of random events or decisions. You can then weigh each potential result and decide on an appropriate course of action.

Grid Analysis

This technique helps you make better decisions by providing you with a way to evaluate several possible choices. The options are presented in a table, in which each row represents a different choice and each column a different element of the problem you want to solve or the decision you wish to make. The idea is to plump with the choice which ends up with the best score because it meets more of the necessary criteria than any of the other options.

To use grid analysis:

• Choose a problem to examine or a decision you need to make
• Break the problem or decision down into smaller chunks.
• Draw a table of columns and rows.
• List the chunks of the problem or decision in the rows.
• List aspects of the decision or problem you want to examine in the columns.
• Analyse the various aspects in the columns for each row.
• Finally, see what conclusions you can draw from your analysis. Which choice or solution do you deem the best available to you?

Another popular decision-making process is cost-benefit analysis.

Cost-Benefit Analysis

This form of analysis is most often used when we need to identify and evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to inform a decision. It is a fantastic form of analysis to use if you need to compare approaches, choices, or viable solutions to a problem.

Most decision-making templates are designed as visual aids, to help you see the information in a chart, table, or in the form of a diagram. It is easier for most of us to identify and understand relationships between a series of decisions. These visual representations might provide unexpected insights. Visualising information can help you understand a complex decision or difficult problem more clearly and may help you remember things better as well.

Using a decision-making template, then, can not only help you think more clearly and simplify what may on the surface be a complex problem or choice, it can also save you time and make you more productive.

It’s time to find out why effective prioritisation is vital if you want to make wise decisions.

The Importance of Prioritisation

If you wish to make better, more informed decisions, you must learn how to rank decisions in order of importance and prioritise tasks. One of the best ways to do this is to use the Eisenhower Matrix.

It’s divided into 4 quadrants:

Urgent and important – For tasks that need to be done immediately and often include emergencies and deadlines.

Important but not urgent – Tasks that fall into this category can be scheduled for later but are still important. They may include tasks like goal setting.

Urgent but unimportant – These are the tasks or decisions you can delegate to someone else. For example, you might ask a co-worker to deal with some time-sensitive email requests.

Non-urgent and unimportant – These decisions or tasks can be discarded or ignored. This can include things like deciding what to wear for work. Narrow your options to make it easier for yourself and save time and mental energy for choices and tasks that matter.

Wrapping Up

Our lives are filled with tough decisions. We rarely have all the information we need to make a perfect choice, but we can use decision templates to give ourselves the best chance of making the best possible one.

In the world of project management, we are constantly making trade-offs and prioritising tasks to manage our time more effectively and become more productive. Use decision-making templates and systems to make decisions easier. We can’t promise these templates will help you decide what to wear for a Saturday night out, but they will certainly help you make better decisions in work and business.

Like this post? You may also enjoy finding out why we make poor decisions.