Why the Best Startup Founders Prioritize Action Over Certainty

The difference between average leaders and exceptional leaders isn't intelligence, it's decision making. One of the biggest killers of organizations isn't bad decisions, it's the no decision. AI is making decision making more important, not less. If you know something has to change or something has to happen, don't wait around, do it now.

Good morning guys, welcome to a solo episode of the Tech Leaders Playbook. Today, I want to talk about the most underrated leadership skill no one talks about, decision making. Every executive wants to talk about strategy. Every technology leader wants to talk about AI.

Every company wants to talk about innovation, but none of those things matter if you can't make quick decisions. The difference between average leaders and exceptional leaders isn't intelligence. I can make it clear. It is an experience.

It isn't even their brilliant vision. It's decision-making. Simple as that. I've seen throughout my life so many people stall as they hymn and ha and are hit with analysis paralysis, right?

But after interviewing CEOs, CTOs, founders, athletes, NFL, legendary NFL Hall of Fame coaches, NBA coaches, athletes, and executives from companies like Apple, Google, National Geographic, Radical Candor, Amazon, and many others, one pattern constantly emerges. The best leaders make decisions differently. Today, we're going to unpack how they make these decisions differently. what are they doing that allows them to build these billion-dollar businesses or these huge teams that get so much done while we sit there and go watch them pass us by and say, oh, I had that idea.

Oh, you know what? We were Twitter before Twitter, but you didn't execute. So it doesn't matter what you were before Twitter or Amazon or whatever, right? They made decisions you didn't.

One of the biggest myths in leadership is smart people make better decisions. And it's not necessarily, right? Many brilliant leaders fail because they overanalyze, wait for perfect information, they avoid risk, they fear being wrong. The reality is most decisions are made with incomplete information.

The higher you go in leadership, the less certainty you will have. Executives aren't paid because they know all the answers. We know that. you know they're the highly paid people the most highly paid people because they can make sound decisions despite uncertainty a friend of mine used to say this all the time it's okay to be right or wrong but never in doubt think about that phrase that means that it's okay to be wrong And it's okay, definitely okay to be right, but it's not okay to constantly be in doubt.

Make decisions, learn from them, pivot, move forward. Obviously you heard the phrase fail fast in tech one of the most brilliant phrases that is not overused I think We all got to fail fast learn from it One of the biggest killers of organizations isn bad decisions It's the no decision. It's the kick in the can down the road. It's the constant kind of stalling.

And what does this create? Teams wait around, projects stall, budgets sit, priorities remain unclear. Organization becomes paralyzed. A mediocre decision made quickly often beats perfect decision made six months too late.

Think about that. Amazon popularized the ideas of one-way door, two-way door decisions. Two-way door decisions, reversible, adjustable, low risk. Move fast.

One-way door decisions are hard to reverse, strategic, significant impact, move a lot slower and more carefully. Most organizations treat every decision like a one-way door. That's the mistake. It's not that every decision needs to be done quickly.

So for example, if you're going to have a huge pivot, you need to be more strategic and thoughtful about it. Move carefully, move slower. But every decision cannot be treated like a one-way door. So think about that.

Let's talk a little bit about lessons from my guest. Dick Vermeule, NFL, Hall of Fame coach, championship teams aren't built on perfect plays, he said. They're built on commitment. Great leaders decide, then they fully commit.

Indecision creates doubt. Doubt spreads. Organizations feel it immediately. Not for me, from the legendary coach, Dick Vermeule.

Jason Rozov, the CEO of the book, the brilliant book and concept, Radical Candor. said, leadership isn't about avoiding difficult conversations. It's about having them. Many leaders know what needs to happen.

They simply delay acting. The decision usually isn't the problem. The courage to execute is, based on his books and our conversation. Marcus East, I don't know if you know that name, but former technology executive at Apple, Google, National Geographic, brilliant guy.

He was on my show. The best technology leaders understand technology decisions or business decisions. The mistake many technical leaders make is optimizing for technical perfection rather than business outcomes. Again, all about decision making.

Those are just a few key things that I remember from our episodes. Let's talk a little bit about the four decision frameworks great leaders use. Framework one, speed over perfection. Ask yourself, what information would meaningfully change my decision?

If additional data won't change your answer, then make the decision. There's no reason to wait around. Many leaders confuse activity with progress, right? We're running around, we're doing things, we're talking to people.

That's not good enough. Framework two, regret minimization. Jeff Bezos famously asked, which decisions will I regret not making? This removes fear.

Fear tends to focus on short-term discomfort. Regret focuses on long opportunities So are you going to regret making one decision failing and going back to the drawing table? Probably not. But are you going to regret not taking advantage of the opportunities in front of you now?

Absolutely. Potentially, you're going to look up in six months, a year, and say, oh my god, I had that idea. I had the tools. I had the resources.

I had the money and I sat on my ass because I had a bunch of people that were doubting it or I was doubting myself. You got to be bold, right? Framework three, reversible versus irreversible. We talked a little bit about this earlier.

Ask, can I undo this? If yes, move fast. If no, slow down and involve others that'll be involved in the execution of these decisions and the success of these decisions, the pain of these decisions, if I'm laying off a thousand people, I better have some conversations about who that's impacting, especially when it comes to people. Who's going to suffer from this?

Oh, my leaders. Oh, hey, I need you to do twice as much now with 20% less staff. Well, I better involve those leaders that are going to have to work harder than ever without these, you know, 20% of these people. And maybe those 20% of the people that they eliminate freeze them up to do better quality work.

Or maybe not. Maybe half of those people were really holding these people down, and now they're going to be stuck having to take over everything again. Principle-based decisions is framework four. Best leaders don't decide from scratch every single time.

This is really important, guys. They create principles. Just like in coding, object-oriented programming, if you're aware of what that is, you create a framework and you don't decide or create code from scratch every single time. That's where frameworks came in.

That's what object-oriented programming was all about. You can use the same thing with leadership frameworks. You create principles, for example, customer first, talent first, long-term over short-term, simplicity over complexity and principles dramatically improve these decisions, the decision qualities so that you can make decisions faster. You can stay true to your core values, your own human core values and those of your organization, right?

So we're not going to go against, we're not going to make decisions that are bad for our team, bad for our customers, bad for us as human beings to be able to go home and sleep beautifully at night. So these are very important guys. So again, principle-based decisions create principles and frameworks that's going to help you stay constantly making decisions, good decisions quickly. And when I say good decisions, I don't mean every decision is a success.

I just mean it's a decision you feel good about. It's based on your principles and you can quickly execute and make moves as needed. The technology leadership challenge, let's talk about that. AI is making decision making more important, not less.

Remember, we can offload so much now to AI, but we have to make good decisions. AI can provide data. It can add faster analysis It can create scenarios It could even make recommendations but ai cannot own accountability you still need to rely on your human judgment the most valuable leaders of the decade won't be the people with the most information because information is out there now they'll be the people who know what to do with it and and connect quickly the future premium isn't access to intelligence, it's judgment.

So many people are relying on AI that using your own human judgment, your own values, your own thought process is going to become more and more important, right? One of the things I talked about years ago is AI becomes more and more and more prevalent. The last thing that's left is our human judgment and our ability to connect with humans on a deeper level. Those are rare things.

One lesson appears repeatedly among the lead performers. They don't wait for uncertainty or certainty. Sorry. They make the best decisions possible with information they have available to them now.

They commit, they learn, they adjust, then they move forward. Because leadership isn't about being right every time, it's about creating momentum. and momentum is almost always built by people willing to decide. So final questions for some of the listeners today.

What decisions have you been avoiding? Is it a project? Is it a hire? Is it a promotion?

Is it a technology investment? Is it a difficult conversation with someone that needs to hear something? Because chances are the decisions itself isn't the problem. The delay is the problem.

everything, everything that you do, that you don't do is hurting you. So just remember that. This has been a very interesting episode, hopefully for you. Very simple one.

One thing I want to leave you with, when it's inevitable, make it immediate. Another great phrase from a good friend of mine, which meant if you know something has to change or something has to happen, don't wait around. Do it now. This has been the Tech Leaders Playbook.

I'm Avidus Antalpian. Until next time, keep learning, keep leading, and keep building. In the words of my good friend Jeffrey Mitchell, when it's inevitable, make it immediate. And that brings us to the end of another great episode of the Tech Leaders Playbook.

I want to thank you for joining us and hope you took away some valuable insights to apply in your professional journey. Don't forget to subscribe on your preferred podcast platform so you don't miss out on the next great conversation. I promise it'll be good. If you enjoyed today's episode, we'd appreciate if you could leave us a review.

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I'm Avita Santablian, and this has been the Tech Leaders Playbook. Keep leading, keep learning, keep giving, and I'll see you on the next one. Until then, stay inspired, my friends.