Making decisions in your business can be stressful, and most of us tend to rely on the same decision-making habits we've had for a long time. In this insightful solo episode, I discuss two common decision-making defaults that can lead to failure and regret. But don't worry, I also offer practical strategies to help you shift your decision-making patterns in order to make more conscious and intentional choices. 

Whether you lean towards impulsivity or overthinking, I’ve got you covered with actionable tips and techniques.  Discover how to make decisions that stand the test of time and allow you to trust yourself in running your business. 

If you’re new to The Driven Woman Entrepreneur Podcast,  let me introduce myself:  I’m Diann Wingert, a business coach and psychotherapist with a background in ADHD and productivity, I bring a unique blend of expertise to her work. Through this podcast and my signature coaching programs, I empower driven women to overcome mindset barriers and make impactful decisions in their businesses.

Key takeaways:

1️⃣ Recognize your decision-making default: Are you more prone to impulsivity or overthinking? Understanding your default style can help you make conscious, intentional choices.

2️⃣ Pause button strategy: Avoid making decisions on impulse by implementing a stall tactic. Take the time to think and consider the options before committing.

3️⃣ Decision partners: Seek the input of others who may provide a different perspective. Having a trusted second opinion can help you avoid the pitfalls of both impulsivity and overthinking.

Mic Drop Moment: 

"Overthinkers will tell themselves ‘I'm going to take action once I have researched every possible option for the decision in front of me, I have compared the relative advantages and disadvantages of every single option before me, and I have reached a conclusion on which one is the better choice?’  Now obviously this is extremely time-consuming and exhausting. It can also be demoralizing because it reinforces our belief that we don't know what we're doing, and that we can't trust ourselves."   

Is your default decision-making style interfering with your success? Take my "What's Holding You Back?" quiz, which can help you uncover the decision-making defaults that might be hindering your progress. 

You'll receive a sequence of emails filled with resources and past episodes of the podcast to support your growth. Here’s the link:  https://bit.ly/whyb-quiz

My signature program, The Boss Up Breakthrough can help you right-size your business so that you can avoid burnout, establish sustainable boundaries, and uncover the profit potential in your coaching or consulting business. 

We work together for 3 months to clarify what’s working, what isn’t, and where you can create more realistic systems, so you can start loving your business again.  At this time,  I am only accepting 1:1 clients and the first step is to schedule a free 30-minute consultation right here: https://bit.ly/calendly-free-consultation

Not ready to work together but want to see more of my content? Subscribe to my weekly Linked In newsletter here: https://bit.ly/TDWE-Newsletter

Putting Insight into action: 

1. Have you ever experienced stress or anxiety when making decisions in your business? How do you typically approach decision-making?
2. Do you resonate more with the impulsive decision-making default or the overthinking default? How have these decision-making styles affected your business and life?
3. What strategies or techniques have you tried to manage impulsive decision-making? Have they been successful for you? How could you incorporate the "Pause Button Strategy" or the "2 Heads Strategy" into your decision-making process?
4. How do you feel about taking risks in your business? Do you tend to see yourself as a risk-taker or do you prefer to avoid making mistakes?
5. What role does fear play in your decision-making process? How do you manage fear and embrace risk?
6. Have you ever fallen into the trap of looking for a "magic pill" solution to your business challenges? How has this mindset affected your decision-making and overall success?
7. How do perfectionism, procrastination, and people-pleasing impact your decision-making? How can you break free from these habits and take more decisive action?
8. How much time do you typically spend researching and gathering information before making a decision? Is there a point where you feel you overcomplicate the process?
9. Can you think of a recent business decision where taking a pause or seeking a second opinion would have been beneficial? How might the outcome have been different?
10. How do you view mistakes and failure in your business journey? Are you able to learn from your mistakes and move forward? How can you cultivate a mindset of learning and growth in your decision-making process?

Well hey there driven woman entrepreneur, today we're going to talk about your decision making default because let's be honest, making decisions in your business can be a major source of stress. Most of us are making decisions The same way we've been making them for a very long time, you know, since before you started a business, and maybe before you even called yourself an adult. Now not surprisingly, many of us struggle with decision making, so there are a ton of decision frameworks being taught by business coaches, productivity gurus, and leadership trainers and honestly, you would probably be fine adopting almost any of them. But my goal in this short solo episode is to raise awareness around the fact that, let's be honest, most of us are winging it in business and in life.

And while it can be an exciting ride, there are two types of decision making defaults that tend to result in far more failure and regret than they do in success. So I'm only going to be talking about those two, because if you are prone to one or both, you definitely want to lean in, and maybe take some notes. And I'm going to give you some very simple, actionable strategies that you can employ just as soon as you finish listening to this short episode, to begin to change things for the better. Okay, if you pay attention to how you make decisions in your business, and you find that one or both of the defaults that I'm going to talk about today are just a little too familiar. This episode was created with you in mind, the uncomfortable truth is that nearly all of us are prone to giving in to these defaults when we're under time pressure or distracted by other important priorities. And when you're running a business, when is that not the case?

So go easy on your self driven entrepreneur, because you're probably going to resonate with both of these. And the good news is that, even if you find that you are relying a little bit too much on either of these defaults, you're going to leave this episode with at least one easy to implement strategy that's going to serve as a pattern interrupt. You've heard me talk about pattern interrupts before, and I love them so much because they help us make more conscious, intentional choices Instead of continuing with our unconscious autopilot programming, you know, the one that gets us into so much trouble. And with practice, we can learn to make decisions that truly stand the test of time in our business and do not require all the mental gymnastics that we've been coming up with to explain why we did what we did to our team or our loved ones. And that my friend, over time adds up to genuinely feeling like you can trust yourself to run your business in a stable, secure, sustainable way that allows you to take pride in your accomplishments instead of thinking, well, I dodged a bullet that time.

So are you ready for the first one? Here we go. Impulsivity. I know, I know, I know. You're probably cringing, but I had to go there straight up, because I have ADHD, and many of my clients do as well and the impulsive decision making default is one that's very familiar to us. Impulsivity is just as likely to lead to negative outcomes as it does to positive ones, particularly if it's the only trick in your bag, the only card up your sleeve, the only decision style in your repertoire. When you tend to make impulsive decisions in your business and life, you will most likely be making them just about all the time. It's all about the dopamine. I mean, let's be honest, we get dopamine from the immediate gratification, and over time, a lifetime of acting on impulse becomes hardwired into our neural pathways. This crowds out all the other options that we might want to develop, if only we could slow our roll and curb our enthusiasm once in a while. If you are a grown up version of the kid who knew the material, but rushed through the test and ended up with a shitty grade, then I don't have to tell you, you are an impulsive decision maker.

And the ironic truth is that quite a few of our impulsive decisions actually do work out okay. And if that's true for you, you probably don't even think of yourself as an impulsive decision maker. You probably call yourself a risk taker and risk taking is highly valued among other entrepreneurs. We hear so many references to quick decision making and quick acting in the entrepreneurial set. For example, just ship it, do b level work. It's better to ask for forgiveness than seek permission and how about take the first strike advantage? All of these are hinting at why it's good to be impulsive. It's good to be a risk taker and many impulsive decision makers will say, I'm not impulsive, I maybe I'm intuitive, and that might even be partly true. But be honest with yourself if you have made just as many bad decisions as good ones, intuition is not your driver. Impatience is, because the underlying fear for the impulsive decision maker is wasting time. I feel this so hard! I hate wasting time, and I hate being bored. So all this means, I am prone to making impulsive decisions.

Now I know this about myself, I accept this about myself, and I manage this in myself. If this is you as well, you can still hang on to your risk taking tendencies. I would never try to take that from you as a fellow entrepreneur, but you would be wise to add a step in your decision making workflow, your decision making process that allows you to continue to be that quick start, but with fewer regrets. Here are two examples of things I use myself and teach my clients that help them make fewer impulsive decisions that they later wish they hadn't. One is called the Pause Button Strategy. I do not allow myself to make decisions on the spot. This is especially true when someone invites me to participate in something whether they're inviting me to be a speaker, join a panel, be on their summit, be their podcast guest.

It doesn't matter what it is. I no longer allow myself to say yes, make a decision to anything in the moment. I have a stall tactic. I can do this without offending people, and I can do this without sounding like I'm not wildly enthusiastic about what they're offering me, but I don't trust myself to make good decisions universally when I make them on impulse! So I have installed a pause button, and I hit it every single time. You can probably think of a number of places where hitting a pause button would be so good for you in your business too. Here's the second one. This one I call the two heads strategy, and it refers to the very familiar phrase, two heads are better than one.

If I know I'm prone to making an impulsive decision, even if I've got my pause button strategy in place, I'm probably also going to check-in with another person. I have many wonderful entrepreneurs in my inner circle, and I'm probably going to reach out to one of them who is less impulsive than me, and say, Hey, what do you think about this? Sometimes it can happen almost as instant freakingtaneuously, as if I allowed myself to make an impulsive decision. Because I use the Voxer walkie talkie app, as do many of my entrepreneurial friends and I can leave a message for them that they can be listening to on their end of Voxer, while I'm still talking, talk about almost instant gratification. And if I know I'm reaching out to someone who is less impulsive than I am, that is chef's kiss a win for me. I think it would be very easy for you to employ one or both of these strategies. You should at least give them a try if you tend to be impulsive.

So are you ready for number two? This one's going to sound like it's all the way on the other end of the spectrum. But as I'm going to reveal in a couple of minutes, impulse decision making and the one I'm about to tell you about are actually often two sides of the same coin. What am I referring to? Overthinking. Overthinking, second guessing, over complicating the decision, which slows it down to the point where it often leads to complete inaction and even avoidance. Now it's going to sound like it's the polar opposite of impulsivity, but what often happens is when we tend to overthink, second guess, we need to do a fuck ton of research, we need to compare all the options, then we've got so much information in front of us, we have over complicated the decision to the point where it's completely overwhelming, and then we can't do anything at all temporarily, that is often followed by an impulsive choice, because we've run out of time, or we've frustrated ourselves into the corner and someone else is demanding a decision. You see how they can be two sides of the same coin.

Now I must admit that compared to the impulsive decision making style, the overthinking, second guessing, over complicating in action style is far more common among female entrepreneurs. There are a lot of reasons for that that I've talked about in other podcast episodes, some of which I will link to in the show notes. But it's also true for many highly creative people, individuals who are gifted and those who have ADD, not the H, but the inattentive distractible type, as well as individuals who are business owners, who have issues with anxiety or OCD. I find with a lot of my clients who are overthinkers, second guessers, ruminators, researchers, and have a really difficult time making decisions, they often tend to engage in these secondary behaviors that I've spoken about a lot as well. What am I talking about? The unholy trinity of procrastination, perfectionism, and people pleasing.

Now it's easy to see why overthinkers tend to be perfectionists and procrastinators as well. Something else I've talked about a lot on this podcast that tends to enter the equation when someone's default decision making style is overthinking is what I refer to as the magic pill. The magic pill is a mindset that often tends to wheedle its way in to someone's decision making style without them even realizing it. How do you know if this is you? Well, if you find yourself ever searching for the perfect coach, perfect consultant, the perfect course, membership, mastermind, mentor, guru, oracle, who knows everything, so that all you have to do is join their program, hire them, and you will gain access to their proven process. Guess what? If you are prone to this, and I have been, and I know so many people that have, so there is no shame in this game. But when you don't achieve your desired outcome, you don't think there's anything wrong with the magic pill mindset, you think, I just haven't found my magic pill yet.

It's kind of the equivalent of entering the dating scene looking for a soul mate. I'm sure you can tell from the way I'm talking, I don't believe in soulmates, and I don't believe in magic pills either. But I do know that many people have been seduced into thinking they're out there, and they just haven't found them yet. You see, the overthinking default is actually so much more damaging to you and your business than being an impulsive decider. It probably is a little counterintuitive because impulsive decision making gets people into so much trouble, but give me a minute and let me see if I can prove this to you. You see overthinkers are not taking action, that's the rub. Overthinkers will they tell themselves I'm going to take action once I have researched every possible option for the decision in front of me, I have compared the relative advantages and disadvantages of every single option before me, and I have reached a conclusion on which one is the better choice? Now obviously this is extremely time consuming exhausting even. It can also be demoralizing, because it reinforces our belief that we don't know what we're doing, and that we can't trust ourselves.

Over time this leads to missed opportunities, self doubt that has become totally habit forming, shame and embarrassment, comparitonitis, because everybody around you is getting further, faster. Now I know if we are spending time on social media, that's built right in, I mean FOMO is built in to social media. It's engineered that way, it keeps us on the apps, it keeps us comparing ourselves, feeling badly about ourselves, so we create more posts, so we stay on the apps. Listen, I am not anti social media, if you follow me on LinkedIn or Instagram, you'll know that's not true. I am very active several times a week. The problem is that if we have an overthinking default to our decision making style, it slows us down to the point where we might not even have a business anymore, but what we definitely won't have is a business that's thriving and fulfilling to us.

Remember when I said that the underlying fear for the impulsive decision maker is wasting time? Well, the underlying fear for the overthinking decision maker is that they're going to make a mistake. I got news for you friend, the uncomfortable truth is that you will make mistakes, you're going to make many, many mistakes in your business and in your life. So the idea that if you just do more research, if you just consider more options, if you just hire more help, take more courses, listen to more podcasts, even awesome podcasts like this one, read more blog posts, join more Facebook Groups, see what other people are doing. None of these things individually or collectively can prevent you from making mistakes. I think the impulsive decision maker doesn't want to waste time, so they're willing to make mistakes, so that they can take action. That doesn't mean they're further ahead, they might be going in circles, but if you're an overthinker, you're definitely going in circles, and the decision that you're making is to not decide.

The mistake you're trying to avoid becomes the mistake you're making, which is not deciding and not taking action. I did say there would be uncomfortable truths in this podcast, didn't I? No matter how much research we do, no matter how many numbers we crunch, no matter how many mind maps we compare, there simply are no guarantees that anything we do in business is going to work, at least in the way that we expect or want it to. And it stands to reason that we can't possibly know with a 100% certainty that any of our individual decisions will turn out right either. Now if it sounds like I'm trying to convince you to just drop the terrible idea of having your own business. Trust me, I'm not. What I want to invite you to do instead is instead of trying to avoid making a mistake, I'd like you to embrace the following: Make peace with risk. Learn to dance with fear. Decide how much thinking is enough and set a time limit.

Decide if you're going to make a decision on what CRM software to use in your business, that you're going to look at three options, and that is it? And you're only going to research each of those options for a set amount of time, because in truth, every single decision you're going to make in your business is going to have multiple, multiple, multiple alternatives. And the number of alternatives, the number of options, is going to continue to increase as is the amount of information available on each of the existing options. You could literally turn it into a full time job just doing research on what you could be making decisions on. No lie! I also recommend that you could recruit a decision partner. They could become your secondary brain. They could become your second opinion. You probably need a few of them so you don't wear the one out, but learning from our mistakes starts with being willing to accept we're going to make them.

Now, if you are a longtime listener to this podcast, or this is at least not your very first episode, then you know that I infuse a lot of humor and sarcasm into how I look at business and life. Why? Not just because it's part of my personality, it's become part of my personality, because humor and sarcasm help me cope with the fact, with the inevitable fact that no matter how experienced I am, I'm going to keep making mistakes. I accept that I'm human, and nobody has it all figured out. In fact, I'm very suspicious of anyone marketing themselves as a business coach or consultant who claims that they have it all figured out.

So if you identify with an impulsive decision making default, and you know that it's really not what you want to rely on indefinitely, and especially if you have an overthinking decision making default, which means you're basically kicking the can on making the decision further and further and further down the road let me help you. It can start with this simple decision to take my quiz. It's called What's Holding You Back? What you're going to get is a short sequence of emails that will link you to back episodes of this podcast and other resources that will help you make progress on whatever is holding you back and impulsivity is on the quiz as one of the options. So remember, Driven Woman Entrepreneur, you don't have to be perfect to be successful, and everybody makes mistakes. That's it for now, I'll be back next week with an amazing guest interview.