Decision Making

Decision Making Process

The first step in decision-making is to find out the correct problem. It is not easy to define the problem. It should be seen what is causing the trouble and what will be its possible solutions. No problem presents itself in a manner that an immediate decision is taken. If the problem is not correctly defined then the efforts and resources spent on a wrong decision will go waste.

After defining the problem, the manager should diagnose and analyze it. He/ She should collect all possible information about the problem and then decide whether it will be sufficient to take a decision or not.

Both obvious and creative alternatives have to be developed for considerations. Minor decisions will consume less time & effort in developing alternatives & vice versa. Care should be taken to develop alternatives which are likely to be feasible from legal, moral, ethical, technological, economical points of view.

Comparison and evaluation of alternatives in terms of feasibility, practicality, affordability, satisfactoriness (i.e. to stakeholders), legality, probability of success, human factor, technicality, & possible consequence of the alternatives.

Select the best alternative considering risk, economy, time, resource factor, practicality, and above all objective contributing capacity. Go for optimization rather than best or maximization. Sometimes instead of selecting only one alternative, two or more alternatives might be selected for implementing simultaneously or sequentially.

First communicate the selected decision to all concerned to secure their cooperation while they will be implemented. Implementation of a decision sometimes may be obstructed by people’s resistance to change (due to feeling of insecurity, inconvenience, fear of unknown). During implementation, several unanticipated consequences might arise which have to be dealt with tactfully

• Evaluate whether the decision taken is yielding the desired results?
• Is there any lacuna in the decision itself or in implementing it?
• Does the chosen alternative serve the original purpose & solve the problem?
• If an implemented alternative appears not to be working, the manager can respond in several ways, i.e. the 2^nd or 3^rd choice can be considered to replace the 1^st one.