Common sense in leadership—that knack for practical, grounded decision-making—feels like a vanishing skill. When we read stories about companies where company leadership makes bonehead moves that are so obviously wrong, we ask, “Why?” I think we all wonder, “How did they miss something so obvious?” From CEOs dismissing employee warnings about quality and safety issues (Boeing) to leaders selecting spokespeople who are diametrically opposite of the customer base (Bud Light), the absence of common sense breeds costly mistakes and frustration. It also costs companies millions and sometimes billions of dollars in sales and profits.
So, why is common sense so rare among leaders? Let’s unpack some reasons, including the tug-of-war between logic and emotion, the pitfalls of immaturity, the gap between leaders and employees and customers, generational divides, and the role of resilience, to understand why leaders falter and how they can reclaim this vital skill.
Defining Common Sense in Leadership
Common sense in leadership is the ability to make sound decisions using shared knowledge, experience, and basic reasoning. Additionally, it includes the ability to gather information from internal and external sources, process that information, and put it into the context of the business. Moreover, it’s warning signs and trends, such as team burnout, that can occur before productivity tanks or a flashy project gets canceled due to misalignment with core goals. Historically, common sense guided leaders through crises with clarity. Yet, in today’s data-drenched, fast-paced world, this “obvious” skill is fading, especially when emotions override logic or inexperience clouds judgment.
Traits of Common-Sense Leadership
- Practicality: Chooses what works over what’s trendy.
- Clarity: Cuts through complexity to focus on essentials.
- Empathy: Anchors decisions in human realities, not just numbers.
Let’s explore why common sense is often lacking in leadership and its impact on organizations.
Data Overload Buries Instinct
Leaders face a deluge of data, including dashboards, KPIs, analytics, and external data (such as studies and market trends). Today, most executives process an estimated 120,000 data points daily (Gartner, 2025). This flood overwhelms innate organizational and experiential knowledge. The deluge leaves leaders fixated on metrics over meaning. When buried in spreadsheets, the “obvious” slips away.
A consumer goods company promoted a young, inexperienced manager to Vice President of Finance and Operations at a newly consolidated manufacturing and distribution facility, combining two previously separate companies. This site managed all production. The new VP directed his team to unify financial data into a single set of accounts. However, the accounting and IT teams merged the data without verifying accuracy, matching accounts only by identical account numbers and disregarding the actual data. Consequently, they incorrectly combined inventory with office supplies, payroll expenses with rent, and other unrelated accounts, causing significant errors. The VP knew about the data inconsistencies but continued to use the data to make decisions.
Another example is a retail CEO who pushed a store expansion based on rosy projections, ignoring frontline reports of declining foot traffic. Common sense would have prioritized human insights, but data ultimately prevailed, resulting in millions of dollars in costs and losses. Ultimately, the expansion resulted in a bankruptcy reorganization.
Fix It: Balance data with dialogue. Validate the data and collection process. Prioritize team check-ins and analyze the data to see if the frontline feedback aligns with it. When it doesn’t, find out why!
Logical Thinking vs. Emotional Reactions
Common sense thrives on logical thinking—calmly assessing facts to reach practical conclusions. But leaders often succumb to emotional reactions, driven by fear, ego, or pressure. A 2025 study found that 60% of leadership errors stem from emotionally charged decisions, like firing a key employee in a fit of frustration or rushing a product launch to “prove a point” (Journal of Organizational Behavior, 2025).
Emotional reactions cloud the obvious, like when a tech exec ignored a known software bug to meet a deadline, grounding an airline’s fleet. Logical thinking would’ve prioritized a delay.
Fix It: Practice pause-and-reflect. Leaders should wait 10 minutes before acting on heated impulses, using logic to guide decisions.
Leadership Training Skips Practical Thinking
Business schools emphasize theory over real-world problem-solving. A 2024 study found that only 25% of MBA students could handle practical scenarios, such as resolving supply chain snags (Harvard Business Review, 2024). Leadership programs prioritize frameworks, not instincts, leaving gaps in common-sense decision-making.
This gap shows up when leaders falter in everyday situations. For instance, a newly minted manager might ace a case study on market entry but struggle to allocate a tight budget across competing team needs. Or consider the mid-level executive who can recite leadership buzzwords “synergy” and “disruption” but freezes when a key client threatens to walk over a service hiccup. These scenarios require practical judgment, including prioritizing tasks, reading people, and improvising under pressure. Yet, training rarely includes role-plays, simulations, or real-world apprenticeships that mimic these realities. Have you ever met a manager who can cite SWOT analyses but can’t mediate a team dispute? That’s the training gap at work.
Fix It: Focus on the hard and soft skills. Integrate simulations, such as budget crises and team conflicts, into leadership training to develop practical judgment.
Immaturity and Inexperience Derail Judgment
Younger or less seasoned leaders, thrust into high-stakes roles, often lack the life experience that sharpens common sense. Immaturity shows up as impulsiveness or overconfidence, like a startup founder who ignored cash flow warnings, assuming “growth will fix it.” A 2025 report noted that 40% of new leaders fail within 18 months due to “naive decision-making” (McKinsey & Company, 2025).
Inexperience also means missing context, such as not foreseeing how a layoff might negatively impact morale. Common sense grows through trial and error, which immature leaders haven’t yet faced.
Fix It: Pair new leaders with seasoned mentors and encourage them to keep a reflective journal to learn from their mistakes.
Tech Reliance Dims Human Judgment
AI tools and automation are invaluable, but overreliance can dull instincts. A 2025 survey found that 70% of executives rely on technology for strategic decisions, from hiring to forecasting (Deloitte, 2025). This erodes the trial-and-error process that builds common sense.
A tech firm’s AI hiring tool rejected top talent due to a glitch. Common sense would have triggered a manual check, but blind trust in technology hurt recruitment.
Fix It: Practice tech-free decisions, such as manual performance reviews, to hone your instincts.
Generational Factors Shape Perspectives
Generational differences influence common sense. Baby Boomers, shaped by hands-on problem-solving, often lean on practical experience. Gen X balances tech and instinct, while Millennials and Gen Z, raised in a digital, instant-answer world, may prioritize speed over depth. A 2025 study noted that 55% of Gen Z leaders prefer app-based solutions over human judgment, sometimes missing obvious fixes (Pew Research Center, 2025).
For example, a Gen Z manager might rely on a scheduling app that double-books staff, ignoring a manual check. Meanwhile, older leaders may resist tech, missing its benefits. Each generation’s lens skews what is considered “common sense.”
Fix It: Foster cross-generational mentorship. Pair younger and older leaders to blend tech-savvy and experiential wisdom.
Ego and Isolation Block Collective Wisdom
Common sense draws on shared knowledge, but isolated or ego-driven leaders dismiss team insights. Social media clout fuels hyper-individualism, making leaders prioritize “vision” over reality. A founder once ignored market data to chase a pet project, sinking their startup.
Tunneled vision kills the collective wisdom that fuels common sense.
Fix It: Host open forums and seek dissenting opinions to anchor decisions in a shared reality.
Stress and Low Resilience Sabotage Clarity
Chronic stress, reported by 45% of executives, clouds the brain’s logic center, making obvious solutions invisible (American Psychological Association, 2025). Leaders with low resilience—less able to bounce back from setbacks—panic or freeze. A stressed exec might cut training budgets during a skills gap, missing the common-sense fix: invest in people.
Resilience builds the mental stamina to stay clear-headed. Without it, leaders make baffling calls under pressure.
Fix It: Encourage employees to find ways to destress and refocus throughout the day. Employee wellness programs, walking breaks, meditation, and other practices can facilitate better thinking.
Why Common Sense in Leadership Matters
The lack of common sense in leadership is costly. A 2025 report tied 55% of corporate failures to “preventable oversights,” ignoring obvious red flags (McKinsey & Company, 2025). Consider the airline that was grounded by a rushed software update when a phased rollout would have been a straightforward solution.
Common-sense leaders:
- Prevent Crises: Identify and address risks like customer churn early.
- Boost Morale: Practical decisions build trust.
- Drive Results: Simple strategies outshine complex flops.
Without it, organizations lose money, talent, and credibility.
Rebuilding Common Sense in Leadership
Leaders can rebuild common sense:
- Listen Actively: Engage employees and customers to ground them.
- Stay Humble: Seek advice when unsure.
- Master Basics: Secure cash flow and morale before chasing innovation.
- Build Resilience: Use stress management to stay clear-headed.
- Mentor Teams: Teach practical thinking to spread common sense.
Call to Action: Lead with Common Sense
Start today:
- Challenge Assumptions: Question tools or reports that seem off.
- Learn by Doing: Streamline a workflow hands-on.
- Spread the Skill: Coach teams on practical decisions.