Happy Sunday Friends!

Here you’ll find 1 quote I’m musing, 2 Ideas, 3 of my favorite things from the week, and 1 question. If you find it useful or interesting, please feel free to forward this along to some friends or others!

One Quote I’m Musing

“Rehearse them in your mind: exile, torture, war, shipwreck. All the terms of our human lot should be before our eyes…”

- Seneca

Recent events we’ve all seen in the news some wall flowering, and some cross-continental traveling have given rise to several discussions on decision making. Specifically, doing so under pressure.

As leaders, especially those in senior leader positions, all the tough decisions are kicked up to you. Some in crisis (or perceived crisis), some in mundanity. Both require focus, foresight, and a framework.

All the fun and easy decisions are made along the way up, leaving you with only those between evils or a final approval with little time to analyze the processes of others. None of which can be delegated.

The first element of a framework is to practice understanding what is in your control. Many factors are beyond our control, such as the actions of malicious actors, third-party or unforeseen vulnerabilities. However, we can control our preparedness, our response plans, and our ongoing efforts to improve proactive and reactive measures. By focusing on these aspects, we maintain an initiative-taking stance rather than a reactive one.

Second Element is rationality over emotion. Panic and fear are detrimental in the face of a crisis, whether that be a cyber-attack or simple catastrophic failure of a system. Decision-makers must rely on rational analysis and clear-headed thinking.

The stoics would practice “Premeditatio Malorum,” directly translated as a premeditation of evils. Think about going into an operation. It doesn’t go well, you die. They would do a postmortem and figure out everything that went wrong, learn from it, and improve the system.

That’s great for everyone but you.

Why isn’t there a premortem? Identify all the things that could go wrong, what to do, and who should do it if that happens. Why didn’t the patch go well, where did the enterprise struggle, what haven’t we thought about? Actively thinking about and training for high stress, difficult, and emotionally trying situations.

For instance, when an incident occurs. A data breach, an attack, a bug that shuts down your enterprise windows systems. calmly assessing the situation, determining the scope of the breach, and implementing a well-structured response plan.

Seneca would tell us that the one thing a leader cannot be excused for was to say, “I did not think that could happen.” That’s because it’s our job. To think things through, to be prepared, to have a plan and anticipate all possible and probable outcomes. Even worse, to say “I didn’t think it would happen again.”

100-year floods don’t wait a hundred years to happen again…
Vulnerabilities can resurface after patching…

We have to ensure our teams are prepared, trained, and lack complacency. Balance efficiency, security, AND compatibility. Gone are the days of actors, programs, and processes operating in autonomy.

-e

Two Ideas From Me

A couple quick prompts to use for yourself to help with key decision making.

What are your micro decisions you can make as quickly as possible? These are non-critical, reversible / fixable decisions that don’t need to be perfect. Illuminating decisions that you can make to keep progress from stalling. They’re either cheap enough that you/your team can change later, or the choice between options that are so close, the time/money loss is irrelevant for a shift.
What are my risks and what are my benefits? Understanding the best- and worst-case scenarios allow you to control elements of the risk you identify (if they are controllable) and maximize the benefits for a given situation. I prefer this to the Pros and Cons because I don’t find those two separate lists useful for decision-making analysis.

Three Favorite Things From Others

“If there is no wind, row.” | Latin Proverb.
“And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.” | Haruki Murakami
“The test of a first-rate intellect is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in your head at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.” | F. Scott Fitzgerald

One Question

What is in my way and what are three identifiable ways I can remove this impediment to my action?

Have a wonderful week,

I’ll see you Sunday.
-e