ASSUMPTION

You have probably heard the phrase “When you ASSUME you make an …. out of U and ME.” 

If you ASSUME about another person their feelings, their intentions, their motivations…if you ASSUME something subjective based on your objective observations of their behaviors and actions…you are likely to be wrong.  You can make positive assumptions and mistakenly count on something that is not there. You can also assume the worst which is not fair to the other person and makes you appear negative.  Our imaginations (leading to our ASSUMPTIONS) can often be more negative than the realities.

But ASSUMPTIONS are necessary for decision-making.  We can’t know everything so we must make ASSUMPTIONS to fill in the framework or background within which we make our decisions.   To think critically expose your ASSUMPTIONS and question whether they are meritorious (reasonably sound for supporting decision-making) or unsupported (and thus providing a high risk of bias).

This is so important for sound decision-making the EBSCO Way states “We document our decision making, including key ASSUMPTIONS. This makes it easy to review our decisions, change ASSUMPTIONS based on new information, and then efficiently adjust as needed.”

Some of us were recently discussing logistics challenges.  We discovered we were overburdening ourselves because we had an ASSUMPTION limiting who can do selected tasks.  As soon as we identified and questioned this ASSUMPTION we were able to adjust our thinking to better use the talents across our team to more efficiently approach these challenges.

You may find this helpful for your own planning if you are trying to achieve ALIGNMENT. If you can confirm the meritorious ASSUMPTIONS and drop the unsupported ASSUMPTIONS, you may find it is a lot easier to achieve ALIGNMENT. 

Figure out your ASSUMPTIONS and check them. Don’t be a donkey.