There's nothing more frustrating than a leader who can't make a decision. At that point, what are they even there for?

I once had a business partner at real estate company who would say: 'the 70% plan executed violently beats the 100% solution every time. Get a good idea of where you're trying to go, MAKE A DECISION, and go.'

What "Executed Violently" Actually Means

He didn't mean violence. He meant commitment. Once the decision was made, you didn't tiptoe into it and leave one foot out the door in case it went wrong. You went all in, immediately, because a 70% solution you fully commit to means speed. And speed wins.

That's the part most leaders miss when they hear "70% is good enough." They think the number is the permission slip for a weak effort. It's the opposite. The number just means you stopped waiting for certainty that was never coming. Everything after that decision still gets your full weight behind it.

The Actual Cost of Analysis Paralysis

A leader who can't decide isn't being careful. The market moves. The opportunity closes. The team stops waiting for direction and starts guessing at it themselves, which is its own kind of chaos.

I've watched this play out enough times to know the pattern by heart. The paralyzed leader isn't protecting the company from a bad call. They're just delaying an inevitable one, usually until circumstances have narrowed the options down to something worse than what was on the table originally.

Why "What Are They Even There For" Isn't Harsh, It's Accurate

A team doesn't need a leader to have every answer. They need a leader willing to commit to one when it counts. If someone can't do that, the title on their door is just decoration.

I don't say this to be cruel. I say it because I've been the paralyzed one before, sitting on a decision because the discomfort of being wrong felt worse than the cost of doing nothing. It was never actually worse. It just felt that way in the moment.

The 70% Rule in Practice

Here's what my old partner's rule actually forces you to do. It forces you to separate the parts of a decision you can control from the parts you can't, and stop wasting energy chasing certainty that'll never exist.

You'll never get to 100%. Not on a real decision, under real pressure, with real stakes attached. The information you're missing at 70% almost never shows up by waiting. It shows up by moving, because action generates the feedback that analysis alone never will.

The Line Between Decisive and Reckless

This isn't a license to skip thinking altogether. Seventy percent still means you've done the work. You've gathered what's reasonably available, you understand the stakes, and you've weighed the downside if you're wrong. What you haven't done is wait for a guarantee that was never going to arrive.

The same discipline that pushes you to decide at 70% instead of waiting for 100% is the discipline that keeps you from confusing speed with recklessness. One skips the thinking. The other compresses it.

What Paralysis Actually Costs Your Team

Every day a decision sits unmade, your team is quietly absorbing the cost. They can't plan around a direction that doesn't yet exist. They start hedging their own effort, because committing hard to a plan that might get reversed feels like a wasted bet. That hesitation spreads downward from you, the same way confidence or its absence always does.

Paralysis doesn't just cost you the decision. It costs you the momentum every single person under you would've had if you'd made the call a week earlier.

Marching Orders

Find the decision you've been sitting on longest. Get a good idea of where you're trying to go. Make the decision. Go. If you want to get sharper on how you actually decide under pressure, take the free 3-minute leadership assessment. Your mission starts here.