Wise decision making in a VUCA world

VUCA Thinking is the class of Thinking that accepts and addresses the idea that the world and our learning, working and living spaces are VUCA_initial – volatile, uncertain complex and ambiguous. Coming to grips with and overcoming this, we are able to move towards achieving VUCA_final - vision, understanding, clarity and agility for impactful living, sustainable and successful.

The reason for this entire hullabaloo about how to think about
the world arises from the fact that many of us are unable to make decisions, let alone wise decisions. The speed and quantity of new information that constantly negates previous knowledge, freezes leaders into the waiting game, unable and unwilling to commit to courses of action that may lead to terrible mistakes that cost the an organization the loss of that most precious one item to rule them all…MONEY!

Before we get into this decision making business (I hesitate to say “wise decision making” lest readers think I am actually wise), let us define a little more obsessively the breakdown and specific meanings of the components of VUCA, both the initial state and the thinking styles to get to the final state.

a.         Volatility to Vision

Where things change fast but not in a predictable trend or repeatable pattern; causing the need for the skill of sensing and responding to volatility to enable vision.

  Skills to be developed: Sensing, Thinking about and Responding to Volatility to enable Vision

                                I.            Logical, Creative and Critically thought out Assumptions to Manage environments

                              II.            Slow Thinking, Anger and Conflict Resolution to Understand and Manage You

b.        Uncertainty to Understanding

Where major “disruptive” changes occur frequently. In this environment, the past is not an accurate predictor of the future, and identifying and preparing for “what will come next” is difficult; causing the need for the skill of pattern recognition to overcome uncertainty & to enable understanding.

Skills to be developed: Pattern recognition to overcome Uncertainty & to enable Understanding

                                I.            Identifying and Analysing Targets and Objectives to Develop Tactics and Strategies

                              II.            Conflict Negotiation to Resolve external Barriers

c.         Complexity to Clarity

Where there are numerous difficult-to-understand causes and mitigating factors involved in a problem; causing the need for the skill of being able to filter complexity to enable clarity

  Skills to be developed: Filtering Complexity to enable Clarity

                                I.            Complexity Thinking to make Order out of  Chaos

                              II.            Choice Making to Enable Decision and Risk Taking

d.        Ambiguity to Agility

Where the causes and the “who, what, where, when, how, and why” behind the things that are happening are unclear and hard to ascertain; causing the need for the skill of building amplified Intelligence to reconfigure ambiguity & to enable agility.

  Skills to be developed: Amplified Intelligence to reconfigure Ambiguity & to enable Agility

                                I.            Commons Creation and Crowd Sourcing to develop Social Collective Intelligence

                              II.            Leadership, Humility and Transparency to Persuade and Change

Whew, that was a pageful!

I certainly am not saying that this one pager is the end all in describing the world and understanding it. The whole basis of VUCA Thinking is to realise that we can never know what lies around the corner, but knowing that we know this in itself is already a huge asset. Wouldn’t it be better to know that an unknown enemy awaits, than to not even know that an enemy awaits?

Which brings us to wise decision making.

It is an accepted fact by most critically minded organisations and individuals that too much information can be a very bad thing. It cripples thought processes simply because we start to think about what else there is that we do not know about, and we keep on trying to fill our perceived gaps in knowledge and information. Time though, marches on regardless of what we know or do not know, and impact, profits, service and even just being nice works on actually doing something.  

Action versus words!

This is very easily said rather than done, I know, and this is why the first page lists needed skills that once developed, will provide the intrinsic confidence to make decisions and to assume that they are at least wise start points. VUCA thinking assumes that wise decisions today are utterly wrong decisions a few days from now, but the decision making process evolves in a way that takes into account that remedial action can be put into place for the future. We already know corrective measures will have to be taken while making what we think to be utterly correct decisions now.

So…this article proposes that we all get to work developing brand new skills for our lives that can only get increasingly VUCA . There is no other way to move forward successfully, sustainably and impactfully. Data mining and search engines are getting increasingly efficient, and knowledge about things we never knew we never knew, are increasing exponentially. Should we choose to put ourselves into positions where decisions have to be made (and you are doing so even when you choose to become a parent), we need to have the confidence that we are making currently wise decisions under accepted VUCA conditions.

I personally see no other way to get a good night’s sleep after a hard day deciding which flavour ice cream to have.