Friday, 24 April 2015
Thursday, 16 April 2015
Task 5- Contemporary technology responses- Personal decision making tools
Two Interesting things I've learned about overconfidence
Overconfidence reflects a natural tendency to overestimate our abilities and perceived chances of success
How overconfidence influence decision making
Overconfidence usually influence our decision making, it creates a bias decision and potentially distorts the estimation of the problem. People overestimate their abilities and chances of success. Individuals who are successful at a task are more likely to believe, mistakenly, that they will continue to be successful under new conditions and therefore they make the wrong decisions without realizing the consequences(Russo & Schoemaker, 2008) .
How to reduce the influence of overconfidence on decision making at my work place
Overconfidence usually influence our decision making, it creates a bias decision and potentially distorts the estimation of the problem. People overestimate their abilities and chances of success. Individuals who are successful at a task are more likely to believe, mistakenly, that they will continue to be successful under new conditions and therefore they make the wrong decisions without realizing the consequences
How to reduce the influence of overconfidence on decision making at my work place
We have high staff turnover due to the
nature of aviation and shift work. The newly trained employees start with
overconfidence because they quickly grasp the primary knowledge from the
training. Those employees become overconfidence after a week or two of working
solo, they overestimate their knowledge and they miss to factor uncertainty
into their judgments. As a result the employees make decisions that lead to all sorts of errors, security
breaches, safety breaches and aircrafts delays. As management, we spontaneously
give feedback to new employees, this only when the supervisors report the
problem.
In order to reduce the influence of
overconfidence on decision making at my work place, I need to work on applying an accelerated
feedback process to newly trained employees. For instance, this can be done by
giving them a feedback after the training is completed, then a week after they
work solo, and then once a month for the next six months. Hopefully after
giving them good quality feedback, it will reduce their overconfidence with the decision they make,
therefore, it will reduce mistakes. However, I need to conduct a leadership sessions for the senior staff and supervisors in order to improve their decision making and leadership skills. This because experience staff and supervisors overconfidence with their decisions can cause an undesirable outcomes that can be avoided if they managed to make the right decision. Supervisors working in the aviation continuously making instant decisions due to the nature of work and for being fast pace environment, no time to waste. Therefore, supervisors that work in such industry needs to be vigilent and good decision makers.
In addition, I believe accountability is
critical way to reduce staff overconfidence at my workplace. Usually when a
staff member or a supervisor make the wrong decision, we circulate an email to all staff explaining to
them the mistake and the consequences of their decision. Sometimes we debrief the
team after the flight departure to avoid such mistakes in decision making in the future. However,
in order to reduce overconfidence, we can apply an accountability process. The
accountability process can include a corrective action as well as a disciplinary
action. This way the staff will be held accountable, and it will reduce their
overconfidence by recalling that they are accountable if anything went wrong.
Reference
Russo, J.E, & Schoemaker, P.J. (1992).
Managing Overconfidence. Sloan Management Review, 33 (2).
Thursday, 2 April 2015
Monday, 30 March 2015
Sunday, 29 March 2015
Task 3- Decision making issues- uncertainty, biases, in personal and group decision making
I classify my thinking process as SYSTEM TWO, in which,
I think rationally considering facts and I put effort before making a decision.
However, the following story will examine my decision making under the
influence of decision bias.
Being the duty manager at the airport, I usually make
the final decision of any issue or challenge for our client airlines. The issue
started with the load controller on the next shift being sick and his spot was
uncovered. This means that no aircraft could depart without producing a load
sheet by a certified load controller. The next load controller doesn't start
work until five hours later.
All load sheets for schedule departures are produced
by the previous load controller apart from one departure. I arrived to work, there
was one load controller on shift but he was about to complete his shift as he
already worked 12 hours. The load controller on shift explained me how to
produce the load sheet. He convinced me that I can produce the load sheet
although I wasn't certified. However, if anything went wrong, it would've caused
a big issue. He influenced my decision by making it sound like it is an easy
job and nothing will go wrong, I wasn't comfortable and I did not feel in
control at all.
I had to decide between offloading 200 passengers or
produce a load sheet in which I am not qualified to do. Finally, under the
influence of framing bias and the fear of the consequences of offloading the
passengers I choose to produce the load sheet. My heart was beating fast and I
was shaking. I should not have done it and I wouldn't do if it ever happens
again.
In group decision making, the fears of the truth by
other group members distorts me the most, particularly at work. This is because
each group member has his/her own agenda; this shifts away the real
solution.
In order to tackle the problem, we have to be truthful
about the cause, even if we are personally responsible for the cause. Lots of
managers like to avoid the real problem instead of being responsible, admitting
the mistake and finding ways to resolving it.
I believe communication and politics at the work place
can improve the solutions of such problems. For instance, if the manager who
makes the final decision trusts my judgment then he/she would probably listen
to my opinion, when I talk to him/her in private. This way I can influence the
manager's decision before having a group meeting. I can form some sort of
lobbying in order to manipulate the group decision.
Friday, 27 March 2015
Saturday, 21 March 2015
Task 2- Inputs to decision making- data, information & knowledge; systems analysis
Sample document link:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9tldV0WKNETaWJ4UDloYnRGUFk/view?usp=sharing
Please visit the above link to read the blog for task 2.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B9tldV0WKNETaWJ4UDloYnRGUFk/view?usp=sharing
Please visit the above link to read the blog for task 2.
Sunday, 8 March 2015
Task 1- Decision Making Typologies
In order to demonstrate Simon's Model, I
will be sharing my personal experience where I believe Simon's Model was used
coincidently. In brief, I work as an Airport Duty Manager for a ground handling
company in Perth International Airport. My job consists of servicing airlines
and solves daily operational issues. I've been approached by my superior to
manage one of our disrupted departments to improve its performance as it was
causing an inconvenience to our clients.
Intelligence
Since I had no experience in this
particular section of our company, I started to gather information in order to
identify the problems and understand the challenges. I started this process by
questioning the staff and clients of what they perceive the problems are and
the reason for the department to have a poor performance. The process of collecting
information is referred to as "Intelligence" according to Simon's
Model.
Some of the problems I gathered showed that
staff had not been trained to do the job. Also there wasn't a trainer or
training courses locally in Perth to provide any form of training. This means
the current staffs had been doing the job without prior training.
In addition, some staff members had a
problem with their skills set and there wasn't a possibility to develop or
improve, which puts more pressure on the rest of the team members.
Also I gathered the department is undertaking
two different duties, which sends conflict messages to the staff. In this case,
the staff chose to do the easier task rather than the hard task.
Design
According to Simon's Model, the stage of
evaluating alternatives is called "Design".
To start, I had numerous of options for the
staffing issues. I could've kept the current staff and work with them hoping
they will develop or relocate some staff to other departments.
Regarding the multiple duties issue, I
could've carried on with the same structure and manage it differently on day to
day basis, or separate the duties by creating teams so each team handles and
focuses on different duties/tasks.
For the training issue, I had an option of
training the whole team by a trainer coming from Brisbane, or sending a local
staff member to Auckland to be trained as a trainer.
Choice
The stage of making a decision about the
alternatives called "Choice".
After weighing the alternatives available,
I decided to concise the department from 25 to 11 staff members in order to
focus and develop a small team of employees. I provided each team member with specific
guidelines of their tasks/responsibilities. The department is no longer
responsible for multiple tasks.
In regards to the training issue, I've
decided to send one staff member to attend a course in Auckland in order to be
able to train the rest of the team in Perth.
Implementation
"Implementation" is the process
of putting decisions into effect, allocate resources and control.
Implementation was the hardest stage
because I had to face the employees with the upcoming changes. Indeed, some of
the changes did not suite some of the staff members, some felt threatened and
some felt unsecure about their jobs.
As a result of the change, everybody's
roster needed to be changed and tweaked few times before finding the best fit.
I was also challenged with unexpected
outcomes where some of the reliable employees had to resign because of personal
issues. Others took a sick leave which left a big gap of uncovered spots in the
roster.
Conclusion
Simon's
normative model of decision making is practical and can be used in our daily
decision making process. Simon's Model can
be improved by adding an additional stage after the implementation stage. This
stage can be called "assessing and finalizing". Here, the decision maker
assesses the implementation, twist and change, and then finalizes the process
of implementation.
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