10 – The decision before the decision

A patrol in rough terrain has someone wounded, and the landing spot is one nobody has scouted. In the mountains the wind decides a good deal of what happens next, with up- and downdrafts you cannot see from the cockpit and that can be stronger than the power the helicopter has. All through the approach I kept judging how much room I still had to get away if it turned bad. Aborting meant flying home without the casualty. Carrying on meant giving up more of that room, and only I could say where the limit lay, because the radio stayed silent about it.

Somewhere in an office, a member of the team has been asking for months for more responsibility and a permanent contract. Her manager finds the conversation important enough to prepare properly. The budget has to be checked with finance first, and then there is the next team meeting, where it can be raised officially. It feels sensible, and nobody in that process does anything wrong. As far as her manager is concerned this is still preparation, and the decision itself comes afterwards.

Meanwhile a recruiter calls her twice. The first time she waves it off, the second time she listens for longer. By the time her manager comes to her with a proposal, she has signed elsewhere. “I would rather have told you here,” she says, “but I couldn’t keep waiting for something that might come, or might not.”

For her manager, the waiting had felt like due diligence. Only when she had signed elsewhere did it become clear that the waiting itself had been the decision.