The Four Methods of Decision Making

When you’re deciding how to decide, it helps to have a way of talking about the decision-making options available. There are four common ways of making decisions: command, consult, vote, and consensus. These four options represent increasing degrees of involvement. Increased involvement, of course, brings the benefit of increased commitment along with the curse of decreased decision-making efficiency. Savvy people choose from among these four methods of decision making the one that best suits their particular circumstances.

Command

Let’s start with decisions that are made with no involvement whatsoever. This happens in one of two ways. Either outside forces place demands on us (demands that leave us no wiggle room), or we turn decisions over to others and then follow their lead. We don’t care enough to be involved—let someone else do the work.