As a business leader and entrepreneur, it is very normal that you’re faced with making decisions. You will encounter lots of decisions ranging from no brainers to complex and difficult. If you have formal business training, you may even be using some decision making tools that will greatly help you to come up with excellent decision and values. Here, you will know and learn some of the effective tips that will serve as your key and guide to keep your decision making skills effective and sharp.

• The first thing is to bring consciousness to how you make decisions. Many people rely on their “gut feeling” to make decisions. Although our “gut feeling” is a very useful tool to use when making important decisions, using rules based decisions can lead to a much higher probability of success. For example, instead of hiring the candidate that you felt the best about, make a list of rules that no person can be hired unless they meet the criteria, first. It depends on the type of work and type of position. But an example is, “I will only hire people with a credit score above 700.” Or “Any person who is late to an interview is automatically tossed out.” Or “Any person who doesn’t arrive to the interview with a copy of their resume in hand will automatically be tossed out.” These rules are designed help you notice things that the candidates are showing you that your gut may not pick up on. But these rules will help increase the probability of success with candidates and should be used to enhance your “gut feeling” success rate. The next tip that you should consider is to accept the reality of limited options. You should be aware that the most difficult decision has little to do with the complexity of the decision. Once the decision is tough, it is usually the risk involved is uncertain or the options just stink. In order for you to make an excellent decision, you must acknowledge your limited options as legitimate and then bring every ounce of your heart and head into making a through decision. You need to accept the reality for what it is and not for what you would like it to be.

• It is very imperative to take time to incubate. Most business leaders and entrepreneurs state that the best ideas come to them when they are away from the front lines includes flying, driving and out of the office. It seems that a relaxed mind that is not overload regarding a particular issue enables a higher level of creative and clear thinking. If time is available, why not take advantage of this condition when making an important decision and give your thoughts a chance to develop more completely. All you need to do is to simply step away from the decision temporarily and then get back to it once your mind has had a chance to relax. Aside from this, you need to be sure that holding off the decision, for whatever time period you decide is really incubation and not procrastination.

• It is also important to run it by the experts. Entrepreneurship is just too complex for a business leader to be an expert in customer service, human resources, marketing, sales, technology, finance and operations. Once you are making a decision outside of your comfort zone, you need to ask yourself what is the downside and upside of this decision.

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