Decision Making Process

In our regular day to day activities whether in personal lives or in our professional lives, we very often face situations filled with choices or alternatives. Choices may involve options for solution to a problem in hand, choosing a path at cross road (such as go or no-go decisions) etc. And we need to decide the seemingly best option or alternative to move forward. Decision making is one of the most important basic management skills for all of us. It is a cognitive ability. It can differ from person to person.

Making decision which are timely and which are based on careful analysis of various information is critical to our success. Decision making is a habit as well as a process. Decisions should neither be taken in haste nor be procrastinated indefinitely. Decision making can be hard sometimes. So to be on the safer side, a project management professional preparation course is the best way to make correct project decisions.

While the individual cognitive ability for decision making will depend on each individual, however, we can follow a well-structured process for decision making as suggested below:

[Please draw and insert a flow diagram showing the below steps]

1. Identify the decision to be made 

• What is the problem on hand
• What is the objective to be achieved 
• How the decision will impact people or the organization
• Urgency and criticality of the decision

2. Gather relevant information

It is important to gather all relevant information about the decision to be made with regards to above mentioned points. It will include identifying all various parties, stakeholders who will part of the decision, how the decision will be impact different groups or individuals or the organization etc.

3. Identify the options

We need to identify clearly all the available alternative options, paths or actions for the decision to be made. 

4. Evaluate the evidence

Evaluating all the options with their pros and cons needs to be carried out

5. Choose among alternatives

Choose the best alternative based on the above careful analysis of all the alternatives.

6. Implement the chosen alternative

Implement the actions associated with the alternative path or option being selected.

7. Analyse the results

We need to analyse the outcome achieved after the implementation of the actions selected in the above step.

Some of the tools and techniques which are used in the process of decision making includes but not limited to are market research, cost-benefit analysis, swot analysis, decision tree, T-chart, Pareto analysis, 5-why’s analysis etc.

Conclusion

Timely and well-thought decision making is extremely important for success in today’s time. We must take a logical approach for decision making. We must also inculcate the habit of decision making.