Flex_ Do Something Different - Ben [49]
‘Moral/life’ choices get made for all sorts of reasons, including parental bias/upbringing, the influence of others, prejudice, random or erroneous thinking, preference or feelings. Despite these somewhat arbitrary influences on important matters, moral/life choices seem to remain relatively fixed in adulthood. This is understandable, perhaps, because they are accrued habitually, but rather odd when one considers the impact they can have on one’s future life. These should at least be taken out and examined every now and again. They are alterable. And a recognition that they are not fixed can unchain an individual and leave them free to make the right choices (for them).
Of course, it is not always obvious, on the surface, what type of decision something is. And the choices might be complex. Decisions and choices that appear to revolve around ‘factual’ matters, for example, can have embedded morals, say, about religious or political matters. For example, should you use your vote strategically when you know the political party of your real choice stands no chance of winning? The decision will depend not only upon the facts but will also be influenced by your political views, for example. For a sensible shopper the decision to pay more for something may be a morally justified one because they are committed to buying locally, for example. Most people don’t make wrong decisions, they make category errors and fail to notice what category of choice they are facing.
56. Why people get paid for making ‘big decisions’
We would argue that many business and political choices – so called ‘big decisions’ – are often not real choices at all, but personal preferences made explicit. So, people who are paid to make such big decisions are really being paid not for the power of their decision-making prowess, but for being publicly accountable. The ‘choices’ they make are clearly visible, often for a long time, to many others.
People may argue against this view because there are really important and big consequences that emanate from those decisions. We do not deny the fact that choices have consequences. It is also undeniable that there is considerable uncertainty about the future. The big decision-maker cannot know what will happen next month in the stock market, or how the public will react to an event, even though they can make pretty good predictions about such things.
If the imperative of a business is to maximise shareholder value or make the most profit, then closing a factory that employs 5,000 people could be the obvious ‘factual’ choice (albeit one with enormous negative consequences for others). But other people will see this as unreasonable because they see it as a ‘moral’ choice. It is this exposure to criticism that we see as one reason for people being paid to make, and defend, big decisions. Our view is that business, like any other domain of life, needs to consider the moral and ethical dimension. In our own business life we have decided to embrace the values of ‘conscious business’.
So to conclude this section, we would argue that a key aspect of choosing is about which of the categories the current ‘choice’ belongs to. People often get the categories very wrong.
57. DSD and decision-making
One good thing to know is that, as personal coherence develops, making decisions in the ‘random’ and ‘moral’ categories becomes much easier to get