John Adair's 100 Greatest Ideas for Effective Leadership

Idea 52: The role of intuition in decision making

It is too easy to be dismissive of intuition, the ability to ‘sense’ what needs to be done or to ‘smell’ trouble and opportunities alike. In fact, it is an invaluable key to making and taking effective decisions.

It is not always possible to analyze problems into solutions, and intuition is the useful power to know what has happened or what to do. Interestingly, the powers of intuition are diminished by stress and general fatigue, so your ability to be insightful in decision making can be adversely affected by these factors.

‘Intuition’, ‘instinct’, ‘first impressions’, ‘feel’, ‘hunch’ and ‘flair’ are important dimensions to explore not only when faced with decision making, but also when considering ...