Facilitating Safe Group Decision-Making

As a field leader, you have to be able to accurately assess risks, mitigate hazards, and carry out safe actions. You also have to facilitate your group making a safe decision together. This can be challenging and requires both competency in risk analysis (see above) as well as solid communication and leadership skills. With this in mind, consider the following four ways that groups make decisions:

• Directive: The leader decides and informs the group.
• Consultative: The leader decides after consultation with the group. This can happen two different ways: the leader might first solicit input from the group and then decide or the leader might tentatively decide and get input and reaction from the group before making the final decision.
• Group decides: All group members (including the leader) contribute equally to the decision-making process. This could happen through a vote or through consensus.
• Delegation: Leader delegates the decision-making to the group after defining the appropriate boundaries and conditions. Before delegating, the leader must feel comfortable with any decision made.

Many experienced leaders employ all of these decision-making styles depending on the situation and the expertise of their groups. By doing so, leaders help maintain a safe learning environment while at the same time helping groups take ownership and responsibility for their collective experience.