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Using Intuition to Make Management Decisions
Copyright 1993 by Arupa Tesolin, Intuita

All decision-making requires risk, there’s no sure way to offset either risk or uncertainty. What we can’t risk is to naively continue making management decisions without considering new parameters -- such as learning how to use intuition better.

The worst thing a manager can do is steer off in unknown directions with an uncertain future. When intuition is included as a functional management skill-set, a managers’ direction is clearer, more focused and intentional, and arises from an alert, conscious and inquiring mind.

Our tendencies in management decision-making owe their habit history to “don’t rock the boat” thinking, “better safe than sorry” and tendency towards risk aversity. What may have been intellectually desirable in the past can be viscerally and emotionally wrong now.

Consequences of poor management decisions range from mere discomfort to public scandal, even the possibility of an injurious or contributive action to the loss of life, particularly in the case of a public health concern. Consider the tainted blood scandal in Canada where one decision against testing resulted in compromised lives and health for many Canadians.

While we cannot and should not throw away reason in the pursuit of purely intuitive solutions, proper reasoning sense is informed by both the rational and the intuitive. We can take the role and impact of using intuition in management decision-making more seriously by:

1.) Appreciating the value of intuitive information
2.) Deepening our understanding of how intuitive approaches can better serve us
3.) Learning how to engage these approaches individually and collectively

Intuitive information sources extend beyond normal decision-making parameters. The intuitive self, operating in a state of clarity and NOT under stress, knows facts beyond the present, influences beyond facts, opportunities, anticipates problems, sources of assistance, new options, and imagination friendly.

When intuitive approaches are summoned they are organically better at resolving issues beneath the surface, richer solutions over time, and can avoid or strategize beyond inevitable obstacles and barriers. They are usually eminently practical, even simple in a complex situation, but they are not simplistic.

Very often we forge ahead in a decision mode, which is wrong...because on deeper reflection we might reach out to a colleague to enquire when niggling thought casts doubt on a mutual goal we have. We might work on solving the technology issue first than later on in the project will block our best efforts to date. We might spend more time with a customer to know the issues and needs to find a more elegant solution that increases both the relationship and profit value. We might extend help to someone even though it seems unrelated to the business at hand, but feels right. Down the road they or someone else may come at precisely the right time with an important key or contact.

Intuition works though subtle cues, cuts through the senses to work directly with emotions, visions -- dreams, daydreams, images, visceral attraction, inspiration. In management decisions we rarely consider these. We do consult the political terrain, self-interests, and often vaporize honesty and trust. To reach the next level we must put self-interest aside and enable ourselves and those around us with higher motivations.

We can distinguish between pure intuitive insight and the less refined sense of “gut feel.” Gut feel is one of many signs of intuition experienced by different individuals but it can also result from following our instinct and experience.

When intuition arrives it is both clear and direct, without confusion or emotional conflict. It grows better in an alert still mind than in a stressed one. It is a highly personal individual experience. When a high trust group is engaged intuition can be experienced as a superior collective sense which can evolve and extend the individual ability.

Until we become fully intuitively capable we must begin in baby steps. First examine the existing decision likelihood’s from traditional approaches. Then apply intuitive approaches. Here is a fairly simple but quite productive approach. Try it once a day and see what happens. You might be quite surprised at what you “learn” and even how smoothly other areas of your life go.

To do this:

1. Suspend the intellectual mind - free it for the time being. If distractions and “thinking” stuff come, favor the activity of the free flowing mind. Give yourself time to “purge” stressful thoughts and engage a “watching the mind” stance, like a neutral observer.
2. Look from perspective of the heart - Information content here can be a lot different than the mind. What is there? Does the decision “feel” good, bad, awkward?
3. Why? Let intuition help you discover areas of concern. Ask probing questions that reveal underlying issues/causes that may not be well realized.
4. Look towards the future. Imagine the future. How does your decision rest? Well or otherwise?
5. Ask what events or forces are occurring now that are unknown to you. Listen to the answers.
6. Ask what people can be involved and how? Be receptive to seeing others in new ways.
7. Engage an iterative process. Repeat as needed, informing reason and extending your intuitive reach.
8. Repeat the preceding steps until you reach the place where reason and intuition dance.

That is wisdom, actively applied.

Management curriculum worthy of learning:

--Meditation and self-awareness skills
--Intuitive techniques
--Creative problem solving and cognitive methods

Our greatest challenges today will be surmounted by choices made, not from what we know, but from what we don't.

Arupa Tesolin is founder of Intuita, a Canadian learning company that offers corporate innovation workshops and general business training via your desktop through Intuita’s On-Line Learning Institute. Arupa is an International Correspondent for Training & Management Magazine, published nationally in India.  She is the creator of "The Intuita 3-MINUTE SOLUTIONSTM" for intuitive intelligence, innovation, visioning, and stress, a recognized author of numerous international articles on intuition and innovation in business, a trainer, speaker and consultant. Contact her at 905.271.7272, www.intuita.com or email.