Biblical Business Radical: Blessed Decision-Making

We don’t often think of Abraham as a business leader, or commander of an army. In Genesis 13, Abraham is returning to Canaan from Egypt, where he’d gone earlier when a famine hit Canaan. His flocks had grown. He employed a lot of herdsmen. Also, his nephew’s, Lot’s, herds had grown. Lot was part of the family business. Conflicts erupted. Recognizing that it was not good for his enterprise to have internal fighting, Abraham decided it would be good to divide the organization into two separate companies. Instead of resources and markets being shared, they would target different areas.

Did Abraham decide which would go where? He deferred to his nephew. “If you go left, I’ll go right. If you go right, I’ll go left.”  Lot went east to the valley of the river Jordan, which is described as being very fertile and having some ‘cities of the plains’ like Zoar, Sodom and Gomorrah. Lot settles near Sodom, and later seems to have moved into the city. He’s taken captive when several city-state kings overwhelm the kings of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboim and Bela/Zoar and plunder the cities. Abraham raises an army and rescues Lot rather than pay any ransom. Abraham also rescues all the women, goods, livestock and all the other captives from the one king that was holding Lot. Most of you will know the rest of the story, understanding that Sodom’s and Gomorrah’s residents were so wicked—not even 10 righteous men were found—that some years later those two cities were destroyed by God. In hindsight, maybe Lot should’ve gone left instead of right...

We often talk about 4 levels of decision-making: Tell, Sell, Consult and Join.

Certainly, in an emergency, disaster or similar situation that requires quick action, leaders should tell their teams what to do; there’s no time for discussion. Poor leaders use this method most of the time, however, demoralizing and not allowing for any empowerment or ownership of the decisions.

Leaders still make the decision in the less urgent situations and sell the teams on how good and wise the leader’s decision is. You’re doing this when you ask for questions about a decision you just announced. You overcome their objections to ‘make the sale’.

Teams have more ownership of the decision when you consult with them. You still retain the decision-making responsibility and in these situations you’re seeking their input. You want to know what they know, see what they see, hear what they hear. You want their perspective and to know what they would do if they had to make the decision.

The highest level of ownership (buy-in) and empowerment occurs by joining them in making the decision. Each team/staff member has an equal vote, including you. It’s tricky in that you don’t want to unduly influence the team and end up with groupthink.

Abraham went to an even higher level and delegated the decision to his nephew and committed to living with the decision. He didn’t renege when Lot went east, as I’ve seen with some leaders. “Oh, I don’t know if you want to do that, Lot. Those cities don’t have a good reputation. There could be some fighting. How about going west instead?” Abraham could have said as a way to exert his own decision-making power.

Similarly, if you want your staff to be really empowered, as one CEO shared with me, stay out of the meetings. Let your staff make the decisions. Delegate authority to them. You might say you trust them, but withhold any power from them. Commit to supporting their decision. And then helping them when they need it—instead of behaving as if you really want to say, “I told you so. I would’ve done it differently. We would have had better success if you’d listened to me.” Leadership gurus often tell us that we need to learn from our mistakes—“fail fast, fail often” is one mantra—but we rarely let our staffs have that opportunity to learn. Take a lesson from Abraham. Be courageous. Delegate decision-making power and be a blessing to all.