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So, I always do this really corny thing in my speeches where I have people in the audience say to the person next to them “I am a Decider.”  Inevitably, the room breaks out into a this-feels-silly-but-I’ll-be-a-good-sport brand of laughter.   Admittedly, it reeks of a Stuart Smalley SNL skit. Fortunately, I’ve already built some credibility by this time of the talk so I don’t come across as a total flake.

But this morning I was reminded why I do this.  Never mind the science and empirical evidence backing up the theory.  I do it because it works.

Mary, the owner of a Corporate Wellness Consulting firm who attended a speech I gave for the Colorado Human Resources Association emailed me to say she landed a Fortune 500 client after my talk.  “I kept thinking about your talk on Deciders,” she said.  “I just kept thinking if I make a decision, I am moving my business forward. I didn’t realize how important it was for me to hear that talk.”

I wish Mary said this because of my unquestionable awesomeness, but it has much more to do with her than me. Mary is smart. She runs a successful business. She holds a Ph.D in Nursing, and is a professor at the University of Colorado.  Despite the many benefits of intelligence, smart people have a knack for out-thinking themselves when making decisions.  Instead of using their formidable intelligence to remind themselves that the future will always be a place where the “best” option is never hiding in plain sight, they kick their analytic powers into overdrive for a long, protracted period of largely unhelpful deliberation.  Meanwhile, the all-important momentum needed to grow their career or their company slowly drains.

Only after hearing my diatribe on decisiveness and the empirical research on why it accelerates growth of all kinds do smart people finally give themselves permission to put their talent and intelligence into action every day with every decision.  But when they do…well, the results surprise even the smartest people.

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