As a product manager, you need to make decisions about your product every day. Unfortunately, you’re almost never going to have all the information that you need to decide. Making good decisions despite uncertainty is a critical skill for PMs.
So how do you make good decisions? Think of your decision making as optimizing for two axes:
- Was it the right decision?
- Did you decide fast enough?
If you always wait to make the right decision, you could delay the project by making your team wait too long for the next steps. But if you always make decisions quickly without evaluating the facts, you could waste your team’s time by making the wrong decisions constantly
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One-Way and Two-Way Doors
When thinking about whether to optimize for decision quality or speed, it’s valuable to think of decisions as one-way or two-way doors. Two-way doors are decisions that can be easily reversed if you’re wrong, so prioritize decision speed. One-way doors are rarer. These decisions cannot be reversed easily, so try to gather more information if you’re uncertain.
If you're struggling to make a decision that’s a one-way door, seek knowledgeable people who disagree. Discussing the decision with experts who you trust (including your customer, if possible) will help you get closer to the truth. Don’t delay the decision forever, however. Even for one-way doors, try to decide when you have about 70% of the information.
Don’t Compromise If You Think You’re Right, Find the Truth
When you’re trying to make a decision with a group of people, it’s natural to want to compromise to avoid damaging your relationship with others. This desire is especially true if the decision-maker is your manager or an executive. But if you genuinely believe that the decision is wrong and have the evidence to back it up, you must have the courage to be the differing voice. Your goal is to find the truth no matter what, even when doing so is uncomfortable.
There’s No Shame in Escalation
When two teams don’t share the same goals, it becomes challenging to make a decision together. When you’re stuck in these situations, escalate up the management chain. There’s no shame in doing so because escalation is often more efficient than arguing back and forth over multiple meetings until both teams are exhausted
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Disagree and Commit
After people make a decision, you must commit yourself and your team to execute on it. Even if you don’t agree with the decision, it’s your job to make sure you understand why the decision was made and explain that to your team. It’s never acceptable to say, “Because my boss said so.”
Remember that decision making is a two-step process. When making a decision, you must find knowledgeable people to help you get closer to the truth. When a decision is made, you must focus on execution.
Tips for Making Good Decisions
Here are a few more tips for making good decisions:
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Express your opinion and encourage disagreement.
One way to listen is to state your opinion clearly and then going to great lengths to encourage disagreement.
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Data does not always equal truth.
Pay close attention when you or someone else is sharing data to support a decision. Ideally, there should be qualitative anecdotes to back up the data points.
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Ask questions to bring discussions back on track.
For conversations that are getting derailed, try asking: “How does this help the customer?” “What problem are we trying to solve?” and “What leads you to believe that's true?”
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Ask people to argue from the opposing perspective.
If two people passionately disagree about something, try asking them to argue from each other’s perspective. If one of those people is you, the same tactic applies.
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Encourage people to participate.
If you think someone is not voicing their opinion, say “We're about to make a
decision that you argued against in the past but you have said nothing recently. Have you changed your mind?”
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Don’t make decisions with too many people.
Ideally, there should be one clear decision maker and only eight people who are stakeholders in the decision. Smaller group debates are often better because they avoid groupthink.