Group Decision Making - Essay Example

Group Decision Making Contents Bibliography 13 Introduction The Car parts manufacturing company was owned by Mr. George Clarke. The company’s initial decision was taken by the owner itself but now George plans to set up a senior management group in order to take decisions on various issues related to the company. The main aim of the report is to analyse whether the group decision making (GDM) have over the individual decision making, and what are the factors that are to be included in the GDM. The main problem that the owner of the company is facing regards the people who would be included in the group for taking business decision and what are the processes that needs to be followed in order to implement a successful group for decision making that would benefit the company. On the basis of the problem that have been identified in the case there is some key research objectives such as – To study the advantages of group over individuals in taking key decisions for the company. To analyse the factors that triggers the effectives of a GDM approach. On the basis of the research some recommendations for the car parts manufacturing company so as to improve upon the GDM approach that is to be incorporated into the system. The report would encompass the potential advantages of the group decision and its relevance to the car parts manufacturing company, and then it would even highlight the way of optimising the approach so that the company can maximise the benefits and finally it would be concluded with a brief recommendation for the company on the best possible ways that the company can focus on in order to the resolve the problem that is described in the case. The structured report would be beneficial for the company to address its problems regarding the setting up of the group for decision making. Literature on GDM GDM is also at times called as collaborative decision making. In this approach the individuals collectively makes decision or a choice from the set of alternatives. The decision is taken as a group and it is not attributable to any single member of the group. The GDM is very much different as compared to that taken by the individuals and it comprises of the decision to the extreme (Allison and Messick, 1985, pp. 563-569). The government cabinets, juries, board members are some examples that states that the GDM is more advantageous compared to that of the individuals. The reasons behind this are that in terms of intelligence and knowledge the group increases the resources and hence the combination becomes much more beneficial compared to that of individual, a group of members have an increased effort and motivation that is directed towards the task, and it even enhances the level of creativity and quick identification and solving of errors in the system (Allison and Messick, 1985, pp. 573-579). The idea of synergy states that the decision made by the individuals is not so effective as compared to that made collectively. Group potentially produces better ideas in terms of three main aspects such as criteria, cause and alternatives. The criteria factor states that GDM facilitates more of the stakeholders to be included into the group and this in turn gives the flexibility to them to incorporate their interest in the criteria of the decision making. When different expertise holding individuals are included in the group it seems to increase the possibility that more of assumptions regarding the cause and effects would be taken in the decision making process. The group tends to deliver a more number of options that are creative and innovative (Comer, 1995, pp. 647-667). It is described in Appendix 1. The Group Model for the decision making process states that the group arrives at a decision that is aligned with the interest of the individual members and the group decision is more towards the satisfaction of the group members. The two major benefits that the GDM offers are in terms of sharing of information and synergy. Synergy relates to the aspect that the most desirable outcome can only be achieved when many minds come together and are involved in the decision making process. This even encompasses the aspect that group tends to achieve the social economies of scope in which the quality of the decision take is increased as more brains are involved in the process (Einhorn et al., 1977, pp. 158-172). Another advantage that is stated is of sharing of knowledge and if this factor is executed properly than it tends to deliver much sound decisions. The major objective of the group is to emphasise on the information that is being shared and to unlock the information that is not being shared to further improve upon the quality of the decisions taken by the group (Gurtner et al., 2007, pp. 127-142). There are some significant reasons as to why the benefits of the group is often ignored for the decision making approach. The individuals that are working in a group are subjected to cognitive demands as a result the motivational and cognitive biases affect the GDM process. There exist three different forms of biases that the group can be subjected to while making decisions. Firstly are the sins of commission, which relates to the inappropriate or misuse of the information. This results in the group members using the information that have been already been said to be ignored, or the use of some inaccurate information for the decision making, or over-estimating the past knowledge and the experience and hence the possible outcome. Secondly it is the sins of omission, in which the useful information is overlooked (Hall and Watson, 1971, pp. 299-317). This relates to the group members being more concerned towards the individual behaviour of the members in the decision making and ignoring some of the vital applicable information. Thirdly are the sins of imprecision, in which the group members rely on those kinds of information that are available readily or the members tends to rely on the factors of the decision making that tends to mislead though it seems to be meaningful (Janis, 1972, pp. 73-74). The major drawback that the GDM process has that makes its benefits to be overlooked is that of the biasness towards group members. In a group the members who have the power or a greater level of confidence are often given more of preference even if they do not possess the necessary knowledge base for the decision making process. The individuals often in a group tend to compromise on their own experience and knowledge in order to go with the majority. The group always focuses on the information that is available to all the members rather than discussing on the information that is available for an individual but may be beneficial for the company for a long run (Isenberg, 1986, pp. 1141-1145). Often if the group size is large the decision making process takes time due to conflicting knowledge and experience and the time are spend on resolving the conflicts. It even ignores the contribution of an individual and focuses more on the group contribution which lowers down the motivation level and this result into inefficient contribution of an individual towards the group. In relevance to the case the company have been operating from the past 15 years on individual decision making approach (Isenberg, 1986, pp. 1148-1151). The literature review states that an ideal group can be one in which there is an ideal flow of knowledge and this can be only possible if the group comprises of managers and even some of the talented lower rank employees (Kerr and Tindale, 2004, pp. 623-635). The five major benefits that the new approach would bring about in the car manufacturing company is tapping into a larger knowledge and information base, the diversity of people in the group would help in making complex decisions on the basis of alternative options and feedback, there would even be greater buy in or acceptance as the decision makers would be involved in the entire process, it would even help in providing a collaborative environment and would result into more accountability of the group members in their specific areas of responsibility, and the approach does not only provide a support for the decision making procedure but also helps in reducing the risk that is associated with taking a bad decision (Kerr and Tindale, 2004, pp. 653-655). Ways of optimising GDM In the context of the case of car parts manufacturing company there exist three different approaches that can be implemented by the company so as to maximise on the outcomes on the GDM. The three approaches are – mathematical, behavioural, and structured approaches. Mathematical approach is suitable in certain situations only where there is a need for the incorporating judgements of the individuals into the decision making. This approach can be well explained with the help of an example of inflation rate where each individual may have different opinions and it is always observed that there are disagreements when the experts forecast their opinions. The mathematical approach encompasses various statistical measures in order to choose the best of judgements from all the opinions given by the experts. The simple average method is the one that is used in this kind of approach. The judgements are meant to be statistically independent from each other and hence when there is an increase in N it would help to facilitate the improvement of the judgement to be selected. In this approach there is no need to bring the group together at the same time (Park, 2000, pp. 156-157). The group consisting of the individuals outperform itself in the process but if there is complicated information then it would be not so beneficial. However the approach indicates that the judgements need not be statistically independent of each other and so the same information is used behind the opinions which results into the same kind of biases and errors. This is the condition in certain situations where there is more of uncertainty and risks. In these conditions there is no such improvement observed with the help of simple averages. In this approach the main problem is the identification amongst all the judgements so as to select the judgement which would be given the most weightage. This involves three kinds of procedures such as self rating, performance related weighting, and rating entire group. The self rating comprises of rating of the perceived expertise of the individual. In the rating entire group process the entire group member’s rates everybody and then measures are incorporated to give weightage to the individuals and this method can even be computerised (Newall and Lagnado, 2007, pp. 125-126). In the performance related weighting the more focus is on identifying those opinions that has been proved to be more accurate in the past years and the ones that are most accurate are given more weightage. The principle though sounds good but it is difficult to be executed in practice. The problems comprise of criteria for success and even the time frame for which the performance would be considered and even it needs some statistical support for the execution of the process. The behavioural approach is the method that tries to identify the various reasons of conflictions that prevail in the group interaction and even adopts certain measures so as to handle such issues effectively in order to facilitate the decision making process on various judgements. This approach can be facilitated by imparting some skills in the group members so that they can involve in the decision making process and not engage into any kind of arguments. In this approach the leader plays the most important role in which the leader needs to encourage the team members to come up with their objections and queries and the leaders should possess the skills to handle effectively the various criticisms that comes up from all the team members (Turner and Pratkanis, 1998, pp. 213-214). The leader should be come up with their opinions and beliefs only when the group members have put across their opinions. The leaders need to remain impartial in the initial stages of the group discussion. The group following this approach needs to be divided sub committees so that they are able to discuss on the various issues independently and when the discussion is completed they can be involved in solving out various difficulties. The experts should be incorporated in the decision making process only at times and they would be involved so as to challenge the various opinions of the group so that the best judgement can be enhanced further and implemented. The devil’s advocate for each of the meeting of the group is played by one member (Schulz-Hardt et al., 2006, pp. 617-619) A second method in this approach is to provide the group with certain guidelines and training so that the decision making process is well structured. Their needs to be specific rules for the communication process so that the entire method can be well governed. Some of the guidelines that can be conducted are avoiding any kind of win loss statements, avoid the techniques of conflict reducing such as average, majority vote, bargaining, etc., avoid arguing, avoid any kind of opinion change so as to avoid any conflictions and to facilitate harmony in the group, the initial agreement should be viewed as a suspect and the opinion differences should not be regarded as hindrance but as something very natural (Schulz-Hardt et al., 2002, pp. 445-446). The statistical models seem to achieve the results but the group who has been conducted with these kinds of instructions seems to deliver the best of bottom line output. The instructions are so well formed that they guide the entire group towards proper decision making. The structured approach is that form of approach in which a very systematic procedure is encompassed leading towards decision making. It combines some of the strategic units of the system and is less prone towards being affected by any kind of uncertainty or risk. The most commonly used techniques in this approach comprises of nominal group technique and Delphi method. The Delphi method was first invented in the Rand Corporation by Dalkey and some of its co-workers. This method comprises of sequence of iterative process. In this process that the judgements are made individually first and then the information is received about the other people’s judgements. This information is then incorporated by them so as to revise on their own opinions. The interactions are then summed up and the mean is taken out of what is left. This approach is mainly utilized in some form of predictions of the future events. The approach is often surrounded by a lot of controversies and there is no such result that indicates that the method has lead to a better forecast for the future (Schweiger et al., 1986, pp. 113-114). The ideas that are generated following this approach are judged on the basis of merits rather than by being biased towards the source for the idea generation. The Delphi approach is beneficial in terms that it limits the effect of any form of social pressure or conformity and even eliminates any kind of production blocking. The second method in this approach is the nominal group technique. This technique comprises of various steps and initially it starts with the assessment of individual, and then this kind of assessment is then recorded and announced in the group meetings that are conducted face to face. Then the process is further executed through a discussion that is carried out on judgements for evaluation and clarification (Stewart and Stasser, 1995, pp. 175-176). The final judgement is then obtained through a mathematical aggression that is carried out the set of selected judgements. This approach has always outperformed though the effects are small but the process is very structured which enables better results that are more practical. Both the structured approaches follow a certain procedure so it helps to reduce any form of arguments in the group and there is no biasness towards a particular idea as it is supported by statistical measures. Recommendations and Conclusion The owner of the car parts manufacturing company has planned on implementing a group for the decision making process. Groups often provide the best possible solution for any issue as compared to that taken by individuals. A group comprises of people that have different expertise and knowledge and this makes it beneficial for the company as the sharing of knowledge facilitates an effective decision making. It is recommended that the company should involve into the group those individuals who has an experience in the company for a long time and knows about the entire business operations. The group would include the managers of the different operational fields of the business. Mr. George Clarke would be the leader of the group as he has taken decisions for the last 15 years and can contribute his valuable opinion in the decision making for the company. The group is recommended to follow the reflective thinking process in order to optimise on the decision making. The group that is to be formed by George Clarke for its company needs to follow a participative style where the group members would be responsible for the entire decision making process and in which group defines the issue and sets on the alternative solutions to address the issue and process facilitator would be the role of the leader of the group. This collaborative approach would maximise the revenues of the company and even would create a satisfactory working environment for the company. Bibliography Allison, S. and Messick, D. M. 1985. The group attribution error. Journal of Experimental Psychology. Vol. 21 (6), pp. 563-579. Comer, D. R. 1995. A model of social loafing in real work groups. Human Relations. Vol.48 (6), pp. 647-667. Einhorn, H. J., Hogarth, R. M., and Klemper, E. 1977. Quality of group judgement. Psychological Bulletin. Vol. 84, pp. 158-172. Gurtner, A., Tschan, F., Semmer, N. K. and Nagele, C. 2007. Getting groups to develop good strategies: Effects of reflexivity interventions on team process, team performance, and shared mental models. Organisational Behavior and Human Performance. Vol.102, pp. 127-142 Hall, J. and Watson, W.H. 1971. The effects of a normative intervention on group decision-making performance. Human Relation. Vol. 23, pp. 299–317. Isenberg, H. 1986. Group polarisation: a critical review and meta-analysis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Vol. 50 (6), pp. 1141-1151. Janis, I. 1972. Victims of Groupthink. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Kerr, N. L. and Tindale, R. S. 2004. Group Performance and Decision making. Annual Review of Psychology, Vol. 55, pp. 623-55. Newall, B, R. and Lagnado, D. A. 2007. Straight Choices. UK: Routledge. Park, W. 2000. A comprehensive empirical investigation of the relationships among variables of the groupthink model. Journal of Organisational Behavior. Vol.21, pp. 873-887. Schulz-Hardt, S., Brodbeck, F. C., Mojzisch, A. Kerschreiter, R. and Frey, D. 2006. Group decision making in hidden profile situations: Dissent as a facilitator for decision quality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Vol. 91 (6), pp. 1080-1093. Schulz-Hardt, S., Jochims, M. and Frey, D. 2002. Productive conflict in group decision making. Organisational Behavior and Human Decision Processes. Vol. 88, pp. 563-586. Schweiger, D., Sandberg, W. and Ragan, J. 1986. Group approaches for improving strategic decision making: A comparative analysis of dialectical inquiry, devils advocacy and consensus. Academy of Management Journal. Vol. 29, pp. 51-71. Stewart, D. D. and Stasser, G. 1995. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Vol. 69, pp. 619-628. Turner, M. E. and Pratkanis, A. R. 1998. Twenty-Five years of Groupthink Theory and Research: Lessons from the evaluation of a theory. Organisational Behavior and Human Decision Processes. Vol. 73 (2/3), pp. 105-115. Appendices Appendix 1 Read More