Tough v. Unpleasant

Many people confuse a Tough decision with an Unpleasant action. Tough decisions arise when you don’t know which option to choose because the options appear to be equal. You could be looking at several good options, like choosing between court-side seats or a luxury box at the game, or between bad options such as going through the rock or the hard place. Tough decisions related to our industry could be choosing an event schedule, who to hire among several great applicants, which music producer or choreographer to choose, when to move into a larger building, or which good employee to get rid of because employment is down.

There’s only one Unpleasant action I want to focus on and that’s firing an employee that needs to go. Typically by the time you are consciously thinking about firing someone the decision has already been made clear. The problem is it requires an Unpleasant action so you hide behind saying it’s a Tough decision. It’s not! As a business owner you have to be able to determine the difference between Tough decisions and Unpleasant actions and you have to be able to deal with both. Making Tough decisions and taking Unpleasant actions is an essential part of having a chance at being successful.