Decision Making Café Using the Knowledge Café to make better decisions

The Knowledge Café is not about decision-making but can be combined with other decision-making processes to help make better decisions.

How often have you taken part in a meeting to decide an issue where there have been two factions in the room?

The first camp has already decided what the decision should be and sees the meeting as a means of coercing the others in the room to agree with them. In contrast, the second faction wishes to explore the issue further before making the decision.

The two groups battle, and usually, those who have made up their minds ahead of time win. This group tends to comprise the more senior managers, the more dominant characters, and those used to getting their way.

In my corporate life, I experienced this many times. They were painful affairs.

I tended to be in the group that felt the need to discuss the issues more, as it always seemed to me that we never really explored issues deeply enough and far too often made poor decisions.

I never had a problem with a decision being taken. Decisions have to be made. And I never had a problem with a senior manager making the decision – whatever the outcome.

All I ever wanted was to be heard before that decision was made, and that so often did not happen.

So I would leave the meeting reluctantly, accepting the decision and feeling no ownership like others in the room.

It need not be like this. There is a simple solution. Split the meeting into two parts.

A high level HR manager at a Dutch bank took this approach during two difficult meetings -one with a diverse group of stakeholders and the other with many high level managers from Dutch banks and banking regulators.

In both cases, attendees lauded his results saying they had never been to a meeting so productive in making decisions.

“It was unbelievable how quickly we started to trust and connect, and could really talk with each other”, one attendee told him.

The first part is a dialogue: exploring the issues with no predetermined outcome rather than understanding the problems better.

This can be run as a whole group discussion, but it is better to run it to the Knowledge Café format – taking care to avoid groupthink and group polarization.

The second part can be more of a debate — making the decision. This can be as passionate and as heated as any meeting where a tough decision must be taken, but in-depth exploration has already been taken.

You go into the first part, saying:

We are going to take some time to explore and discuss the issues — to gain a better understanding of the situation. We are not going to make a decision, and it is important that everyone’s voice is heard.

You then go into the second part by saying:

We have spent time exploring the issues, you have all had your opportunity to contribute to the discussion, but at the end of the day, we need to make a decision. Time for dialogue is over — we must now make a decision.

The gap between the two meetings could be a tea break, a morning and afternoon session, or, better still, several days where people can have side conversations and further explore some of the issues. It may even make sense to have two or more Café sessions if the decision warrants the time taken.

Try it. It is such a simple thing to do. Split meetings into two parts:

1) To better understand the issue

• Dialogue – Café style
• Divergent
• About understanding the issues

2)  To make a decision

• Debate
• Convergent
• About making a decision

One of the prime applications of the Knowledge Café is to make sense of an issue, situation, or opportunity, and it is thus an excellent precursor to any decision-making.

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