A deal goes quiet. A new hire asks what to do next. A buyer wants a discount by Friday. And you have to decide right now, with half the facts on the table.

You want deals that close and a team that moves without waiting for you. That only works if your decisions are fast and mostly right. The fix fits on a napkin: three numbers, thirty seconds, written next to every decision.

Most founders were trained for a slower world. Map the situation, model the scenarios, wait for the data, then decide. In a market that moves this fast, waiting for the data means the decision gets made for you.

I talked this through with Cyndi Wentland on the Intentional Leaders Podcast (May 2025). Cyndi works with leaders who lean toward caution, and she asked how to move faster without moving recklessly. Listen to the full conversation: Master Resilience in Times of Uncertainty, on the Intentional Leaders Podcast

Speed alone is the dangerous part

Peter Drucker drew it as a simple grid: right thing or wrong thing, done efficiently or not. "The worst thing to do is the wrong thing efficiently."

That's why I told Cyndi that "speed plus direction is velocity." A sales team running fast in the wrong direction does more damage than a slow one. 🐬 You don't want a faster team. You want velocity: speed with the right direction.

So the direction stays rough and long (a three year picture of where the company goes) and the action stays short (the next seven days). Nothing in between. No milestone plan that's outdated by March.

Write down the odds, not just the decision

Drucker (my mentor's mentor) taught us to write down every decision. I still do. Back then it was one entry a month. Today it's about 20 an hour. Smaller decisions, far more of them.

Next to each one I write three numbers:

• POW, probability of winning. Say 55%.
• POL, probability of losing. The opposite, 45%.
• POR, probability of ruin. "Ruin means it's irreversible and it would create serious damage for the organization." If that number is even 10%, you don't take the decision.

Picture a buyer asking for 20% off to sign this week. POW: the deal closes. POL: you train every future buyer to wait for the discount. POR: close to zero, unless this client becomes your price anchor for the whole market. Thirty seconds, and you're deciding instead of reacting.

"You need to become very good at taking decisions very quickly under uncertainty with a lack of data." And the target isn't perfection. "I think the goal should be 80% right."

🐯 Two things make you faster. Volume, because after the ninth time you see the same pattern you recognize it in seconds. Your team notices. "And because you are faster, you are the leader." And a reset: the last decision was wrong, the next meeting starts in seven seconds, and you walk in without carrying the baggage. Journaling builds that space inside you.

Judge the process, not the outcome

Chew on this one. It changes how you review a lost deal. "The outcome actually doesn't tell you if it was the right decision. The process tells you if it was the right decision."

You can do everything right and still lose the deal. You can skip every step and win one by luck. If you only look at the result, you learn the wrong lesson both times.

So review the steps. Did you ask what doing nothing costs the buyer before you named a price? Did you get a starting date before the proposal went out? 🌴 That's where control of the sales conversation lives: in the order of the steps, not in the luck of the outcome.

Friday: gold, silver and bronze medal mistakes

Every Monday each person on the team names the most important thing to do this week. Every Friday they report the wins first, then three mistakes. Gold medal, silver medal, bronze medal.

The example I gave Cyndi: "I forgot to call back that very important person and I realized it when it was too late." The deal was lost.

The lesson: "next time if I can't call them back, I will hand it over to somebody who can call them back quicker because velocity matters."

Naming mistakes out loud, every week, is how you build psychological safety and keep the room from going stale. Without it, everything gets muted. Nobody tries a new opener, nobody admits the deal is stuck, and you find out at the end of the quarter.

🐬 Each person also owns one simple number in their own swim lane. If that number doesn't move three weeks in a row, you ask whether it's really the most important thing, and whether you're doing it the right way.

Under pressure, you fall back on your process

"We fall down to the levels of our current processes." Not to the level of your goals.

I told Cyndi about a week where I had to reach out to more people and didn't feel like it. That small voice: I don't want to bother anybody. So I opened my prospecting system. Five steps. Step one, go to their LinkedIn profile. Step two, send the message. Check. Click. Sent.

"It makes it small. So, it's not overwhelming anymore." 🐯 Small beats overwhelming, every time. A founder who sounds needy on a call usually has no process behind the call. A founder with a process sounds calm, because the next step is already decided.

Make the decision safe for the buyer too

Your buyer is doing the same math you are. What if this is the wrong decision? Do I lose time, money, reputation? So the most important question for your sales process is the one we landed on near the end of the show: "how can we make it safe and easy for people to buy?"

When the buyer has said what doing nothing costs them, when the scope is written in their words, when the starting date is theirs, the decision feels safe. You led them there.

Your next 7 days

1. Monday: name the one most important sales move this week. One per person.
2. Every big decision: write POW, POL, POR next to it. Thirty seconds.
3. Every lost deal: review the steps, not the result.
4. Friday: wins first, then your gold, silver and bronze medal mistakes.
5. When you stall: open the process, do step one.

🌴 That's Sprintlife. Fast decisions, in the right direction, made in control. And evenings where the last call of the day stays at the office.

Listen to the full conversation with Cyndi: Intentional Leaders Podcast with Simon Severino

Grab the free tools and join the Sprint Club: https://www.strategysprints.com

Ready to accelerate now? Book a Discovery Call: https://calendly.com/strategysprint/discovery-call

Happy hunting.
Simon & The Sprinters 🐬⚡️🐆