In this episode, Sam Shriver, Chief Sales and Marketing Officer at The Center for Leadership Studies, talks with George Morrow about executive decision-making.
Episode Transcript
Introduction
Welcome to The Center for Leadership Studies podcast, an exploration of contemporary leadership issues with experts from a variety of fields and leadership backgrounds. In this episode, Sam Shriver, Chief Sales and Marketing Officer at The Center for Leadership Studies, talks with George Morrow about executive decision-making.
Sam Shriver
Let’s talk a little bit about executive decision-making. Is there a formula or a process that executives should follow to make high-quality decisions?
George Morrow
I think ideally, a person at that level rarely makes decisions other than what’s for lunch for themselves because I think their main job is tapping the collective intelligence. So I think by asking the right questions, more or less a Socratic way, you can usually get a group to come up with the right answers. And I think the more that the people you lead come up with the right answer or the right decision, the more they own it. Now, having said that the worst thing you can do is let a potential decision just kind of tumble around with no ownership. I think at some point, you got to pull up and take the shot. And so occasionally, you do have to move in and say, okay, I’ve heard everything. I’m going to make the call at this point.
But that’s generally only because the very smart people that you lead had some fundamental disagreements, and they weren’t going to be resolved by more discussion. One of the great terms I heard that influenced me was from a CEO of a very large company, and he said one of the biggest learnings he had in his career was listening to conclude. When he said that, I was thinking, what does he mean by that?
What he means by that is as a leader, you have to keep an open mind. If you are discussing a subject and you automatically jump to your conclusions on what you think the decision ought to be, or what you think the situation analysis points to, you’re not going to help the team make a better decision. In fact, you’re probably going to impose your will on those people.
So listening to conclude means listening to all of the facts, asking questions to make sure you get the full slate of issues or facts on the table, and only then trying to reach a conclusion. Probably the worst times I got burnt in my career was when a person or a group of people came into my office, hair on fire, and gave me a very emotional, one-sided story to which I reacted, assuming that they told me the whole story, went to confront another person, and then found out the other side of the story. And it’s embarrassing, it’s unprofessional, and it’s not particularly endearing or an endearing way to influence your boss.
And so your job is to understand that people will come in emotionally, they will come in with one side of the story, and your job is to artfully flesh out the other side of the story so you can get a full sense of what really went on before you take any decisive action.
Conclusion
As an executive vice president at Amgen, the world’s largest independent biotech company, George Morrow led global commercial operations the division responsible for the commercial activities of approximately 3800 staff in over 50 countries. He also oversaw global government affairs, which manages Amgen’s policy and strategies with various government agencies. Before joining Amgen, George had 20 years of commercial pharmaceutical experience, with 10 years at Merck and 10 at Glaxo.
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