For this Portfolio Project option, you will encapsulate what you have learned about leadership and about yourself throughout this course. Before you begin, reflect on all the assignments in the course

Personal Strategy Decision-making Outline

Efosa Aiworia

ORG 525 – Decision Theory in a Global Marketplace

Colorado State University-Global Campus

Dr. Mark Ellis

May 27, 2019

Abstract

In our everyday lives, there is a variety of choices that need to be sometimes made as simple as what to eat, where to go and what to wear, but in an organizational setting, making a decision can cause a company to succeed or result in its demise. Decision-making has evolved to coincide with leadership so much that it is challenging to consider one without the other, great leaders make the best decisions, but these decisions affect the shareholders, stakeholders, financial power of the company and the environment, i.e., climate change. Using Unilever as the fictitious organization that has been hit by the 2008 financial recession, it is safe to say that the organization is battling a national economic recession with a severe impact on its finances and stability. It is up to the Chief Operating Officer (COO) to make decisions regarding the situation that will impact the survival and demise of the organization.

Keywords: Decision-making, Unilever, leadership, theory, recession

Personal Strategy Decision-making Outline

As versatile as the human mind is, it sometimes finds complex tasks daunting, and decisions concerning things of import accompanied by intuition and weak guidance that often has serious consequences. To fully understand decision-making, it is essential to consider the mistakes the brain can make, the human brain relies on its environment and experiences to make decisions, often dependent on perception, beliefs, values, background, and appearances without a logical consideration of the steps involved in making a solid decision. Using intuition in decision-making is not all bad, and for quality decisions to be made via intuition a leader needs to understand their biases, and problem-solving steps, problem-solving steps are also used in rational decision making. In an organizational setting, decision-making is what an organization revolves around, and as the COO of an organization situated in a country going through an economic recession, it is vital to take measures to ensure the longevity of the organization. Decision-making involves judgment; judgment, according to Bazerman & Moore (2013) “refers to the cognitive aspect of decision-making” (p. 1). This paper is a two-page summary of a final portfolio project with the objective of elaboration the COO’s leadership role, decision-making process, approach and theories, and problem-solving process as it is relevant to the topic.

As the COO of the organization, there are three significant responsibilities assumed – designing and implementing business operations, creating policies that promote company culture and vision, and overseeing operations of the company and work of executives. In this event of economic recession, it is the job of the COO to develop measure subject to the Chief Executive Officers approval on how the organization is to cut their losses and move forward. The COO needs to evaluate the problem-solving skills put into the decision-making classified as Strategic – several acquisitions, reduction of offices, Structural – reducing the number of network branches, Process-oriented – integrating IT & operations of acquired banks and harmonizing their processes and People-oriented – workforce downsizing (Aravopoulou, Branine, Stone, Fotios, & Mitsaki, 2018).

The decision-making process used is rational, and it involves the eight problem-solving steps of the Discipline method developed at Ford Motors (Luczak &Wolniak, 2015). These problem-solving steps will be expanded upon as the portfolio grows. The decision-making process utilized is that posited by Bazerman & Moore (2013) that asserts – the definition of the problem as the first step – to solve any problem, a person must state the exact problem. The following steps involve identifying the criteria, weighing the criteria, generating alternatives, rate each alternative on similar standards, and compute the best decision (p. 3).

Subjective Expected Utility Theory – this theory emerged due to rational decision-making and the advancement of technology, mathematics, and innovation. This theory makes the argument that decisions are made to fulfill the most appealing outcome and stipulates subjectivity and uncertainty as part of the decision-making. The risk of an economic recession is massive enough to consider this theory. “Utility theory requires that a rational person be able to measure utility under all circumstances and to make choices and decisions accordingly” (Mustafa & Kingston, 2014, p. 24).

This paper is just a summary of future elaborations, there may be more theories and more talk on leadership, for now, it appears that people have difficulty behaving logically as humans are emotional beings which is why it is necessary to have a decision-making process and problem-solving process to aid with making decisions, so solutions are permanent.

References

Bazerman, M. H., & Moore, D. A. (2013). Judgment in managerial decision making. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

Eleni Aravopoulou, Mohamed Branine, Merlin Stone, Fotios, V. Mitsakis. (2018). Strategic decision-making process (SDMP) in times of crisis: Evidence from greek banks. Journal of Business and Retail Management Research, 12(4) Retrieved from https://csuglobal.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.csuglobal.idm.oclc.org/docview/2080786400?accountid=38569

Jacek Łuczak, & Radoslaw Wolniak. (2015). Problem-solving and developing quality

management methods and techniques on the example of automotive industry. Manager, 22(1), 237-250.

Mustafa, N., & Kingston, P. (2014). Organisational decision-making behaviour: A review of decision-making theories. Journal of Organisation and Human Behaviour, 3(1) Retrieved from https://csuglobal.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.csuglobal.idm.oclc.org/docview/1733218394?accountid=38569