Unstructured processes of strategic decision-making

The author aims at developing a better understanding of unstructured strategic decision making processes and the conditions for achieving successful decision outcomes. Specifically he investigates the processes used to make CRE (Corporate Real Estate) decisions. To reveal the fundamental differences between CRE decision-making in practice and the prescriptive ‘best practice’ advocated in the CRE literature, a study of seven leading Italian management consulting firms is undertaken addressing the aspects of content and process of decisions. This research makes its primary contribution by identifying the importance and difficulty of finding the right balance between problem complexity, process richness and cohesion to ensure a decision-making process that is sufficiently rich and yet quick enough to deliver a prompt outcome. While doing so, the study also provides more empirical evidence to some of the most established theories of decision-making, while reinterpreting their mono-dimensional arguments in a multi-dimensional model of successful decision-making.

Developing a multi-dimensional scale for ethical decision making: the managerial ethical profile (MEP)

This article describes the development and validation of a multi-dimensional scale for measuring managers’ perceptions of the range of factors that routinely guide their decision-making processes. An instrument for identifying managerial ethical profiles (MEP) is developed by measuring the perceived role of different ethical principles in the decision-making of managers. Evidence as to the validity of the multidimensionality of the ethical scale is provided, based on the comparative assessment of different models for managerial ethical decision-making. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) supported a eight-factor model including two factors for each of the main four schools of moral philosophy. Future research needs and the value of this measure to business ethics are discussed.

Planning online : a community-based interactive decision-making model

The first use of computing technologies and the development of land use models in order to support decision-making processes in urban planning date back to as early as mid 20th century. The main thrust of computing applications in urban planning is their contribution to sound decision-making and planning practices. During the last couple of decades many new computing tools and technologies, including geospatial technologies, are designed to enhance planners' capability in dealing with complex urban environments and planning for prosperous and healthy communities. This chapter, therefore, examines the role of information technologies, particularly internet-based geographic information systems, as decision support systems to aid public participatory planning. The chapter discusses challenges and opportunities for the use of internet-based mapping application and tools in collaborative decision-making, and introduces a prototype internet-based geographic information system that is developed to integrate public-oriented interactive decision mechanisms into urban planning practice. This system, referred as the 'Community-based Internet GIS' model, incorporates advanced information technologies, distance learning, sustainable urban development principles and community involvement techniques in decision-making processes, and piloted in Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan.

Impact of a data warehouse model for improved decision-making process in healthcare

The health system is one sector dealing with a deluge of complex data. Many healthcare organisations struggle to utilise these volumes of health data effectively and efficiently. Also, there are many healthcare organisations, which still have stand-alone systems, not integrated for management of information and decision-making. This shows, there is a need for an effective system to capture, collate and distribute this health data. Therefore, implementing the data warehouse concept in healthcare is potentially one of the solutions to integrate health data. Data warehousing has been used to support business intelligence and decision-making in many other sectors such as the engineering, defence and retail sectors. The research problem that is going to be addressed is, "how can data warehousing assist the decision-making process in healthcare". To address this problem the researcher has narrowed an investigation focusing on a cardiac surgery unit. This research used the cardiac surgery unit at the Prince Charles Hospital (TPCH) as the case study. The cardiac surgery unit at TPCH uses a stand-alone database of patient clinical data, which supports clinical audit, service management and research functions. However, much of the time, the interaction between the cardiac surgery unit information system with other units is minimal. There is a limited and basic two-way interaction with other clinical and administrative databases at TPCH which support decision-making processes. The aims of this research are to investigate what decision-making issues are faced by the healthcare professionals with the current information systems and how decision-making might be improved within this healthcare setting by implementing an aligned data warehouse model or models. As a part of the research the researcher will propose and develop a suitable data warehouse prototype based on the cardiac surgery unit needs and integrating the Intensive Care Unit database, Clinical Costing unit database (Transition II) and Quality and Safety unit database [electronic discharge summary (e-DS)]. The goal is to improve the current decision-making processes. The main objectives of this research are to improve access to integrated clinical and financial data, providing potentially better information for decision-making for both improved from the questionnaire and by referring to the literature, the results indicate a centralised data warehouse model for the cardiac surgery unit at this stage. A centralised data warehouse model addresses current needs and can also be upgraded to an enterprise wide warehouse model or federated data warehouse model as discussed in the many consulted publications. The data warehouse prototype was able to be developed using SAS enterprise data integration studio 4.2 and the data was analysed using SAS enterprise edition 4.3. In the final stage, the data warehouse prototype was evaluated by collecting feedback from the end users. This was achieved by using output created from the data warehouse prototype as examples of the data desired and possible in a data warehouse environment. According to the feedback collected from the end users, implementation of a data warehouse was seen to be a useful tool to inform management options, provide a more complete representation of factors related to a decision scenario and potentially reduce information product development time. However, there are many constraints exist in this research. For example the technical issues such as data incompatibilities, integration of the cardiac surgery database and e-DS database servers and also, Queensland Health information restrictions (Queensland Health information related policies, patient data confidentiality and ethics requirements), limited availability of support from IT technical staff and time restrictions. These factors have influenced the process for the warehouse model development, necessitating an incremental approach. This highlights the presence of many practical barriers to data warehousing and integration at the clinical service level. Limitations included the use of a small convenience sample of survey respondents, and a single site case report study design. As mentioned previously, the proposed data warehouse is a prototype and was developed using only four database repositories. Despite this constraint, the research demonstrates that by implementing a data warehouse at the service level, decision-making is supported and data quality issues related to access and availability can be reduced, providing many benefits. Output reports produced from the data warehouse prototype demonstrated usefulness for the improvement of decision-making in the management of clinical services, and quality and safety monitoring for better clinical care. However, in the future, the centralised model selected can be upgraded to an enterprise wide architecture by integrating with additional hospital units’ databases.

Investigation of decision making issues in the use of current clinical information systems

Clinical information systems have become important tools in contemporary clinical patient care. However, there is a question of whether the current clinical information systems are able to effectively support clinicians in decision making processes. We conducted a survey to identify some of the decision making issues related to the use of existing clinical information systems. The survey was conducted among the end users of the cardiac surgery unit, quality and safety unit, intensive care unit and clinical costing unit at The Prince Charles Hospital (TPCH). Based on the survey results and reviewed literature, it was identified that support from the current information systems for decision-making is limited. Also, survey results showed that the majority of respondents considered lack in data integration to be one of the major issues followed by other issues such as limited access to various databases, lack of time and lack in efficient reporting and analysis tools. Furthermore, respondents pointed out that data quality is an issue and the three major data quality issues being faced are lack of data completeness, lack in consistency and lack in data accuracy. Conclusion: Current clinical information systems support for the decision-making processes in Cardiac Surgery in this institution is limited and this could be addressed by integrating isolated clinical information systems.

The governance of inter-organisational decision-making : understanding the impacts of informal networks on formal decision-making regimes in the Brisbane Airport region

Airports and cities inevitably recognise the value that each brings the other; however, the separation in decision-making authority for what to build, where, when and how provides a conundrum for both parties. Airports often want a say in what is developed outside of the airport fence, and cities often want a say in what is developed inside the airport fence. Defining how much of a say airports and cities have in decisions beyond their jurisdictional control is likely to be a topic that continues so long as airports and cities maintain separate formal decision-making processes for what to build, where, when and how. However, the recent Green and White Papers for a new National Aviation Policy have made early inroads to formalising relationships between Australia’s major airports and their host cities. At present, no clear indication (within practice or literature) is evident to the appropriateness of different governance arrangements for decisions to develop in situations that bring together the opposing strategic interests of airports and cities; thus leaving decisions for infrastructure development as complex decision-making spaces that hold airport and city/regional interests at stake. The line of enquiry is motivated by a lack of empirical research on networked decision-making domains outside of the realm of institutional theorists (Agranoff & McGuire, 2001; Provan, Fish & Sydow, 2007). That is, governance literature has remained focused towards abstract conceptualisations of organisation, without focusing on the minutia of how organisation influences action in real-world applications. A recent study by Black (2008) has provided an initial foothold for governance researchers into networked decision-making domains. This study builds upon Black’s (2008) work by aiming to explore and understand the problem space of making decisions subjected to complex jurisdictional and relational interdependencies. That is, the research examines the formal and informal structures, relationships, and forums that operationalise debates and interactions between decision-making actors as they vie for influence over deciding what to build, where, when and how in airport-proximal development projects. The research mobilises a mixture of qualitative and quantitative methods to examine three embedded cases of airport-proximal development from a network governance perspective. Findings from the research provide a new understanding to the ways in which informal actor networks underpin and combine with formal decision-making networks to create new (or realigned) governance spaces that facilitate decision-making during complex phases of development planning. The research is timely, and responds well to Isett, Mergel, LeRoux, Mischen and Rethemeyer’s (2011) recent critique of limitations within current network governance literature, specifically to their noted absence of empirical studies that acknowledge and interrogate the simultaneity of formal and informal network structures within network governance arrangements (Isett et al., 2011, pp. 162-166). The combination of social network analysis (SNA) techniques and thematic enquiry has enabled findings to document and interpret the ways in which decision-making actors organise to overcome complex problems for planning infrastructure. An innovative approach to using association networks has been used to provide insights to the importance of the different ways actors interact with one another, thus providing a simple yet valuable addition to the increasingly popular discipline of SNA. The research also identifies when and how different types of networks (i.e. formal and informal) are able to overcome currently known limitations to network governance (see McGuire & Agranoff, 2011), thus adding depth to the emerging body of network governance literature surrounding limitations to network ways of working (i.e. Rhodes, 1997a; Keast & Brown, 2002; Rethemeyer & Hatmaker, 2008; McGuire & Agranoff, 2011). Contributions are made to practice via the provision of a timely understanding of how horizontal fora between airports and their regions are used, particularly in the context of how they reframe the governance of decision-making for airport-proximal infrastructure development. This new understanding will enable government and industry actors to better understand the structural impacts of governance arrangements before they design or adopt them, particularly for factors such as efficiency of information, oversight, and responsiveness to change.

Predictive modelling : parents’ decision making to use online child health information to increase their understanding and/or diagnose or treat their child’s health

Abstract Background The quantum increases in home Internet access and available online health information with limited control over information quality highlight the necessity of exploring decision making processes in accessing and using online information, specifically in relation to children who do not make their health decisions. Objectives To understand the processes explaining parents’ decisions to use online health information for child health care. Methods Parents (N = 391) completed an initial questionnaire assessing the theory of planned behaviour constructs of attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioural control, as well as perceived risk, group norm, and additional demographic factors. Two months later, 187 parents completed a follow-up questionnaire assessing their decisions to use online information for their child’s health care, specifically to 1) diagnose and/or treat their child’s suspected medical condition/illness and 2) increase understanding about a diagnosis or treatment recommended by a health professional. Results Hierarchical multiple regression showed that, for both behaviours, attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavioural control, (less) perceived risk, group norm, and (non) medical background were the significant predictors of intention. For parents’ use of online child health information, for both behaviours, intention was the sole significant predictor of behaviour. The findings explain 77% of the variance in parents’ intention to treat/diagnose a child health problem and 74% of the variance in their intentions to increase their understanding about child health concerns. Conclusions Understanding parents’ socio-cognitive processes that guide their use of online information for child health care is important given the increase in Internet usage and the sometimes-questionable quality of health information provided online. Findings highlight parents’ thirst for information; there is an urgent need for health professionals to provide parents with evidence-based child health websites in addition to general population education on how to evaluate the quality of online health information.

A flexible asset maintenance decision-making process model

Optimal Asset Maintenance decisions are imperative for efficient asset management. Decision Support Systems are often used to help asset managers make maintenance decisions, but high quality decision support must be based on sound decision-making principles. For long-lived assets, a successful Asset Maintenance decision-making process must effectively handle multiple time scales. For example, high-level strategic plans are normally made for periods of years, while daily operational decisions may need to be made within a space of mere minutes. When making strategic decisions, one usually has the luxury of time to explore alternatives, whereas routine operational decisions must often be made with no time for contemplation. In this paper, we present an innovative, flexible decision-making process model which distinguishes meta-level decision making, i.e., deciding how to make decisions, from the information gathering and analysis steps required to make the decisions themselves. The new model can accommodate various decision types. Three industrial case studies are given to demonstrate its applicability.

Will the application of spatial multi criteria evaluation technique enhance the quality of decision-making to resolve boundary conflicts in the Philippines?

Systematic studies that evaluate the quality of decision-making processes are relatively rare. Using the literature on decision quality, this research develops a framework to assess the quality of decision-making processes for resolving boundary conflicts in the Philippines. The evaluation framework breaks down the decision-making process into three components (the decision procedure, the decision method, and the decision unit) and is applied to two ex-post (one resolved and one unresolved) and one ex-ante cases. The evaluation results from the resolved and the unresolved cases show that the choice of decision method plays a minor role in resolving boundary conflicts whereas the choice of decision procedure is more influential. In the end, a decision unit can choose a simple method to resolve the conflict. The ex-ante case presents a follow-up intended to resolve the unresolved case for a changing decision-making process in which the associated decision unit plans to apply the spatial multi criteria evaluation (SMCE) tool as a decision method. The evaluation results from the ex-ante case confirm that the SMCE has the potential to enhance the decision quality because: a) it provides high quality as a decision method in this changing process, and b) the weaknesses associated with the decision unit and the decision procedure of the unresolved case were found to be eliminated in this process.

How small-sided and conditioned games enhance acquisition of movement and decision-making skills

This article summarizes research from an ecological dynamics program of work on team sports exemplifying how small-sided and conditioned games (SSCG) can enhance skill acquisition and decision-making processes during training. The data highlighted show how constraints of different SSCG can facilitate emergence of continuous interpersonal coordination tendencies during practice to benefit team game players.

Megaprojects, Affected communities and sustainability decision making

Increasing scrutiny from the wider community is contributing to a shift towards the delivery and operation of major projects that meets and maintains the sustainability priorities of the community. This is especially significant for large economic projects which have a global track record of social benefit shortfalls, cost overruns, and underestimation of risks. Major industrial and infrastructure projects that cost more than US$1 billion are typically called mega-projects. Globally, investment in mega-projects has exceeded $10 trillion in the last ten years. With so many projects in the pipeline -and many taking place in emerging economies – the effectiveness of the sustainability decision making process is particularly important. The purpose of this paper is to examine how the existing sustainability decision making processes and strategies address the potential challenges facing communities affected by mega-projects. It highlights issues with current operational level approaches to social sustainability assessment at the project level, and argues that to improve accountability and transparency of project outcomes, positive externalities that flow from goods and services provided by the social and cultural systems of the community must be incorporated into decision making.

The role of interpersonal influence in budget decision making: The Canadian public library experience

This study determined factors which influenced Canadian provincial (state) politicians when making funding decisions for public libraries. Using the case study methodology, Canadian provincial/state-level funding for public libraries in the 2009-2010 fiscal year was examined. The data were analyzed to determine whether Cialdini’s theory of influence and specifically any of the six tactics of influence (i.e., commitment and consistency, authority, liking, social proof, scarcity, and reciprocity) were instrumental in these budgetary decision-making processes. Findings show the principles of “authority,” “consistency and commitment,” and “liking” were relevant, and that “liking” was especially important to these decisions.

Effective clinical decision-making from practice-based evidence

This is an ongoing research investigating the use of health information technologies (HIT) to improve clinical decision-making processes. Effective and timely clinical decision-making can lead to positive improvements in patient’s health outcome...

The role of emotions in service customer decision-making

This chapter explains how customers make purchase decisions and how these decisions are influenced not only by the service marketer but also by the customers own emotions. While decision-making is described from the perspective of purchasing services rather than purchasing goods, we challenge the traditional notion that customers make informed, rational and well-thought-out decisions. Rather customers are often driven by subjective feelings such as emotions. We present evidence of how these emotions influence the behavior of customers, their attitudes and evaluation of the service, as well as final decision-making processes.

The Value of Being on the Net- the effects of Web sites of companies on consumer decision making

The unique characteristics of marketspace in combination with the fast growing number of consumers interested in e-commerce have created new research areas of interest to both marketing and consumer behaviour researchers. Consumer behaviour researchers interested in the decision making processes of consumers have two new sets of questions to answer. The first set of questions is related to how useful theories developed for a marketplace are in a marketspace context. Cyber auctions, Internet communities and the possibilities for consumers to establish dialogues not only with companies but also with other consumers make marketspace unique. The effects of these distinctive characteristics on the behaviour of consumers have not been systematically analysed and therefore constitute the second set of questions which have to be studied. Most companies feel that they have to be online even though the effects of being on the Net are not unambiguously positive. The relevance of the relationship marketing paradigm in a marketspace context have to be studied. The relationship enhancement effects of websites from the customers’ point of view are therefore emphasized in this research paper. Representatives of the Net-generation were analysed and the results show that companies should develop marketspace strategies while Net presence has a value-added effect on consumers. The results indicate that the decision making processes of the consumers are also changing as a result of the progress of marketspace