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Own Your Impact equips experts and leaders to transform their expertise into meaningful influence. Host Macy Robison reveals how successful thought leaders use deliberate systems—not luck or volume—to amplify their authentic voice and create lasting impact. Through practical frameworks and strategic guidance, you'll discover how to build a self-reinforcing ecosystem of Core Resonance, structured Content, a Central Platform, strategic Connections, and intentional Commercialization. Whether you're just starting to share your expertise or scaling an existing platform, this podcast delivers the roadmap to turn your ideas into purpose-driven influence that resonates far beyond what you might imagine possible.
Strategic Decision-Making for Thought Leaders
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[00:00:00] Welcome back to the podcast. I'm Macy Robison, and I'm here every week to help you transform your expertise into a platform of purpose and influence. Last week we talked about embodiment as the catalyst that transforms your core resonance from theory into magnetic authority. It's that last one of the four E's that by walking your talk by.
[00:00:23] Showing up as how you're authentically wired. You're able to be more magnetic, able to more easily move people, , with the things that you teach, with the way that you show up. Today, I wanna address another pattern that I'm seeing in my client conversations, and that is the struggle with strategic decision making.
[00:00:42] As we get started talking about this, I need to give a tip of the hat to my friend Wes. He and I were talking about this concept about a year ago, he shared a story about one of his clients, and this client basically said one of the hardest things about running a business is that you are among [00:01:00] many other things.
[00:01:00] The chief decision maker, the chief deciding officer, is actually, I believe what he said, the chief deciding officer. And man, when Wes said that, that hit me like a ton of bricks. All of the things that have been hard for me in my business. , More often than not, they come down to decisions that I have to make.
[00:01:17] Making decisions can really be exhausting, we start businesses of our own because we want freedom to run our own thing, to be our own boss, to build something meaningful, to have control over the impact we can have and the income we can make .
[00:01:30] But we don't often talk about. The price of that freedom, and that is the weight of constant decision making. We're usually not trained for this when we go to school. We are given assignments, we are told what to do when we hold corporate jobs. We do have some autonomy and some authority, but there is usually someone above us that is the chief decision maker.
[00:01:52] So it's a paradox really. I see it often and I. It comes down [00:02:00] to that push and pull of, I really want options, but options can be exhausting to face and make decisions through. We want to keep our options open 'cause that feels safe, but that ultimately means we're not taking risks to grow our business. .
[00:02:14] And it seems like more possibilities should mean more potential, right? But that's not true. Keeping your options open, not making decisions, can be one of the most draining things that you do as a business owner. It can take you down the path of least resistance. And while that might feel safe in the moment, it can eventually kill momentum and drain your energy faster than anything else.
[00:02:34] So we're gonna talk a little bit today about why this happens, and more importantly, give you some tools to build some of those decision making muscles that can transform your thought leadership journey and business. So again, I wanna acknowledge strategic decision making is hard, and I think there are three reasons for this.
[00:02:51] First of all, we're afraid of closing doors. When we decide, it actually means to cut off. Every choice you make means saying no to other possibilities. [00:03:00] When we decide to build a course, we are gonna need to say no to one-on-one coaching for a time while we build that course. It feels risky because what if you're wrong? If we take an opportunity to speak at a conference, what if another opportunity comes up later? We're just afraid of closing those doors, but holding everything open takes a lot of energy.
[00:03:20] The second reason I think that this is hard is we really don't have decision making frameworks or filters built in to running this type of business. We know how to research options. We know how to create pro and cons list, but we don't have systematic approaches. For making choices in our businesses that align with who we are and where we're going, that is sometimes more gut-based than data-driven, and it can be really hard to come up with a framework that is going to be reliable.
[00:03:49] Third reason is we're often making these decisions in isolation. When you're the chief deciding officer, you are making these decisions more often than not, in this type of business on your own. [00:04:00] And so one of the ways through is to find someone who can come alongside you and mirror back what you're seeing.
[00:04:06] They can be a trusted diagnostician who can help you see your blind spots, validate your thinking, but that's hard to find. It can sometimes require an investment that you may not be able to make, and so you. End up in this cycle of making these decisions all on your own and second guessing yourself, and then you get back to being afraid to closing off options and doors.
[00:04:25] So all of these things work together to create decision paralysis. , If you don't have the framework, if you're worried about limiting your options, if you're trying to figure all of this out by yourself, that decision fatigue becomes real and it becomes hard to figure out how to. Map a strategy, how to come up with a way to decide.
[00:04:44] Let's talk for a second about what I think strategy really is. We sometimes use strategy as a synonym for planning, and it is that to some extent. But I really think strategy is about answering questions, making decisions, making decisions that help us win, making [00:05:00] decisions that help. Others win. It's not about creating the perfect plan that accounts for every possibility that might come up.
[00:05:06] I think it's about making a series of aligned choices that move you in a steady, clear direction. I've worked with a lot of people who have been successful in this area, and the ones that are the most successful, the ones that you know about. Don't make perfect decisions, but they do make aligned decisions and they make them quickly, and then they adjust.
[00:05:25] As they learn, they adjust as they go. They know that they can't make adjustments unless they're moving. If they're just sitting waiting for something to happen, waiting for a light bulb to come on, waiting to make a decision, it's really hard to keep momentum. We just need to keep walking through doors. One of the decision filters I sometimes use when it comes , to. Figuring out whether I should keep moving or not is, , the two-way door, , decision. I heard Adam Grant talk about this. With the founder, Sam Altman, the founder of Chat, GPT, you know, AI's moving quickly. They have to make fast decisions.
[00:05:58] They have to be as confident as they [00:06:00] can, and one of the things that they do is if this is a two-way door, meaning if we can walk through this door and if we made the wrong decision, we can walk right back without much loss, except for a little bit of time. We're not gonna second guess it. We're just gonna move through the door because we can get back, we can rebuild, we can get back to where we were.
[00:06:17] If it's the type of decision that. Is a one-way door, meaning we're not coming back this way ever again. If we go this way, we need to slow down and get some more data, get some more time, make a more measured decision. That's one thing you can do, but that's an aligned decision that's aligned with how they wanna show up and, and who they are in the business they're trying to build.
[00:06:38] And you can do the same thing. What I find with thought leadership is the most aligned decisions are grounded in our core resonance, the four E's that we've been talking about. When you honor how you're wired, when you leverage your lived wisdom, when you are able to match your natural expression, style, your archetype, and you can support and authentically embody those things long term, those are [00:07:00] the right decisions to make when they feel like you and then you're not guessing.
[00:07:04] You're choosing based on who you are and how you naturally create value. And that is where we want to be. So last week we talked about embodiment, and I wanna remind you, I did talk a little bit through this process that I will use with clients walking them through the four E's to help them when they feel stuck.
[00:07:20] It works really well with decision making and giving you some clarity that's based in grounded in who you are. This isn't the only way to make decisions. But it can be really powerful when you've reached the edge of your map, when you've hit the ceiling of progress and you're not sure which direction to move or where to expand from here, I ask clients, and I do this myself to walk through the four E's.
[00:07:44] So is this decision I'm about to make? Let's look at essence first. That's step one. Does this align with how I'm naturally wired? When I look at my working genius, when I look at. My why, what drives me when I look at maybe some of the other assessments that can account for [00:08:00] how I am wired, how I am naturally gifted, something like strength finders, things like that.
[00:08:06] Does it work with those results? Is it going to tap into my natural energy? That essence is who you are. I said to someone today, , if you were coming to me for voice lessons, the first thing I would do is check your range. I wanna know how you're. You're built. Are you a soprano? Are you an alto?
[00:08:22] Are you a tenor? Are you a bass? I don't wanna give you songs to sing that are outside your natural capacity. And it's the same with essence. So that's step one. Step two is the second E experience.
[00:08:34] Is this coming from your lived wisdom or is it just a theory you're testing? Does it connect to the transformation you've actually walked through? Or are you outside of your depth here? , Can you speak to this with some earned authority and some authentic empathy? Because if you wanna show up as the guide and help the hero win the day, you need to have walked through some of these things.
[00:08:54] 'cause that natural credibility is going to give you confidence. As you are moving down [00:09:00] this decision making path, the third E expression, that's the third step in this decision filter. How do I naturally communicate and create transformation? Does the thing I want to do, does the decision I want to make align with my natural thought leadership archetype?
[00:09:14] Does the platform I want to build, , or the format I want to create content in energize me or drain me. Will this reach people who respond to my authentic frequency? And then the last step embodiment. Can I walk my own talk with this decision? Can I apply my own wisdom to this choice? Does my outer expression match how I feel on the inside?
[00:09:34] And can I maintain this without burning out if a decision you're about to make passes all four filters, I say move forward. That feels like a two-way door for me. When it doesn't, you can slow down, you can adjust, you can choose differently. Now, here's a bonus. If in your ip, your content, you have a framework that you teach to your clients that you have as part of your coaching, as part of your books most thought leaders do.
[00:09:59] [00:10:00] There's something additionally powerful you can use when it comes to making decisions. Use your own framework as an additional decision making filter. It's one of the best things you can do to superpower your decision making even further. I recently worked with a client where we built this in to her decision making as she's trying to expand her business.
[00:10:18] We went through the four E's and then we looked at her own framework. She has a framework that she teaches. Every decision should be a triple win for stakeholders, and we created a team decision map together that relies on her four E's, how things are wired, this framework that she uses in her client work and in her coaching and in her train the trainer program.
[00:10:40] And that way, not only she can make more aligned decisions when opportunities come up, but we set up this document so her team members can make aligned decisions instead of waiting for her approval on everything and. I'm really excited to see how that works out for her because she's empowering with these two [00:11:00] filters together, not only herself, but her team members to act in her stead and then only bring things to her that really do require her stamp of approval.
[00:11:09] And this is the power of using your own frameworks when you have them. It's not just teaching and helping your clients, but they can guide your own strategic choices and empower your team to operate more independently. And when you do that. It strengthens that fourth E of embodiment because you're walking your talk.
[00:11:26] Now, there's a cost to indecision. Indecision is not neutral. Every day you don't decide is a day. You're not building momentum in a direction. Every week you spend weighing options is a week you're not implementing and learning from real feedback, from testing things, from trying things. I have watched brilliant experts spend months researching the perfect platform strategy, the ideal content approach, the optimal business model.
[00:11:50] And in the meantime, their less thorough competitors are out there testing, trying, learning, and building relationships with real people. You've got to get out there and start [00:12:00] working with people. And sometimes that requires making decisions a little bit more quickly than you might feel comfortable with.
[00:12:06] You can do small tests, you can do what Jim Collins says, and, , fire bullets. Before we fire cannonballs, we test our aim. We see what's working. 'cause the truth is most strategic decisions aren't permanent. They're directional. You can always adjust as you learn more about what works and what doesn't work.
[00:12:22] But you can't adjust anything if you never start. Instead of making decisions, doing research that makes us feel good, we feel like we're accomplishing something or we go watch, , a YouTube video that's gonna teach us something new.
[00:12:34] Or we take a course, or we listen to a podcast. And I'm glad you're listening to my podcast. That's amazing. But what I hope you do is. Take some momentum from this podcast and go start making some decisions so you can get in movement. So it's a skill. Decision making is a skill, , that gets stronger with practice.
[00:12:53] Here's how to build some of those muscles so that you can get moving. Set decision deadlines. When you're facing [00:13:00] a choice, give yourself a specific deadline for making that decision. It creates urgency and it prevents endless analysis. We've gotta ship it like Seth Godin always says. The second thing I want you to think about is using the four E's to filter.
[00:13:13] The more you use this framework, this core resonance framework, the faster and more intuitive it becomes. And when you start with smaller decisions, you can build some confidence to work your way up to bigger ones. The third thing I would suggest is find someone who can be a trusted diagnostician for you.
[00:13:27] This could be a coach. You're already working with a mentor. People in a mastermind group, you could find a strategic partner. This is one of my favorite roles to play with my clients, is to come alongside them and help them co-create what it is they're building. To reflect back to them what I'm seeing, to read the label while they're inside the jar and help them understand what it is they're building.
[00:13:47] You do need someone who can mirror back what they're seeing and help you see blind spots help remind you of who you are so that you can stay in momentum. And then the last thing that is a really important practice when it comes to making decisions [00:14:00] is track your outcomes. We can't always control the lag measures, but we can look at the decisions that got us to the results, the lag measures, the lead measures, what were the things we could control?
[00:14:11] What were the things we could do that have an effect on the results we want to see? And when you keep a record of the decisions you make and how they turn out, it gives you some patterns that you can repeat and build some confidence in your decision making ability over time. So here's your invitation this week.
[00:14:28] Identify one decision you've been avoiding or postponing. It could be the decision to send an email out and let people know that you're starting a consulting business. It could be the decision to go with this email service provider over this one. Run it through the four e strategic filter. It could be, do I start a podcast or not?
[00:14:49] There's so many things it could be, but look at the four E's. Ask yourself the, the questions that I shared in each of those four areas, and if the decision passes, all four filters. Set a deadline, [00:15:00] move forward and let's go. If it doesn't pass the four Es filters, then maybe adjust the option you're trying to decide and make it more aligned with who you are and how you wanna show up or be willing to say no so that you can say yes to something that does align lemme give an example. Early in my business and career as a marketer, I've always worked with thought leaders. I've always worked with authors. I started out by building websites for authors, and because I was just getting started, I would take on other clients who needed websites as they came along, even if they weren't my ideal customer.
[00:15:34] ' cause I needed to generate revenue and I got to a certain point where I was just underwater building websites all the time and I didn't feel like I could let any of my client work go. But I also felt like I was not growing in the way I wanted to grow. I really wanted to, I. Kind of turn the ship and move more toward becoming a strategic partner, providing that level of partnership to my clients instead of being [00:16:00] the one who is the producer and the doer in everything.
[00:16:04] And in order to make that possible, I had to make the decision first. The decision was I am no longer working with any clients who are not part of my ideal customer group. Now, this is, you know, six to eight months in steady work, bringing in revenue. It's pretty scary to make that decision. In order to progress, I had to cut off that, , revenue source of the random chiropractor that shows up in my, , schedule to talk to me about building a website and refer them to someone else in my community and my network.
[00:16:35] And it freed up some time, which was really scary at first. But nature abhors a vacuum. And when you create space for something that you deliberately want, I have never seen this not be true. The right things show up if you can hold. Space for them to show up. Suddenly, I had people who were reaching out who were in my ideal customer avatar.
[00:16:55] They were thought leaders, they were authors. There were people who wanted help with building a business around [00:17:00] their ideas. And then I had to make the decision when I was coming back into consulting. To only stay in this seat as an advisor, as a teacher, as a thought leader myself, with the things I'm teaching, I work with a lot of clients, but it's really all around strategy.
[00:17:18] I don't write emails anymore for them. I partner with other folks to do that so that the work can get done. Many of my clients have teams and early on. I got really nervous and I decided there was one client I could make an exception for, and it just didn't work out very well. Had to make the decision not doing this anymore.
[00:17:37] I'm gonna hold space for the clients that I know I can help with this framework and just trust that it's going to work, and so many of you who are listening have been such a huge support in helping me test these things out. You've been coming to workshops. Signing up to work with me, going through the lab, , referring other people to me.
[00:17:58] And that has been such a huge [00:18:00] boost to that decision I made to say, you know what? I'm gonna hold the line here and I'm gonna do the work that I'm best equipped to do. It's scary to make decisions like that, but it's critical to your growth. So just remember. You have to say no sometimes so that you can say yes to the things that align, and then you have to trust and keep moving forward.
[00:18:20] You are the chief deciding officer of your thought leadership platform, your business, your authority based business that is the price of admission for the freedom that you wanted. But when you develop systematic approaches to decision making, when you have trusted advisors that can help you. When you ground your choices in who you are instead of what everybody else is doing and the tactics that they're trying, that decision making process transforms from overwhelming to empowering.
[00:18:45] It gives you confidence because you had the courage to decide. When experts, when thought leaders master strategic decision making, they build momentum faster. They feel confident in their choices. They create platforms that energize rather than exhaust them, and most importantly, they [00:19:00] stop second guessing themselves and trust their ability to navigate uncertainty.
[00:19:04] There will always, always, always be uncertainty in entrepreneurship. There are so many things that are out of our direct control. We're not trying to eliminate uncertainty. We're trying to build skills to make good decisions in spite of uncertainty. We're trying to control the controllables. So whether you work with me, whether you work with someone else, whether you develop these skills on your own, I think it's important to have someone alongside you.
[00:19:30] You can even build your own imaginary board of directors. I've done that over the years. , Folks who I've learned from read books by tried to figure out how to navigate some of these things as though they were giving me advice when I read their books. That can be really helpful to build that strategic thinking muscle.
[00:19:47] The isolation of decision making can be one of the biggest challenges . So even if you can find a friend that you can trade coaching time with, I've done that with so many folks over the years. It doesn't have to be done alone. [00:20:00] If you're finding you need that strategic mirror, someone who can help you develop these types of frameworks and apply them to your specific thought leadership challenges, I would love to invite you to join.
[00:20:09] One of the cohorts of my resident Thought Leadership Lab one is starting soon in mid-October. I would love to have you join us if this feels like the right next step for you. This is exactly the type of work we do Together, we develop systematic approaches to building a thought leadership based business and make sure we have the scaffolding and the systems in place that can grow your thought leadership, grow your business.
[00:20:34] Have it be aligned with who you really are. If you want more information on how all of this works,
[00:20:39] if this feels like a good fit for you, the best next step you can take is to go ahead and go to macy robinson.com/quiz and take the thought leadership assessment. I've been sending out expanded analysis documents for folks and giving them some information, additional information about their expression and how they show up in their thought leadership archetype, [00:21:00] and you'll have a way to contact me directly if it feels like it's a good fit.
[00:21:03] For you from filling out that quiz, I would love to have you take it. I think it can be helpful on its own, and then you can have a conversation with me about whether working together is the right fit. But whether it is or not, the most important thing is you don't try to navigate these strategic decisions alone.
[00:21:18] Find someone you can talk to. Find someone who can mirror these things back for you. Now, next week we're gonna explore another foundational piece of the resonant thought leadership system. We've talked about it before, your central platform strategy. , The online house, the business you're building to invite people into for transformation.
[00:21:36] Because once you know how to make aligned decisions, you need to understand how to build that digital home base. But for today, the invitation is simple. Choose one strategic decision you've been postponing, run it through the four Es filter and commit to moving forward this week.
[00:21:50] If this episode resonated with you, I would love to have you share it with , another entrepreneur who might be struggling with the weight of constant decision making. I've been so grateful for those of you who've been listening and [00:22:00] sharing the insights that you're gaining on LinkedIn with friends.
[00:22:04] It's been really encouraging and I'm so grateful to you for doing that. , It helps other people feel more confident in the decisions that they're making too. But thank you for listening. Thank you so much for joining me this week on Own Your Impact. I'll see you next week.