What Does Intuition Mean In Business Decision Making?

Intuition has an everyday role in our lives. It does in business too. What does intuition mean in business though?

What Does Intuition Mean?

First, intuition is the acquiring of knowledge and the making of decisions through emotions. It’s a feeling of knowing something. That includes the feeling of knowing a good decision.

When people ask me, “How do I know when my intuition is at work?” I reply, “Whenever a guess takes place, it’s there.” That’s because one can never know all there is about something. That means filling in the gaps. Intuition does that.

It’s easy to discount emotions. Many mistake them for feelings. They think they only say something about our state. Yet, they tell us things. That’s why they’re called e-motion, from the Latin, to bring forth motion. In short, they coach us on what to do, or not to do.

What intuition means in business is tackling the aspects of a decision that lie outside of what we know, what we can prove, and what we can quantify.

What Does Intuition Mean In Business?

In business, intuition plays a key role in decision making. Yes, it’s easy to dis emotions in business. Yet, no decision is a good one without intuition. Otherwise, one makes decisions only on known, proven and quantified info.

That leaves out info that might fall within one’s awareness. It leaves out too any account for unknowns, known and not. In short, one’s not playing with a full deck if he roots in only certainties.

Thus, no decision is purely rational. No decision is purely intuitive either. The known, proven and quantified will always exist. Likewise, aspects of decisions that live in the realms of the unknown and awareness will too. For example, in warfare, the idea of holding forces in reserves addresses aspects that live here.

What does intuition mean in business decision making then? It means filling in the gaps, just as it does in everyday life.