Friday, May 27, 2022
  • About Us
  • ImagiNATION
  • Adverts
  • Rate Card
  • Contact Us
The Nation Online
Advertisement
  • Home
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Life & Style
    • Every Woman
      • Soul
      • Family
    • Religion
    • Feature
  • Society
  • Columns
  • Sports
  • Chichewa
  • Enation
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Life & Style
    • Every Woman
      • Soul
      • Family
    • Religion
    • Feature
  • Society
  • Columns
  • Sports
  • Chichewa
  • Enation
No Result
View All Result
No Result
View All Result
Home Columns Rise and Shine

The 40-70 Colin Powell rule

by Nation Online
28/10/2021
in Rise and Shine
4 min read
0
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on WhatsAppShare on LinkedinLinkedinShare via Email

 Last week, the world lost a very historical black American man, Collin Powell who was the former head of US Military forces and former Secretary of State.

Over the last 10 years, we have covered a very important principle that he developed—the 40-70 Rule. To remember him, let us recap.

Many of us fear to make tough decisions and when the moment comes to make the big decision, we do look for information to help make the decision but we are not too sure how much information is adequate to make a good decision.

This is the challenge that is well tackled by Colin Powell. Colin Powell was a well-known and respected strategist and leader. His leadership theories are a subject of study by many scholars and practised by many of his admirers in the military and in public and private sectors too.

On this particular subject of making tough decisions, Powell prescribed the amount of information that one needs to make the decision. He said that we need between 40 and 70 percent of the total information to make a decision. He believed that with less than 40 percent of information, we are bound to make a wrong decision. At the same time, if we keep looking for information beyond 70 percent, then by the time we make the decision, it will be so late that others will have taken that decision and moved on. It will be too late!

According to Dr. Steven Anderson, a leadership author and analyst, we as human beings can tap into intuition to fill in the rest of 30 percent gap between the 70 percent information that we get and the full information required to make a decision. We need to trust our guts.

Our intuition or guts come in handy to help make good decisions in spite of having less than complete information.

If you aspire to be a great leader, you need to accept this reality and begin to practise Colin Powell’s 40-70 Rule. It is not easy to embrace this rule. We feel like lacking and are afraid to make a decision with incomplete information. And yet, that is the correct approach to decision making and leadership. Why exactly are we afraid to make quick decisions based on the majority but not all of the information required? Are we afraid of making the wrong decision?

Great leaders aim at ensuring that they make more correct decision than wrong ones. They don’t aim to make zero wrong decisions. A leader that is so careful that makes no wrong decisions makes so few decisions that he or she cannot be a successful leader.

We are not rejecting the fact that good leaders need to care about the decisions they make. But they must be ready to fail. They should only ensure that they are wrong few times compared to the counts of the times they are correct. Good leaders accept uncertainty and they operate with uncertainty. Dr. Anderson said: “In my experience, people who want certainty in their decisions end up working for other people, not leading.”

Therefore, if you want to climb career ladders as a leader, you need to embrace uncertainty and you need to begin to make decisions with incomplete information. You need to start to trust your guts feelings and use your intuition to make tough decisions based on incomplete information.

For this rule to work, we need to be resourceful. We need to rapidly get as much information as possible. Remember, this rule is not promoting laziness or that you don’t need information to make a good decision. Rather, the rule is saying you need to balance between perfection and speed. The best decision too late is worse than a half good decision in time! As you aim for quality, mind the timing also.

In closing, I will quote Dr. Anderson again: “So, the next time you have a tough decision to make, do what Colin Powell does, get enough information to make an informed decision and then trust your gut. You’ll be glad you did.”

Previous Post

IMF projects 2021Inflation at 9.5%

Next Post

Malawi unveils $46.3bn climate change rollback

Related Posts

Rise and Shine

How to triumph in interviews

March 31, 2022
Rise and Shine

How to triumph in interviews

March 24, 2022
Rise and Shine

How to triumph in interviews

March 17, 2022
Next Post
Lake Chilwa dried in 2018 due to prolonged drought

Malawi unveils $46.3bn climate change rollback

Opinions and Columns

Business Unpacked

Tame egos, take risks to grow economy

May 26, 2022
People’s Tribunal

What was that press briefing all about?

May 22, 2022
Big Man Wamkulu

Wife, in-law plotting my downfall

May 22, 2022
My Thought

Tonse Alliance died on arrival

May 22, 2022

Trending Stories

  • His case heard in UK court: Sattar

    Acb explains Sattar miss

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Govt, IMF talk deal

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Gone but still in our midst

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Flames drawn against Zimbabwe

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Cooking oil for relief

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0

Malawi-Music.com Top10

  • Values
  • Our Philosophy
  • Editorial policy
  • Advertising Policy
  • Code of Conduct
  • Plagiarism disclaimer
  • Disclaimer
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use

© 2022 Nation Publications Limited. All Rights Reserved.

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Life & Style
    • Every Woman
      • Soul
      • Family
    • Religion
    • Feature
  • Society
  • Columns
  • Sports
  • Chichewa
  • Enation

© 2020 Nation Publications Limited. All Rights Reserved.

This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. Visit our Privacy and Cookie Policy.