Posted by Chester Morton / Friday, 1 December 2017 / No comments
Types of decision making - Non-programmed decision making
TYPES OF DECISION MAKING - NON-PROGRAMMED DECISIONS
Definition of decision making
Decision making represents a process of choosing the best
alternative from among many possible options available to the manager of a business unit. A manager at any given moment of making a decision concerning the
business would first of all assess all the different alternative decisions
which the business can take. Each of these alternative decisions will be looked
at in terms of their advantages and disadvantages which are known to the
managers of the business. From this evaluation, a final decision may be arrived
at. Weighing the merits and demerits of each choice or option helps the
managers of the company to make the best decisions.
One must bear in mind that decision making is an important
function of management. Without this managerial function of decision making,
other functions of management such as planning, directing, organizing and
staffing cannot be performed because each of these function involve making
decisions. In the words of Stephen Robins, “decision making is the selection of
a preferred course of action from two or more alternatives.”Non-Programmed decisions are made in unstructured situations
which reflect new situation because these situations don’t happen frequently
and are also complex in nature.
TYPES OF DECISION MAKING
Introduction
Introduction
Decision making can be categorized into two main types; Programmed decision making and non-programmed decision making.
NON-PROGRAMMED DECISION MAKING
Non-Programmed decisions are made in unstructured situations. Unstructured situations reflect new dimensions because these do not happen frequently
and they are also complex in nature.
Since these problems rarely happens or have never
happened before, they need a lot of brainstorming to have it solved. In these
kinds of situations, managers rely on a combination of skill, subjective
judgment, a great deal of scientific analysis and a considerable amount of
logical reasoning.
Subjective judgment is needed to evaluate the situation. Non-Programmed
decisions carry in them a fair degree of uncertainty because while in the view
of the manager the decision is meant to address the problem, the outcome is
seldom known or is always not known; principally because they are taken in the
context of a dynamic business environmental conditions.
By way of example, let us take a situation where a manager
takes a decision to increase the advertising expenditure of a business,
undertake a coaching in effective salesmanship for his staff, upgrade the technology
used in producing his product, yet he notices that profit margins are still
falling. A situation of this nature requires immediate action and such decision
may be non-programmed.
The various kinds of non-programmed decisions include: Personal decisions, Strategic
decisions, Crisis intuitive decisions, and Problem-solving decisions.
We can summarize the main features of non-programmed decision
as follows:
- Situations
which require that a non-programmed decision be taken are unique and
ill-structured or unstructured
- Non-programmed
decisions are usually one off decisions.
- They
make managers rely on intuition and subjective judgment, personal intuition, and
innovativeness.
- A
non-programmed decision is taken when there are extraordinary and unexpected
problems.
- A non-programmed decision involves a combination of common sense and trial and error.
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