Why Good Decisions Can Produce Bad Outcomes

Executive Field Note 053

A good decision does not guarantee a good outcome.

Decisions are made with available information.

Outcomes occur in conditions that continue to change.

Chance intervenes.

Other participants act.

Unknown variables become relevant.

A poor decision can sometimes be rewarded.

A sound decision can sometimes be punished.

If the outcome becomes the only measure of the decision, luck can be mistaken for judgment—and judgment for failure.

The result matters.

But it does not necessarily tell us whether the process that produced the decision was sound.

Executive Question:

Are you evaluating the decision—or only what happened afterward?

Published by Executive Insights. A publication of Axiom Research Press