To Choose or Not to Choose

Apr 7

By Tim Violet
Director, Business Development, North America

As I was considering a topic for this edition, what to choose, I thought I would actually choose: the necessity to “choose.” We all do it, we all must address matters, navigate our way through life by weighing options. Even not selecting an option is actually a choice.

But what holds us back, while it seems others easily traverse the various presented alternatives?

For many of us, it is the “unknown.” And yet, we:

buy cars
take out loans
purchase homes
decide to raise a family
select a career

All with a degree of confidence in the future.

Yet, in many business settings, we stumble, freeze, explain away indecisiveness, so WHY? What is different?

Many of us are quite comfortable with the status quo, even if there are profitable options that could be employed. Failure, the unknown, procrastination, no definite objective, doubt, possible bruised ego, all are possible factors.

We then look for an excuse to maintain the status quo:

lack of time
lack of resources
lack of direction

Leaders lead. To be a leader, you must be able to “choose” from the various paths to the future.

A couple of quotes to contemplate, if you choose to:

“In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.”
—Alice Roosevelt Longworth

“The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that is changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.”
—Mark Zuckerberg