Page 119 - Fundamentals of Management Myths Debunked (2017)_Flat

What are the approaches
3

Managers Can use to Make Decisions?

4-2 Explain the three approaches managers can use to make decisions.

Decision making is the essence of management. 10

• Everyone in an organization makes decisions, but it’s

particularly important to managers.
• Managers make decisions—mostly routine ones like which

employee will work what shift, what information to include in © mihaela19750405/Fotolia
a report, how to resolve a customer’s complaint, etc.—as they

plan, organize, lead, and control. See Exhibit 4–6.
Exhibit 4–6 Decisions Managers May Make

Planning Leading
What are the organization’s long-term objectives? How do I handle unmotivated employees?
What strategies will best achieve those objectives? What is the most effective leadership style in a given
What should the organization’s short-term situation?
objectives be? How will a speci c change affect worker productivity?
How dif cult should individual goals be? When is the right time to stimulate conict?

Organizing Controlling
How many employees should I have report directly to me? What activities in the organization need to be
How much centralization should there be in an controlled?
organization? How should those activities be controlled?
How should jobs be designed? When is a performance deviation signi cant?
When should the organization implement a different What type of management information system
structure? should the organization have?
source: Robbins, Stephen P., Coulter, Mary, Management, 13th Ed., © 2016, p. 45. Reprinted and electronically reproduced by permission of Pearson Education, Inc., New York, NY.
• Managers want to be good decision makers and exhibit good decision-making behaviors

so they appear competent and intelligent to their boss, employees, and coworkers.
McCarony/Fotolia
1 Rational Model 11

• This approach assumes: Decision makers MUST ACT RATIONALLY.
How? Use rational decision making; that is, make logical rational decision making

and consistent choices to maximize value. 12 Describes choices that are consistent and value-
maximizing within specified constraints
(Check out the two decision-making tools described in the Technology and the Manager’s Job box on p. 121.)
118