37 Organizational Decision Making 1 Incremental Decision Process

37 Organizational Decision Making 1

Incremental Decision Process Model • The identification of sequential steps in the process of decision making was carried out by the research of Henry Mintzberg • This approach, the incremental decision process model, places less emphasis on the political and social factors of the Carnegie model, but tells more about the structured sequence of activities undertaken from the discovery of a problem to its solution • One major findings of this research is that major organizational choices are usually a series of small choices that combine to produce the major decision. Thus many organizational decisions are a series of nibbles rather than a big bite. 2

Three Decision Phases 1. Identification phase: – – problem, recognition, diagnosis more info is gathered 2. Development phase: – i. ii. development of a solution can have two forms or directions: search procedures design a custom solution, when the problem is novel 3. Selection phase: – the solution is chosen 3

Learning Organizations & Decision Making • Here the problems are novel and unique, uncertain environment plus complexity • Two approaches to decision making used, – one is the combination of Carnegie model and Incremental approach – the other is the unique approach called the Garbage Can model 4

Combination Approach • Carnegie model’s coalitions specially helpful in problem identification stage • Solutions reached through the incremental step approach 5