When Consensus Hurts the Company

Boards and top management teams often try to gain consensus about important decisions. New research offers insights into when that’s the right course, when it isn’t — and how leaders can determine the best form of decision making for a given situation.

Felipe A. Csaszar and Alfredo Enrione

SPRING 2015

Management is fundamentally about making decisions. In organizations, key decisions are often made by groups — boards, senior management teams, finance committees and so on — rather than by single individuals. Thus, an important role of the person leading a decision-making team is to know how to combine multiple opinions — in effect, to become a decision manager. We have found that how a decision is made can significantly ...