Making risky decisions

• Intense competition and increased visibility of failure puts pressure on managers to both take risks and make good decisions - a highly stress inducing combination.
• You can reduce risks and spread ownership but not eliminate them.
• Can you influence your culture to be more tolerant of error, seeing it as a necessary condition for innovation to occur?
• Is this a leadership opportunity for you in your culture?
• You can also immunize yourself somewhat to the fear of error by making many risky decisions on a small scale initially and keeping a record of your successes. Taking a big risk against a background of having avoided risks altogether is harder.
• How can informing stakeholders reduce the risk for you?
• Get more information on the pros and cons of various options can help reduce risk if it is available and when time permits.
• How can you ensure that you consider other options objectively to avoid justifying your preferred option, hence seeing its benefits more clearly than its downsides?
• How receptive are you to negative feedback about your preferred option? Most managers are less receptive than they think. You may be sending subtle messages to doubters that silences their objections.
• Make a list of the risks involved in making a particular decision, its benefits and potential costs. Make a plan to reduce each risk, one at a time. Putting your analysis and plan on paper can help to reduce anxiety - keeping it in our heads or to ourselves increases anxiety.
  

See also Risk Aversion