Effective decision-making involves starting out with the right mindset.
Decision-making is a basic skill common to all law enforcement officers regardless of position or rank. It might be time to take another look at how we perform this essential task. Though there are many decision-making formats, there is one common component that is more important than any other: defining the problem you are trying to solve. One of the key ways to do so is by framing.
Carpenters are judged by the product of their work. They use framing to come up with correct angles. This ensures the best possible outcome by lining up their project correctly. If the carpenter’s framing is off, even by just a small amount, the entire project will be skewed and could collapse. As decision makers we can learn from the carpenter’s example. As carpenters use framing to create the best angles and therefore create a strong structure, we can use framing to get the best answers. In other words, if we ask the wrong question, we get the wrong answer. In realigning our thinking by focusing on framing, the question becomes more important than the answer.
