personal reflection on decision making
Personal reflection on decision making
The decision making process is evident everyday whether it be the decision to join an organization, leave an organization or merely choose to participate in an activity. There are many decision making theories that have been developed throughout the years, the majority of which have probably been used by everyone at some point during their life span, whilst they still attempt to find a suitable managerial decision making style for the future.
On many occasions throughout my life I have found myself in a situation where I must critically evaluate and assess my situation in order to resolve an issue. The most recent of which came just last year where I had decided to hand in a change of status form to the university to swap courses from Chemistry to Business Management.
The decision making theory I had unintentionally adopted was the rational- decision making model. Rationality can be defined as “a style of behaviour that is appropriate to the achievement of given goals, within the limits imposed by given conditions and constraints” (Herbert A. Simon, 1976).
After having identified the issue of having a disinterest and a dislike in Chemistry I did not know what I wanted to study thereafter. It would have been unintelligent to rush into a non-programmable decision as I could not afford to make the same mistake and risk picking an incompatible course due to financial and personal reasons. Despite my parents attempting to sway me towards certain subjects and erode my decision making process I evaluated all other courses without bias in order to have as much possibility of making the correct decision “In logical decision making, goals and alternatives are made explicit, the consequences of pursuing different alternatives are calculated and these consequences are evaluated in terms of how close they are to the goals” (Simon, 1987). Despite observing some courses which I would have enjoyed, these were eliminated as a choice due
The decision making process is evident everyday whether it be the decision to join an organization, leave an organization or merely choose to participate in an activity. There are many decision making theories that have been developed throughout the years, the majority of which have probably been used by everyone at some point during their life span, whilst they still attempt to find a suitable managerial decision making style for the future.
On many occasions throughout my life I have found myself in a situation where I must critically evaluate and assess my situation in order to resolve an issue. The most recent of which came just last year where I had decided to hand in a change of status form to the university to swap courses from Chemistry to Business Management.
The decision making theory I had unintentionally adopted was the rational- decision making model. Rationality can be defined as “a style of behaviour that is appropriate to the achievement of given goals, within the limits imposed by given conditions and constraints” (Herbert A. Simon, 1976).
After having identified the issue of having a disinterest and a dislike in Chemistry I did not know what I wanted to study thereafter. It would have been unintelligent to rush into a non-programmable decision as I could not afford to make the same mistake and risk picking an incompatible course due to financial and personal reasons. Despite my parents attempting to sway me towards certain subjects and erode my decision making process I evaluated all other courses without bias in order to have as much possibility of making the correct decision “In logical decision making, goals and alternatives are made explicit, the consequences of pursuing different alternatives are calculated and these consequences are evaluated in terms of how close they are to the goals” (Simon, 1987). Despite observing some courses which I would have enjoyed, these were eliminated as a choice due
References: • Simon, H. A. (1976). From Substantive to Procedural Rationality. In S. J. Latsis (Ed.), Method and Appraisal in Economics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: pp. 130-131 • Mu-Lan Hsu, Kuan-Yao Chiu, (2008) "A comparison between I-Ching 's early management decision-making model and western management decision-making models", Chinese Management Studies, Vol. 2 Iss: 1, pp.52 – 75 • James R. Lang, John E. Dittrich and Sam E. White “The Academy of Management Review” Managerial Problem Solving Models: A Review and a Proposal, Vol. 3, No. 4 (Oct., 1978), pp. 854-866 • Herbert A. Simon, “The Academy of Management Executive (1987-1989)” Making Management Decisions: The Role of Intuition and Emotion, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Feb., 1987), pp. 57-64 • http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_files/irol/97/97664/reports/Mintzberg.pdf, Accessed 18/12/2013 • (http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/21681.Henry_Mintzberg, Accessed 18/12/13)