Decision frameworks are designed for calm conditions. Most consequential decisions do not happen in calm conditions.
A study tracking real-time decision-making in ICU teams found that structured decision protocols were followed completely in fewer than 30% of high-pressure cases, even when staff had been trained on them and believed they were using them. Stress compresses cognition. People revert to the fastest available heuristic, which is usually the most familiar one — not the most accurate one.
The training problem
Organisations train staff on decision frameworks using low-stakes scenarios, then expect those frameworks to hold under pressure. This is not how procedural memory works. Skills practised in calm conditions do not automatically transfer to high-arousal situations. Aviation and emergency medicine figured this out decades ago and moved to simulation-based training with realistic stressors. Most business environments have not followed.
A framework you have only ever used in a workshop will not survive contact with a real deadline, a senior stakeholder demanding an answer, or conflicting information arriving simultaneously.
What actually holds under pressure
Simple decision rules with three steps or fewer. Pre-committed criteria written down before the pressure arrives. Checklists reviewed at the start of a decision process, not during it. The goal is not a sophisticated framework — it is a minimal structure that survives the conditions where decisions actually get made.
Complexity is a liability when the clock is running.