Ego and decision-making never belong together

Ego and decision-making never belong together. Once you start, your vision becomes clouded with personal issues, the exact opposite of what stakeholders expect from you.

When we talk about ego in leadership, we tend to picture the table-thumping, my-way-or-the-highway type who demands credit for victories and passes the blame for losses. That can happen, but ego is far more insidious for most of us. 

It’s often a silent operator, surfacing at points that you don’t expect it or feel too much emotion to acknowledge it. It might not make you shout, but it will make you stop listening, and when that happens, your decision-making suffers.

Therefore, to lead effectively, we have to understand how the ego operates—and how to keep it on a leash.

The 2020s have become a decade that praises toughness in business and politics. In those environments, ego can be encouraged, sometimes openly, because it feeds into the strong-leader mentality. 

Unfortunately, ego isn’t a long-term solution in business. The net result is always mediocrity. The only metric is how long the company has to wait before that result becomes obvious. 

Let’s talk practicalities. Here are the immediate risks of letting ego have a say in your decision-making:

• • The echo chamber effect: We all know the dangers of echo chambers developing in boardrooms, but this risk takes that a step further, because it develops inside your mind. Ego closes your brain to challenges, ensuring that even if people give you valid points in real-time, your natural response is only to reinforce your own arguments. 
  • Slow adaptation: A leader governed by their ego will be far slower to admit mistakes or embrace something new and valuable. If you find yourself championing a key innovation, only to frustrate colleagues who tried and failed to win your approval on it last year, you might have fallen into this trap.
  • Talent repulsion: Ego-driven leadership often alienates colleagues. In a boardroom setting, this is very serious. Unchecked, it may easily result in someone walking away over disagreements that never needed to happen.

1. The paradox of experience: Unfortunately, there can often be a correlation between expertise and ego. Early in our careers, we are open sponges, acutely aware of what we don’t know. We ask questions; we verify data. However, as we climb the ladder, a shift occurs. We start to rely heavily on pattern recognition. We think, “I’ve seen this before, I know how this plays out.” This is why ego matters so much in a boardroom setting: boards naturally demand extensive career-fuelled expertise. Ego is frequently a symptom that potential directors have to deal with.
2. We always think of ego as loud. Only extreme cases get this far. In others, ego will simply fuel an unwillingness to debate, compromise or embrace others’ viewpoints. This can be just as damaging in the boardroom.

You cannot remove your ego entirely because it’s just part of being human. That said, you can take steps to keep it in check, especially during key decision-making periods that really matter.

Reinforce dissent: Establish yourself as a person who is happy to head a ‘Devil’s Advocate” and live by that principle. Constantly remind colleagues that you welcome feedback and will embrace it. 

Treat intuition and data separately: Intuition is good, but so is data. If the data speaks against your intuition, that’s not a bad thing. The important thing is that you treat both as separate yet critical factors and assign each one a logical degree of importance for each decision.  

Don’t be afraid of “I don’t know”. Unfortunately, corporate culture is as bad as ego when it comes to penalising the phrase “I don’t know.” However, it’s one of the most applicable phrases in business. In the heat of a decision-making moment, no one can be expected to know everything. “I don’t know, let’s find out” is your ego-less response that will build trust. 

Do a ‘pre-mortem‘. Before locking in a decision, run a pre-mortem. Imagine yourself presenting the project to outsiders and try to pinpoint their criticism. This will prepare you for feedback ahead of time. For many people, this can make a world of difference. Ego is sometimes brought out by the shock factor of hearing unexpected negative feedback. If you anticipate what’s coming, you can keep the ego at bay. 

Leadership is not about being the smartest person in the room; it is about creating an environment where the best idea wins, regardless of who it came from.

Ego is the enemy of that environment. It grows alongside your experience, whispering that you know it all, and it hides behind a mask of fake certainty. By acknowledging these traps and building systems that value data over status, you protect your organisation—and yourself—from the blind spots that lead to bad decisions.