Decisions, Decisions

Buz Mertes

VP, Loss Management and Policy Servicing
GE Capital Mortgage Insurance Corp.
Raleigh, North Carolina

By transforming the art of decision making into a science, you can save time, money, and frustration. My team handles tough decisions every day. It has to decide whether we can "cure" a loan for someone who has stopped making payments on it or whether we have to recommend foreclosure because of real financial trouble.

For a long time, we couldn't figure out what allowed some of our reps to make better decisions than others did. We pulled six of our best reps off their jobs and analyzed their decision-making processes for 10 months. We found that these reps had radically different styles. Our challenge was to figure out the critical processes that drove their decisions and then to make sure that those decisions were driven by factual, up-to-date information. We had a goal: to become more consistent in our decision making and to improve our customers' perception of us. We ended up creating a software program, called Loss Mitigation Optimizer, to aid us in that process.

Turning decision making into a science saved us time and money. Before we implemented this technology, we were curing fewer than 30% of our cases. Now we cure more than 50% of them. The decision-making process itself takes 30% to 50% less time per deal. Our savings jumped dramatically - by about $8,000 per case. In the project's first 18 months, these additional savings came to $15 million in net income. Some people think that decisions of this type can't be driven by data. Our results show otherwise.

Buz Mertes joined GE in 1984. Since 1996, Mertes has sponsored a series of projects that have increased the company's net income by more than $20 million.

Jerry Seeman

Senior Director of Officiating
National Football League
New York, New York

As a referee, I found that the pressure was the same whether I was officiating a preseason game or a Super Bowl. Being on the field is like being in a fishbowl: Everyone - players, coaches, fans, the media - is waiting for your decision. A successful call depends on three things: You must be in position, you must have a deep knowledge of the game, and you must have intense concentration. Remember, no matter what the reaction to your decision may be, you answer to only one thing: your conscience. Above all, when making a decision, you have to keep your cool.

One of the biggest errors that I see officials fall into is making calls too quickly. Each decision has two phases: You read and analyze the play, and then you make the call. But when things happen in a split second, it can be tempting to throw a penalty flag before you know what happened. That's why I tell all of my officials to work in "cruise control." The fans may go crazy, the players and coaches may get excited, but there should be seven people on the field who work every game the same way from beginning to end - and who exude a quiet confidence.

Once you make a decision, you'd better be able to communicate it. I remember having to make a call on a bizarre play in a playoff game between Houston and Cleveland. After an attempted onside kick, the kicking team illegally touched the ball, which then went out of bounds. The rules dictate that the kicking team should kick again. That team again tried an onside kick, and again it illegally touched the ball - but this time, it recovered the ball. I called that the receiving team would gain control of the ball on the spot where it was illegally touched. This was a complicated play: The NFL probably hasn't seen another of its kind in the past 15 years. At first, the fans didn't understand my decision. But I explained to them what the proper ruling was, and they accepted it. I was confident about my knowledge of the game. And I didn't lose my cool.

Jerry Seeman, one of the most celebrated referees in football history, became an NFL line judge in 1975. He was appointed referee in 1979. His responsibilities now cover the league's supervisory staff, as well as regional game observers, collegiate scouts, and all game officials.