The best debugging tool available for a decision that has been stuck for weeks despite the answer seeming obvious. > We are often co-mingling the decision and the implementation. The decision itself is often clear, but the implementation likely feels painful. When we think of both together, our feeling of fear about the implementation infects our view of the decision. ### **What I'm thinking about** 1. **The contamination runs one way** – Dread about the execution flows backwards and makes the decision itself look genuinely uncertain. It isn't. You already know. What you're avoiding is the conversation, the disappointment, or the cost that follows. 2. **Step one is naming who you serve primarily** – Customers for a company. Founders and LPs for a fund. Citizens for government. Family members for a family. Only one primary constituency; the point is to force a choice rather than optimise across all stakeholders simultaneously. 3. **Step two produces the answer** – *"What is in the best interest of the person we serve primarily?"* That is the correct decision. **Write it down before thinking about implementation at all.** 4. **Step three is where the pain lives, and it has two branches** – Either implement without dwelling on the injury it causes, or look at that injury directly: reach out to the people affected, find out what actually matters to them, and find ways to help them get it. Then implement. 5. **Use a thought partner** – "Ask a co-worker, spouse or friend to be your thought partner. **Why? Because they are not in fear about the pain of implementation. Only you are.**" ### **So what?** The diagnostic question when a decision has been open too long: *do I actually not know the answer, or do I not want to do what the answer requires?* These feel identical from the inside and need completely different treatments. More analysis helps the first and entrenches the second. Related: [[Type 1 and Type 2 Decisions]] [[Fear and Anger Give Bad Advice]] [[Issue, Proposed Solution]] [[Firing Well]] [[Executive Operating System MOC]]