In business, there are those decisions you make on a routine basis and those you make infrequently. For example, in a restaurant business, the decision of knowing what to add to the menu, is one that is frequently made. Frequent decisions are the easiest to make because of the amount of data available to support those decisions. For example, a restaurant owner who has tried different menus knows what items are popular with customers and so are more armed with developing menus that sell. However, a restaurant that does not collect data on hot items on its menu, is less able to optimize the menu for increased sales. Every business should have a special database that tracks repetitive decisions pertinent to the business. Do not depend on intuition as the human mind is not always rational. Let the numbers speak for themselves.

On the other hand, infrequent decisions only happen once in a while and are harder to make. For example, an equipment breakdown in a restaurant: Deciding whether to fix or replace the equipment is one that should take some thought. In circumstances like this, the decision maker will have to dig up information relevant to the problem. There is so much data available to the average business owner and knowing what is pertinent takes training. When making infrequent decisions, only items that affect the future are important. Information about things that happened in the past but have no bearing to the future should be discarded. For example, the fact that the business owner spent $20,000 to buy the equipment 5 years ago is irrelevant. Being too tied to the past causes one to make foolish decisions. What is important in this case is the cost of repairing the old equipment compared to the cost of buying a new equipment. Also, the useful life of both the old equipment and the new equipment should be compared against the cost to see where the most money can be saved in the present/ future. Holding on to the money spent in the past, will cost you more money in the present/ future.

In summary, business owners should collect relevant data pertaining to their business in a database. This makes it easier for optimizing future decisions. Infrequent decisions should follow a decision making process or the business owner risks making a foolish choice. Following your emotions is very risky in business!

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