Letter: The cost of indecision

This is refers to the article “How to avoid decisions” by Shyamal Majumadar (April 1). The art of avoiding decisions can be summed up in the “4D mantra” — dump, delay, delegate and the last resort do. There are two reasons for the indecisiveness of many managers. One is that an act of omission is considered less serious and pardonable.

The second reason is that the real cost of taking a decision is obvious to everybody. For example, employers often delay investing in training their employees, because its cost is easily quantifiable. However, they forget that indecision in many cases can prove to be costlier in the long run. The cost of not training employees is not readily reckonable. However, it is sure that an organisation will pay a price for having under-trained employees in the future.

P S Venkataraman, Hyderabad