When my kids were young we played “not it” to decide who was picking up the dog’s mess in the backyard. Last one to touch their nose had to go get the bag.
Grown adults play the same game. We just use calendars instead of fingers.
“Let’s revisit this after the holidays.”
“We need to post numbers for this quarter first.”
Most of us would spell bureaucracy D-M-V. But bureaucracy isn’t a thing so much as it’s a behavior.
Not choosing is a choice. And there’s a long-term cost most people never account for: you never find out whether you’d have been right. So your judgment never improves.
Over time, the designated decision maker becomes the indecision maker. And that leaks out across the organization, because your team sees deferral as the default.
You held off letting someone go and they eventually (finally!) left. The opportunity to enter a market passed. The work got absorbed into an already stretched team.
The decision got resolved. Nobody chose it.
Well, it all worked out!
Ehhh…kinda.
I spent one three year term on a non-profit board. The idea was to limit time to keep ideas fresh and people from burning out.
Good in practice. But when the day to day leadership didn’t like a board idea, all they had to do was wait.
I brought the idea of a 5K fundraiser. I’ve run a number of 5Ks so I knew the participant side, and I’ve led several events for a workout group I’m part of, so I felt like I had both ends covered on what we’d need.
The first time I brought it up, they needed time to think about it.
The next month they needed to talk to their insurance provider.
The next it was talk to the people at the location we proposed.
The next it was me answering some questions those people had.
The next it was “we’ll put it to a vote when we look at next year’s agenda.”
The next was a Christmas party.
And then I rolled off.
No 5K ever occurred.
The term limit was meant to keep the board fresh. It also meant anyone who disagreed with me had a published expiration date.
Dragging your feet on a decision is still a decision.
Not a no. Not a yes.
Nobody gets blamed for an outcome nobody chose.