Operating in Uncertainty
Notes on making decisions when information is incomplete and conditions change faster than the plan.
Operating environments rarely offer the information a decision deserves. Waiting for it is itself a decision, usually a worse one, because the cost of delay compounds quietly while the cost of a wrong call is visible immediately.
Separate reversible from irreversible
Most operational decisions can be undone within a quarter. Those deserve speed and a short feedback loop. A much smaller set — an acquisition, a long-term supply commitment, a change in ownership structure — deserves slow, deliberate analysis and outside pressure-testing.
Track assumptions, not just outcomes
When a decision is made under uncertainty, the useful artefact is the list of assumptions behind it. Outcomes tell you whether you were lucky. Assumptions tell you whether the reasoning still holds when conditions move.
- Write the two or three assumptions the decision depends on.
- Define what would have to be observed for them to be wrong.
- Revisit them on a fixed date rather than when something breaks.