PUBLIC DECISION MAKING

By
Emmanuel Kwesi Mensah
What is Decision Making

Decision-making is the study of identifying
and choosing alternatives based on the
values and preferences of the decision
maker. Decision-making is one of the
central activities of management and is a
huge part of any process of implementation

Is the process of identifying problems and
opportunities and then resolving them.

A decision is a choice from available
alternatives.
Decision making and problem solving are
used in all management functions, although
usually they are considered a part of the
planning phase

MANAGEMENT FUCTION

Management Functions
Planning
Decision Making
Organizing
Leading
Controlling
Decision-Making Process
Step 1: Identify the decision to be made.
You realize that a decision must be made.
You then go through an internal process of
trying to define clearly the nature of the
decision you must make. This first step is a
very important one.

Step 2: Gather relevant information. Most
decisions require collecting pertinent
information. The real trick in this step is to
know what information is needed, the best
sources of this information, and how to go
about getting it.


Some information must be sought from
within yourself through a process of self-
assessment; other information must be
sought from outside yourself- from books,
people, and a variety of other sources. This
step, therefore, involves both internal and
external work.
Step 3: Identify alternatives. Through the
process of collecting information you will
probably identify several possible paths of
action, or alternatives. You may also use
your imagination and information to
construct new alternatives. In this step of
the decision- making process, you will list
all possible and desirable alternatives
Step 4: Weigh evidence. In this step, you
draw on your information and emotions to
imagine what it would be like if you carried
out each of the alternatives to the end. You
must evaluate whether the need identified in
Step 1 would be helped or solved through
the use of each alternative.
In going through this difficult internal
process, you begin to favor certain
alternatives which appear to have higher
potential for reaching your goal. Eventually
you are able to place the alternatives in
priority order, based upon your own value
system.

Step 5: Choose among alternatives. Once
you have weighed all the evidence, you are
ready to select the alternative which seems
to be best suited to you. You may even
choose a combination of alternatives.
Step 6: Take action. You now take some
positive action which begins to implement
the alternative you chose in Step 5.

Step 7: Review decision and consequences.
In the last step you experience the results of
your decision and evaluate whether or not it
has solved the need you identified in Step
1. If it has, you may stay with this decision
for some period of time.

If the decision has not resolved the
identified need, you may repeat certain
steps of the process in order to make a new
decision. You may, for example, gather
more detailed or somewhat different
information or discover additional
alternatives on which to base your decision.
TYPES OF DECISIONS

Routine

Nonroutine Decisions.

Pringle et al. classify decisions on a
continuum ranging from routine to
nonroutine, depending on the extent to
which they are structured.
ROUTINE DECISION
Routine decisions focus on well-structured
situations that recur frequently, involve
standard decision procedures, and entail a
minimum of uncertainty
Routine decision maker can usually rely on
policies, rules, past precedents, standardized
methods of processing, or computational
techniques. Probably 90 percent of most
management decisions are largely routine.
TYPES OF ROUTINE
DECISIONS

Payroll Processing
Reordering Standard Inventory Items
Paying Suppliers
Nonroutine Decisions
Nonroutine decisions, on the other hand,
deal with unstructured situations of a
novel, nonrecurring nature, often involving
incomplete knowledge, high uncertainty,
and the use of subjective judgment or even
intuition, where no alternative can be
proved to be the best possible solution to
the particular problem.
Such decisions become more and more
common the higher one goes in
management and the longer the future
period influenced by the decision is


PART 2
Individual Decision Making
Rational approach ideal method for how
managers should make decisions

Bounded rationality perspective how
decisions are made under severe time and
resource constraints
Steps in the Rational Approach
Rational decision making consists of all
optimizing, or maximizing, the outcome by
choosing the single best alternative from
among all possible ones,
Rationality requires a complete knowledge
and anticipation of the consequences that
will follow on each choice. In fact,
knowledge of consequences is always
fragmentary.

Since these consequences lie in the future,
imagination must supply the lack of
experienced feeling in attaching value to
them. But values can be only imperfectly
anticipated.
Rationality requires a choice among all
possible alternative behaviors. In actual
behavior, only a few of these possible
alternatives ever come to mind