Decision Making

Decision making can be regarded as the mental processes

(cognitive process) resulting in the selection of a
course of action among several alternatives. Every
decision making process produces a final choice. The
output can be an action or an opinion of choice.

Decision Making Stages:

Developed by B. Aubrey Fisher, there are four stages that

should be involved in all group decision making. These
stages, or sometimes called phases, are important for the
decision-making process to begin

Orientation Stage: This phase is where members meet for

the first time and start to get to know each other.

Conflict Stage: Once group members become familiar with

each other, disputes, little fights and arguments occur.
Group members eventually work it out.

Emergence Stage: The group begins to clear up vague in

opinions is talked about.

Reinforcement Stage: Members finally make a decision,

while justifying themselves that it was the right
decision.

Page 1 of 8
Decision Making Steps:

1. Identifying the Problem:

The first step is for you to identify and define the

problem. A problem is a question that requires
appropriate solution. Here, you find the limiting factors
and obstacles.

2. Analyzing the Problem:

In the second step you are supposed to analyze the

problem. Gather the necessary information or data
regarding that problem.

3. Develop a List of Alternative Solutions:

After analyzing the problem, you should develop a list of

the alternative answers that solves the problem. There
are resources that are of great help in developing the
list such as browsing the internet etc.

4. Selecting the Best Alternative:

From the list of alternative choices, select the best

choice. From the list, compare the effects of each
choice. When selecting the best choice, bear in mind the
risk element of each choice against your expected gain.
Do proper timing of your decisions.

Page 2 of 8
5. Execution of the Best Choice:

In this step, you put the best choice on action.

Communicate properly to your subordinates by being clear,
concise and in an understandable manner regarding the
choice.

6. Follow up:

Keep following up with the progress on how the decision

is being implemented. You exercise this through proper
control. This helps you in detecting the areas that
require improvement or modification before the whole
decision comes to halt.

7. Monitoring and Feedback:

The last step is to get feedback. Feedback from your

subordinates helps you to determine the effectiveness of
the implemented decision. If possible, you should come up
with a mechanism that gives you periodic reports on the
success of its implementation.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Team /

Individual Decision Making:

A major advantage of team decision making is that more

information is brought to bear identifying and evaluating
alternatives. The more diverse the team's composition,
the more likely it is that creative ideas will be
forthcoming.

Page 3 of 8
Advantages:

1. Diversity: Varied cultures, age teams, gender, etc all

add to the diversity of team which gives us varied
perspectives and enhances the kind of ideas the team can
come up with.

2. Varied Experiences: There are difference in fields of

experience and amount of experience and there differences
in the life experiences and the kind of experiences
people have had even with the same problem. This pool of
experience can be a great advantage.

3. Enhanced Memory for Facts: An individual may forget a

particular piece of information, but as there are a
number of people involved here, there is the combined
memory of all members to recollect data.

4. Greater Acceptability of Decisions: As everyone has

made some contribution to the decision, people tend to be
more accepting of the decision. Also those who may not
have contributed still support it as "the team" has come
to this decision.

Page 4 of 8
5. Error Detection: When there are many people working
together, mistakes and errors that may have accidentally
gone unnoticed and had serious consequences are spotted
by other team members.

6. Collective Understanding: The members together come to

a decision after much deliberation and discussions and so
everyone has a better understanding of the course of
action to be followed.

7. Less Influence of Bias: Individual biases can be

challenged and individuals may have to recognize and
eliminate them.

8. More Creative Solutions: With so many people involved,

more creative and innovative solutions to problems may
emerge than an individual may have been able to develop.

9. Shared Responsibility: There are a number of people

involved, so no one person has to shoulder the burden of
work or of single-handedly making a decision.

10. Motivational Effect: The team decision making may

even have a motivational effect on the team if the team
is a successful one.

Page 5 of 8
11. Simplifies Complex Decisions: Many complex decisions
can be made by the team decision making process which an
individual may not have been able to tackle.

12. More information and knowledge are available

13. More alternatives are likely to be generated

14. More acceptances of the final decisions is likely

15. Enhanced communication of decision making may result

16. Better decision generally emerge

Disadvantages:

While team decision making has numerous advantages there

are times when individual members may outperform the
team. In fact, at times, what are the very advantages of
team decision making become disadvantages?

1. Diversity: Too much diversity, or diversity when

diversity is not needed, can reduce cohesiveness and
affect the team decision making process.

2. Time Used: With too many people involved, more time is

required to reach a decision which reduces efficiency.

3. Team Think: If members strive for agreement at the

cost of accurate assessment of required information, the

Page 6 of 8
team decision making falls prey to the problem of team
think and individual performances may reflect better
results. This is particularly true for highly cohesive
teams.

4. Diffusion of Responsibility: As numerous people are

involved, no one person wants to assume responsibility
which may lead to lesser results.

5. Potential for Conflict: If the team is too large or

low on cohesiveness or too diverse, and sometimes even if
none of these factors are present, there is the potential
for conflict which may reduce output.

6. Team Polarization: People sometimes tend to make more

extreme or radical decisions in a team than individually.
This is an advantage so far as it offers new solutions
but extreme solutions may present more problems than
anticipated.

7. Cost to Organizations: The cost in terms of time,

money and resources is high where team decision making is
involved which may not always be viable.

8. Competition: If individual performance is also

rewarded in teams in a manner that is not motivational,
team decision making may inadvertently lead to
competition among individual members.

Page 7 of 8
9. Lack of Objective Direction: In a team without a
leader, there may be a lack of direction and the
decisions arrived at may be vague or ambiguous.

Page 8 of 8