Event! Virtual Team Challenge
Week Four: Decision-making
Student Handout
Decision-making is the process of selecting a course of action from multiple options.
Some Key Terms from class:
What are Decisions?
Consider this: You are faced with a situation in which you must decide among several options and determine which one has the best outcome. What shirt do you buy? What homework should you do first? What course should you take?
Decision-making is the process of selecting a course of action from among multiple options. Every decision-making process produces a final choice. It can be an action or an opinion. It begins when we need to do something but we do not know what. Decision-making is a reasoning process which can be rational or irrational.
Right now you might make decisions concerning shopping, or deciding what to eat. As you get older, your decisions will increasingly affect your life – as well as other people. For example, some day you will be deciding whom or what to vote for in an election which can determine the course of history. So how do you prepare yourself? Begin by educating yourself about how to make important decisions.
Being Smart About Decision-making.
Do you have trouble making decisions? Here is a well-known method that people use to make decisions:
Tip for Success: People who can effectively make decisions are largely successful. For example, adequately deciding on a proper course of action for a business could be the difference between success and failure. When making decisions in your life, you should also think about how your decisions may impact your future. It is critical to know how to make decisions that will help you reach your goals.
Lessons for Success: Here is a simple process to effective decision-making:
1) Identify the need to make a decision. Remember that a decision is a determination about possible courses of action. First ask, does a determination need to be made?
2) List all possible options. What possible choices or courses of action could you pursue? List as many as you can.
3) Identify the outcome of all these possible options. What would happen if you chose each one? Think carefully and try to anticipate everything you can.
4) Rank-order the options according to the favor ability of the outcome. Place each option in order, from most desirable to least desirable, according to the results that pursuing each alternative would create.
5) Choose and implement the highest-rank option. Now that you know what to do, implement your decision by putting your determination or selected course of action to work.
6) Evaluate the outcome. Did you make the right decision? Was the outcome as you expected? Why or why not?
Complicated Decisions
Decisions can be complicated in many ways, especially when we aren’t aware of all the options we have, or the impact of our choices. Since we cannot always make the optimum decision, we frequently make the most appropriate decision given the information available to us. There are three reasons we do this:
1) Bounded Rationality. We all have thinking limitations that constrain our ability to interpret, process, and act on information. Sometimes we think we are smarter than we actually are.
2) Incomplete information. Information may not be available, or there may be risk or uncertainty in the potential outcomes. Our decisions may also be limited by time and by the money we have available to pursue various options.
3) Settling. Often, rather take the time to fully evaluate all options and make the optimal decision, we merely choose what we feel is the most ‘satisfactory’ decision – which often results in missing opportunities and benefits that would have resulted from the optimal decision.
Decision-making in New City
Making the right decisions in New City is largely about having all the facts. If you research your options thoroughly and listen to what people tell you, you will be prepared to negotiate and make decisions that benefit your team and you. A basic step in this process is writing the facts down as you find them so that you have them at your disposal when the time comes to make your decision.