A Decision-Making Guide for the Busy Manager

With all the responsibilities and challenges those in management positions face on a daily basis, it can be tough to make the right business choices consistently.

Luckily, The Energy Project president and CEO Tony Schwartz has ten tips in his Harvard Business Review article Ten Principles to Live by in Fiercely Complex Times to help managers do just that.

Schwartz explains that it’s always best to look at all angles of a situation or problem even when you think you have a solution in case you and/or your employees miss something and that you should always work hard and challenge yourself if you hope to be happy at work. Acting in a way that will make your employees feel good about themselves and focusing on job satisfaction instead of material gain is another important aspect of the ten principles.

His tips include:

1) Always challenge certainty, especially your own

2) Excellence is an unrelenting struggle but it is also the surest route to enduring satisfaction

3) Emotions are contagious so it pays to know what you’re feeling

4) When in doubt ask yourself, “how would I behave here at my best?”

5) If you do what you love, the money may or may not follow, but you'll love what you do

6) You need less than you think you do

7) Accept yourself exactly as you are but never stop trying to learn and grow

8) Meaning isn't something you discover, it's something you create, one step at a time

9) You can't change what you don't notice and not noticing won't make it go away

10) When in doubt, take responsibility

These principles, Schwartz says, are meant to guide managers in being genuine, honest and receptive to other viewpoints and ideas when they make choices at work. However, some may find these ten tips useful in other areas of their lives as well.