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Are you waiting for information you can’t possibly obtain? I don't mean that you're looking in the wrong place. I’m talking about information you’re waiting for that literally does not yet exist.
That may sound strange, but I see it regularly in my executive coaching work with leaders. The decision might involve any number of challenging scenarios: a strategic shift, a career move, a difficult conversation, an investment in a new opportunity. The details vary, but the pattern is remarkably consistent: a leader wants more information, clearer insight, and greater confidence that the decision will work out as they intend. On the surface, that sounds sensible. And most of us would prefer thoughtful leaders to impulsive ones.
The challenge, however, is one of diminishing returns: some decisions eventually reach a point where additional thinking stops producing additional clarity. The facts have been gathered, the options have been explored, trusted people have offered their perspectives, and the risks are reasonably well understood. But there it sits, parked, waiting for... what?
In my executive coaching work with leaders, I've noticed that people rarely get stuck because they haven't thought enough. By the time they're talking to me, they've usually considered their situation from every conceivable angle. They've researched, talked it through with trusted colleagues, slept on it, revisited it, and probably had the conversation with themselves a dozen times.
But something often goes unnoticed: the quest for information that belongs to a future chapter of the story. They assume that if they think a little deeper, analyze a little harder, or wait a little longer, the missing piece will eventually appear. Sometimes it does, and sometimes the information they're looking for can only emerge after action begins.
I was reminded of this recently while speaking with a client who was considering a significant career move. She had done her homework thoroughly. She understood the opportunity, the risks, and the trade-offs involved. She had spoken with people she respected and spent considerable time reflecting on the decision. At one point, she made a joke about it and said she was waiting for the universe to send her a registered letter confirming she was making the right choice. The image made us both smile because it captured the situation, and her wiring, perfectly. (Sometimes, clients come up with the perfect metaphor on their own.)
She wasn't avoiding the decision or being careless. She had simply reached the point where further analysis was unlikely to produce anything meaningfully new. The information she wanted was on the other side of the decision, the result of experiencing it firsthand.
Many leadership decisions eventually arrive at this point. More analysis feels productive because analysis has served us well throughout our careers. Gathering information is often the right response to uncertainty. The difficulty comes when we continue gathering long after we've exhausted what the current chapter can teach us.
Ronald Heifetz's work on Adaptive Leadership offers a useful distinction here. Technical problems can often be solved through expertise and existing knowledge. Adaptive challenges are different. They require learning, experimentation, and movement into territory where important answers emerge only after action has begun.
Senior leaders encounter these challenges constantly. Markets change. Technologies reshape industries. Customer expectations evolve. Business models that once seemed stable begin to shift. In situations like these, leaders often keep searching for information that nobody has access to yet. Not the board. Not the consultants. Not the person with twenty years of industry experience.
Reality is frustrating that way. It tends to hold onto certain information until somebody actually does something. Leaders who would never describe themselves as risk-averse can find themselves waiting for reassurance that cannot be obtained ahead of time. The decision remains under review, another meeting gets scheduled, another discussion takes place, and the future remains politely on hold.
Meanwhile, reality keeps moving. Competitors make decisions, employees draw conclusions, and opportunities evolve. More importantly, new information appears when somebody tests an idea, enters a market, has a conversation, launches a project, accepts a role, or declines one. Action reveals things that analysis cannot.
That's why people who move sometimes appear to have better information than everyone else. In many cases, they created it. I’m not advising recklessness or abandoning thoughtful analysis. Good leaders should examine assumptions, consider consequences, and seek wise counsel. The challenge is recognising when analysis has delivered everything it can reasonably provide. Many important leadership decisions don't begin with certainty. They begin with a willingness to learn.
My client eventually made her move. What struck me afterwards wasn't whether the decision worked out. It was how little new information appeared between the moment she felt stuck and the moment she finally acted. The certainty she had been waiting for never arrived. What arrived was the next chapter of information. Once she stepped into the experience, she began learning things that had been impossible to know beforehand. Those insights had never been available to her while she was standing still.
That realization has stayed with me because it applies to far more than career decisions. Some of the information we want most is unavailable until we begin moving toward it.
YOUR COACHING CHALLENGE
Think about a decision you've been carrying for a while.
Write down the information you believe you still need before acting. Then write down what information could only become available after you take action.
As you compare the two lists, notice whether you've been waiting for information that genuinely exists or information that belongs to a future chapter of the story.
If certainty never arrives, what decision would you make based on what you already know?
Sit with that question for a few minutes and notice what emerges.
Reach out for a free exploratory Executive Coaching conversation at www.leslierohonczy.com.