HOW TO BE AN EXPERT DECISION MAKER
“Be willing to make decisions. That’s the most important quality in a good leader. Don’t fall victim to what I call the ‘ready-aim-aim-aim-aim syndrome’. You must be willing to fire.”
T. Boone Pickens, American Financier
Whether you are a manager at a company or a regular person in daily life, everybody makes countless decisions throughout their lives. Some of these decisions require little to no thinking and analyzing. They are so easy to make in fact, we don’t even realize that we are making them. However, decisions that require analysis and thorough thinking tend to be not so simple to make. This is where different decision-making strategies come to play. These strategies are commonly used in managerial level decision-making and significantly help managers to simplify and better analyze decisions in order to make the best decisions with available resources. In this essay we will talk about some strategies and environments in which these strategies could be implemented. In order to better educate you on this matter, we’re going to be talking about practical examples throughout the essay. We wish you happy reading and hope for you to actually use some of these decision making tips in the future.
Using the Contingency Framework While Making Business Decisions
We acknowledge that in business life, managers and other employees with work experience don’t want to get all caught up in theories and other impractical information. However, for our essay to make sense we’re going to briefly introduce you to some key concepts to help you enhance your decision making skills. Please don’t be discouraged to read the rest of the essay as it contains (hopefully) very helpful information.
First, let’s introduce you to the concept of contingency framework. It mainly depends on two things: one, problem consensus and two, technical knowledge about solutions. Let’s talk about what problem consensus is. Problem consensus is the common agreement among managers about a problem’s nature and goals within the organization. Imagine you and your friends agreeing to visit a restaurant to hang out. Your rich friend, let’s call him Tayfun, wants to go to Nusret Steakhouse to enjoy some steak. On the other hand, your other friend, let’s call him Özgür, is vegan and wants to visit the local vegan restaurant. Meanwhile, you are thinking about hanging out at Kocatepe Kahvecisi to enjoy some coffee because you just ate and aren’t hungry. In this case, the problem consensus is low. All of you have different goals and have no common agreement about your problem of wanting to hang out. Now, consider another case where you and your wife and children want to go somewhere for vacation. All of you have been stressed out from your work and school life and want to go somewhere quiet. This is when problem consensus is high because all of you have the same goal and the problem’s nature is agreed upon everybody in the household.
Problem consensus is done, let’s move up to technical knowledge a.k.a. solution knowledge. This one is pretty straight-forward. Consider you are a tourism and hotel management graduate and the TV in your home broke. Since you are a tourism and hotel management graduate, you have no idea how to fix a TV. Therefore, you have uncertain solution knowledge as you didn’t specialize in electronics engineering. But if you were, you would have a pretty good idea about how to fix a TV and you would have certain solution knowledge and probably a working TV.
Now, on to how the contingency framework works. As we have already explained problem consensus and solution knowledge, contingency framework basically works in harmony with these elements. Contingency framework in a nutshell is a guide for decision-makers to find their way easily when making decisions. The framework itself is pretty straight-forward. You decide on whether or not the solution knowledge and problem consensus is certain or uncertain and pick a strategy to implement to your problem. Below are some recommended strategies you could use BOTH in your work life and in your daily life. Enjoy.
- Carnegie Model:
We’re going to kick things off with a decision-making model which helps managers deal with certain problems that require some “persuasion”. As you probably know, it’s not always easy to make a decision when your colleagues or your friends do not have the same idea or mindset as you. People are not always going to see eye-to-eye with your decisions. That’s where the Carnegie model comes in to help you deal with these struggles. What Carnegie model does is: it helps you to come together as an organization and have a common goal and problem consensus. Carnegie model’s main goal is to eliminate uncertain problem consensus. Carnegie model does this by encouraging decision-makers to bargain and create coalitions in whatever organization they are in. Sometimes managers in an organization might not share the same goal and there may be limited information about the problem that you have found yourself in. In cases like this, your first goal must be to achieve the maximum problem consensus level that you can achieve then simply act accordingly and create a solution. It is crucial to keep in mind that, doing this may be tougher than it is to read, so you have to make do with what you have and not worry too much about what could have been better. Let’s try to clear your head up a little with an example. Imagine you and your friends come together to work on an assignment with a deadline that arrives tomorrow morning and you are trying to get the group in order. While everyone is blaming each other for being late and many other reasons, you are thinking about a solution and choose to implement the Carnegie model to your problem. At this stage you have limited time to make a decision and there is chaos amongst the group. You decide to talk some sense into the group and remind everyone there is limited time to the deadline and they can argue about this later. Everyone calms down to the amazing speech you just gave and starts to work on the assignment. Now, the priority of getting the group is resolved and it is time to work but there is very little time to the deadline and you need to act fast so you just take your colleague’s advice they have given you earlier and steal another coworker’s work (do not try this at home). It is not right and the assignment is far from perfect but the problem is solved. Congratulations, you have just made a decision using the Carnegie model.
- Incremental Strategy:
One of the most helpful strategies to help with decision-making are incremental strategies. Incremental model is best used when, well, when you sort of know what to do as it is based on analyzing a problem step by step as the name suggests. You can perceive this strategy as if you are taking baby steps in order to solve a problem. This strategy is best implacable when consequences of your actions are unpredictable and your alternatives are indefinable. Which basically means you don’t have a clear idea or a path to solve a problem. However, this doesn’t mean that your hands are tied. Thanks to the incremental strategy, you can take baby steps in order to overcome the problem that you currently have. Think of a baby taking its first steps while following its strategy in which the baby is, well, you the problem-solver. And as a problem solver you need to take a small first step and following it with many other small steps in order to overcome your problem. What is brilliant about this strategy is that it doesn’t take much time to implement and it significantly reduces your risk. Incremental strategy is about taking small steps as we have already mentioned. What is great about this is that it mostly saves you from backlash if you were to make a wrong decision. Instead, you are making small decisions to avoid making a wrong big decision.
- Cybernetic Strategy:
What if you weren’t able to use the incremental strategy? If the problem that you are facing cannot be solved by figuring out small solutions, what do you do? This is when cybernetic strategies come into play. Cybernetic strategies are basically decision making by using the trial and error method. For example, let’s say you are an actor and you are tired from all the shooting you have been doing at the studio and you have decided to get you a cup of coffee from the coffee machine. It turns out that the machine is broken. You are an actor, not an engineer so fixing the machine properly is not an option. There are many things you could do to solve this problem but you don’t want to waste much time as you are desperately in need of some coffee. In this case, you could do what many people do against food/drink vending machines: give it a good kick until it works. It is not guaranteed to work, but it’s worth a shot. Little do you know, you kicking the machine in order to solve the problem of not getting coffee is actually a cybernetic decision making strategy.
Whether you are a manager or a housewife, decision-making is part of your life every step of the way. Being a good decision-maker benefits and rewards you throughout your life that’s why it is crucial to learn how to be a good decision-maker. However, being a decision maker is not always easy and it helps you intensely to use some of the strategies we have given you to be better at what you do.
HOW TO BE AN EXPERT IN ORGANIZATIONAL LIFE? 