What Makes Strategic Decisions Different by Phil Rosenzweig - Article Example

Article Critique Phil, R 2013, ‘What Makes Strategic Decisions Different: You have to know what kind of decision you’re making in order to make it well’. Harvard Business Review, pp.88-93. Name Unit Title Introduction Article summary The article by Phil Rosenzweig “What Makes Strategic Decisions Different” looks critically at decision making with empathizes on the business executives. The article argues that despite the availability of research on decision making, business executives have not been able to apply the lessons learnt. The advancement in the literature on decision making has not been able to bring the expected changes. The article argues that business executives do not fail to implement the lessons due to ignorance or assumption, but due to the inadequacy of the research. The author argues that the current literature on decision making looks at only one form of decision making (Phil, 2013). The type of decision that the current research have focused on is not what most of the executives faces. According to the article, the executives face strategic decisions with consequences. The fact is that decisions that are made in a certain circumstance may not be applied in other. According to the author, people need to be informed on the differences between different decisions. The manager can only succeed in making strategic decisions when they know the type of decision they face. Decisions are composed of two categories; control and performance. Control refers to the ability of influencing the outcome and terms of the decision. Performance looks at the way in which we gauge the outcome success. Combing performance and control lead to the four fields of decision (Phil, 2013). According to the author, the four fields of decisions are making of routine choices and judgments; influencing outcomes; placing competitive bids and managing for strategic success. For the firsts and the second type of decisions, the person has no control but have an absolute performance. These according to the author are decisions based on consumer choices personal decisions. In the fourth field, the person can be able to influence the outcome. This is where the need for outperforming our rivals occurs. The strategic management decision is categorized in the fourth quadrant. These are challenging decisions that the managers are faced with in running organizations. The choices that are made by the executives are only successful if they can outdo their rivals (Phil, 2013). According to the article, improving on how we make decisions in the fourth quadrant can greatly benefit business executives. Most of the research is said to have been focused on the first type of decision making. According to the article, only those who can think beyond will be able to make successful decision in the fourth quadrant. From the article, the decision maker is required to be able to determine the type of decision that they are facing and respond to it with the required approach. The executives who are making the fourth type of decisions need to have a talent for analysis and take daring actions (Phil, 2013). Strengths and weakness of the author’s arguments From the article, the author argues that the main reason that research on decision making have not been taken up by executives is due to wrong literature. The current research does not look at the most challenging decision making that the executives’ faces (Phil, 2013). The author has been able to support this claim with sufficient view points. The author has argued on the claim giving appropriate examples which are able to give insight into the decision making. The argument support is clear since he has used real life examples which make it more credible. In this case, using examples in argument makes it more credible. This enables the reader to get the real picture of the basis of claims. Also the strength of the arguments by the author is clarity. Through the article, the author has been able to maintain a clear argument which has been supported by appropriate explanation. The author uses the right language which makes it easy to get the claims and their supports. This is by using the appropriate vocabularies and terms which are relevant in the field. Being able to give the argument in a clear language has made it possible for the reader to understand and relate with the author. The author’s argument is reasonable. The author uses words which does not invoke emotions. This makes the argument more strong as he does not give the reader a chance to doubt him. The argument by the author is reasonable. This is due to fact that most of the arguments made are genuine and applicable in real life. The main weakness lies in the lack of appropriate support evidence to the claims. For example, the author argues that most of the business executives do not follow the solutions in decision making offered by the current research. The claim is not supported by plausible evidence making it hard to authenticate it. This leads to some of the claims being biased. The author has bias in the argument by regarding the current research inadequate without appropriate support to the claim. The arguments also lack appropriate support from other writers. There are also no relevant facts and statistics on the article’s arguments. View point I agree with the article’s thesis statement. This is due to the fact that executives are faced with very difficult decisions which require more research than basic decisions. These are decisions that cannot be solved using the convectional procedures used in making everyday decisions. In making a decision, there is a need to understand what type of decision is. There is a need for the people to be informed on the types of decisions so that they can make strategic decisions. The researchers have to categorize the decisions so that it becomes easy to choose the model to follow (Phil, 2013). There is a need to understand that executive decisions requires more critical thinking than the rest of the decisions. The executives are supposed to be able analyze their moves before coming to the final decision (Larrick, 2004). Most of the business executive decisions lacks an appropriate prediction model. This requires the person involved in making the decision to be vigilant and not base the decision on bias (Pugh, 2007). Strategic decisions can be easily influenced on their outcomes. These are decisions which their success means outdoing the rivals. The author has been supported by the fact that the decisions are concerned with a competitive business situation. I agree that decisions that are implemented by business executives are vital and can only be measured by outcomes. The executive decisions are determined by their consequences (Idson, et al. 2004). If the decision is able to give the firm a competitive edge, it’s considered a good decision. It has been determined that the position of the decision maker in organization determines the skills that are required in making the decision. In an organization, decision makers can be categorized as executives, managers and supervisors (Miller, Hickson & Wilson, 1996). The business executives are expected to have the highest level of intuition. This is through the ability to foresee the threats and opportunity that a decision presents (Stanovich & West, 2000). The decisions that are made at lower levels in an organization do not require a lot of intuition. These are decisions consisting of clear consequences and are less ambiguous (Thompson, Gentner & Loewenstein, 2000). This shows that decision making differs and the research cannot categorize decision making using one model for all decision makers. According to me, I support categorizing the decisions into four. Based on the fact that strategic decision is different than routine decisions, I support that there is a need to look at them differently. This can only be done through understanding them as a different category with unique characteristics. The more we understand the repercussions of making a certain decision, the more likely we will think deeply (Bartol, et al. 2010). This involves the use of empirically tested methods which can help in coming up with better decisions. This is why the author argues that the executive must have good analysis and ability to take brave actions. There is a need for more research on strategic decision making. This is a point that has been expressed by several writers. The current research cannot adequately support an executive in making decision. There is need to come up with a decision making model for the executives (Bazerman & Moore, 2008). This will enable them to make structured decisions that will be able to have good performance. According to Mintzberg et al. (1976), there is a way in which a decision presents itself. This is due to fact that there must be a stimulus to evoke it. In executives, the stimulus is the organization well being or an idea that can help the organization gain a competitive advantage. This shows how important the executive decisions are and need for more insight into them. Conclusion The article gives insight into the current t literature in decision making and their inadequacy to help in making business executives decision. Decisions are divided into four levels with the business executives taking the fourth level. The author argues that the current literature have been focused on two levels of decision making leaving the third and fourth level with little research. According to the article, there is need to understand the complexity involved in making executive decisions. These are decisions which success is determined from the performance. The outcome must enable a competitive advantage to the business. The main strength of the article is the use of examples and use of clear words. The report is also reasonable and has avoided invoking emotions in the argument. The main weakness lies on the fact that the author lacks enough support for the claims. There is no credible evidence that can validate the argument. Despite this, I agree with the thesis statement due to the evidenced that I have gathered from the literature. There is an inadequacy in research on business executives’ decision making. References Bartol, T., Matthews, S & Scott-Ladd, 2010, Management - A pacific rim focus 6e, Australia: Mcgraw Hill. Bazerman, M.H. & Moore, D. 2008, Judgment in Managerial Decision Making, 7th ed. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc Idson, L. C., Chugh, D., Bereby-Meyer, Y., Moran, S., Grosskopf, B., & Bazerman, M. 2004, ‘Overcoming focusing failures in competitive environments’, Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, Vol. 17, no.3, pp.159-172. Larrick, R. P. 2004, Debiasing. In D. J. Koehler & N. Harvey (Eds.), Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making. Oxford, England: Blackwell Publishers Miller, S.J., Hickson, D & Wilson, D 1996, ‘Decision making in organizations’. In S.R. Clegg, C. Hardy, & W.R. Nord (Eds.), Managing Organizations: Current Issues,London: Sage Publications. Mintzberg, H., Raisinghani, D & Theoret, A. 1976, ‘The structure of “unstructured” decision processes’. Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol.21, pp.246-275 Phil, R 2013, ‘What Makes Strategic Decisions Different: You have to know what kind of decision you’re making in order to make it well’. Harvard Business Review, pp.88-93. Pugh, D. S. (Ed.). 2007, Organization theory, London, Penguin. Stanovich, K & West, R 2000, ‘Individual differences in reasoning: Implications for the rationality debate’, Behavioral & Brain Sciences, Vol.23, pp.645-665. Thompson, L., Gentner, D & Loewenstein, J 2000, ‘Avoiding missed opportunities in managerial life: Analogical training more powerful than individual case training’. Organizational Behavior & Human Decision Processes, Vol. 82, no.1, pp. 60-75. Read More