8 Techniques To Improve Decision Making Skills

While with smaller decisions (like which flavor of cake you get) it's best to just have some blind faith and go with your gut. Chances are you're making the right decision.

2. Identify The Reason You Are Making This Decision

Choices are made because they have to. Certain agendas and reasonings can affect the decision you make in the end. Try to determine who this decision is for and who will benefit from it. Are there any other reasons you are making this decision? All of this information can help you achieve your reason for making the decision, as well as making it easier to make the choice.

3. Determine How Many Choices You Have

In a lot of choices, you have more than two choices, a lot of the times the choices are even hidden from view. Organize your options into "what could work", "what won't work", and "what will work". Before you make a decision try to have all your bases covered.

4. Make An Informed Decision

Before making a decision ask questions. They may be to yourself, to someone else that you have to make the decision with, just ask questions in general. Try to get as much information as you can about the decision you have to make. 

Who is going to benefit from you in selecting one decision over another? Will one decision be harder to carry out than another? Just try to think things through before making any sort of choice.

5. Get a Second Opinion

Decisions can be hard, but you shouldn't always have to feel obliged to make them on your own. Sometimes it's best to get a second opinion from someone you trust. Be it your friend, a family member or if you have the means, call an expert. The point is that getting someone else's two cents on a matter can be a real help and it will make making that decision much easier and be a generally better decision. 

It doesn't even matter if you approve of their response either, hearing another person's view on it will get you thinking, often enough to make a  good decision.

6. Trust What makes Sense

When making decisions, common sense can play a pivotal role in determining whether you make the right choice or you don't. Be careful, though, it is a tool in your arsenal and not a hundred percent of the equation. 

Learn to listen to your common sense and logically attempt to use it to add prices of the puzzle that were missing previously. You can use it to make small decisions, but in larger one's simply listen to it, trust it, and fall back to it if everything else fails.

7. Decide With Logic, Not Emotion

There are times we get caught up in the moment, making rash ill advised decisions due to pride, anger or even sadness. Emotions can be dangerous if you wish to make good decisions as they are impulses and often get you doing the first thing that pops into your head. 

Before making a decision take a deep breath, clear your mind and try to make sure your emotions are not clouding your judgement. Afterwards, all you need to do is use logic and think proplerly on your decision.

8. Learn From Bad Decisions

We all make poor choices, but that should not stop us from thinking carefully on the next problem we face. Our lives come with one decision after another and we can't always choose correctly. What to do here is to not be afraid to fail, to accept it gracefully and learn from it so you make the right choices the next time around.

Decisions are important, we are faced with them everyday. We make big decisions where we have to think hard and clear about them. And we have small decisions which we just role with. Either way practicing making these decisions is key to learning how to make the right choices. You get some right, you get some wrong, but maybe with the help of these techniques you get it right more often.