Decision Making Techniques and Approaches

This assignment delves into the multifaceted world of decision making. It examines different techniques and approaches employed across various disciplines such as business, environmental science, and healthcare. The analysis encompasses structured decision-making processes, heuristic decision making, and multi-criteria decision making models. The provided text explores the relationship between data science, big data, and data-driven decision making, highlighting the importance of systems thinking in management science. Ethical considerations in decision making are also addressed, emphasizing the need for a balanced approach that considers both rational and intuitive aspects.

ANALYTICAL
THINKING
AND
DECISION MAKING

TABLE OF CONTENT
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................3
TASK...............................................................................................................................................3
P1 Importance of decision making and application of decision analysis...............................3
P2 Identify and outline decision problem...............................................................................6
P3 Apply simple multi-attribute rating technique to outlined decision making.....................8
P4 Strengths and limitations of analysis...............................................................................10
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
Analytical thinking and decision making may refers to new approach for problem solving
more quickly and properly. This term may sound complicated but it is actually the easiest and
most effective way to cut to chase to get correct solution (Dane, Rockmann and Pratt, 2012).
This report is based on General Motors which in an American multinational corporation
headquartered in Detroit that designs, manufactures, markets and distributes vehicles and its
parts as well as sells financial services. The company was founded by William C. Durrant around
the year 1908 . It is a kind of organisation which deals at global level having number of locations
around 396 facilities on six continents. The given assignment which includes importance and
application of decision making analysis with determining a specific decision problem related to
work. This will also discuss about application of simple multi attribute rating technique to
outline decision problem. There are various strengths and limitations of analysis which are
needed to be explained in detail in respect of issues. General Motors has to analyse the
situational aspects to take decision along with evaluating it.
TASK
P1 Importance of decision making and application of decision analysis
Decision making is process of selecting world class choices among accessible
alternatives. There are numerous decisions are taken and implemented within an organisation in
day to day routine life for obtaining better and fruitful outcomes (Subramoniam and et. al.,
2013). Making and applying a decision within commercial business retailer enterprise especially
General Motors can be treated as problem solving approach by applying and implementing
communication skills. And it is accepted at global level so that managerial work cannot be

implemented and formulated without strong decision making skills. There are various
importance of decision making which are discussed below:
Utilisation of Resources: There are sample of resources available within business
corporation of General motor company. But utilisation and implementation of resources is most
important aspect requisite for making as well as formulating suitable decisions which are fruitful
for organisation.
Selecting the best alternatives: There are so many different approaches are available in
market for solving or taking specific decision. So, selection of the best suitable approach is done
by using different available software tools or by utilising skills as well as financial and statistical
results for desirable outcomes in future.
Evaluation of Managerial Performance: Decision making approach is not only crucial
for selecting best fruitful decision among various acceptable and available options but it is also
important for evaluating as well as analysing performance of managers or team leaders.
Enhancing Motivation Level: This process also plays important roles in motivating
group of employees who work within this commercial organisation. It provides overall relevant
information regarding decisions which are taken previously or in future which helps in operating
a decision in a fruitful manner (Reyna and Brainerd, 2011).
Indispensable Component: Decision making process is an indispensable element for
each and every level of employees of management within commercial retailer enterprise success.
Because without formulation and implementing suitable decisions at right duration of time, they
are unable to attain desired targets of plan at particular period of time limits provided.
Achievements of Objectives: Decision making procedure is essential for attaining
enterprise goals and objectives within given time period and financial budget. For achieving
company's goals, the best alternatives are searched and utilise relevant resources in an efficient
manner to complete the desirable aspects of company..
Pervasive Function: Decision making activity is applying and implementing at each and
every level of managerial post. Just like top, intermediate and ground level management
authority form and apply strategic decision, tactical decision and daily routine life decisions
which helps in attaining desired outcomes.
Application of Decision Analysis

Decision analysis cite as wide quantitative field, related to research and development as
well as statistics. This may deals with optimization and analysis of decisions and judgements
made or formulated by individuals, group of peoples or commercial business organisation.
Motive behind decision analysis is to provide assistance to decision makers in formulating and
implementing decisions in a more effective an efficient manner under complex situations
(Epstein, 2013). Decision analytic structure or model helps decision maker in applying and
implementing decisions in a systematic and structured manner for achieving company's desired
objectives in a fruitful way. There are several elements which are included in all complex
decisions making processes and they are-
 Decision: All simple, complex as well as miscellaneous decisions are formulated and
implemented by decision makers.
 Uncertain Event: Those events or circumstances whose outcome determines regime of
nature.
 Consequences: These consequences will came from results of the decisions which are
taken and implemented by decision maker as well as from the outcomes of uncertain
physical phenomenon (Schmold and et. al., 2013).
 Objectives and preferences: These can be refers to such aspects which may find out
about the circumstances and environment in which decision can build be managers or
leaders to fulfil desired prospect of company.
 Decision analysis broadly used in business and government judgement making as well as
medical diagnosis and treatment, negotiations and litigations. A non-comprehensive list
of most common applications are:
Business Sector:
 Airline and hotel production management.
 Quality assurance and control.
 Reliability and maintenance.
 New product development and venture launching (Saaty, 2013).
 Credit and loan portfolio management.
Government Sector:
 Environment risk management.
 Research and development programmes.

 Emergency management.
Common Sector:
 Medical diagnosis and treatment.
 Litigation.
 Biding and negotiations.
P2 Identify and outline decision problem
It is very important to first identify various problems which need to be sorted out for
facilitating smooth and effective work in company to attain desired profits. The situational
analysis can be broken down into specific elements to determine causes behind it (Groves, Vance
and Choi, 2011). General Motors has a problem of raw material supply which needs to be solved
by several techniques that may sort out issues of supply more effectively and efficiently. Some of
useful strategies in such aspects are given below:
 Planning based on real demand insights and shaping: - There should be a correct
prediction as well as contingency planning methods which are needed to be ensure a
complete view. Along with that, they have to consider effective response to risk like
suppliers going out of business. Political upheaval and natural calamities of
manufacturing. General Motors has to adjust pricing and promotional strategies to shape
demand, move additional product, drive revenue growth or further expand margins for
high demand with limited market supply.
 Build an adaptive and agile supply chain: - this may refers to that technique by which
an executive become able to analyse and shape demand with risk. And they need to
modify their supply chains as per changing trends of market having various opportunities
as well as benefits. General Motors company must deploy dynamic planning capabilities
and continually fine tune operations. This will help to ensure responsive agility to meet
changing demand (Pearson, 2013). By this technique, enterprises may reduce or even
eliminate shocks across supply chain network. It will facilitate better visibility and
enhanced collaboration crosswise value chain including various processes.
 Optimize management of supply for profitable innovation: - It is an essential aspect
to make and apply new innovative or creative strategies to improve working of an
organisation to attain better profits. The General motors company need to put their efforts
to build successful products should be manufactured at right cost, place and time. It is

necessary to make decision relevant to it in early cycles of product development which
may break or make product successful. Various kind of innovations and competitive
advantages may improve from selection and management of suppliers. There is no better
way to attain seamless and clear collaboration processes for end-to-end supply chain
business.
 Align supply chain with business goals: - It is necessary to every firm for making better
policies to improve sales and operation planning procedures. This renders cooperation
among sales, manufacturing and distributions but still, there are some financial gaps.
General motors company may build one way bridge through integrated business
planning. This can include engagement of people, methods and technology components
of organisation (Provost and Fawcett, 2013). This technique integrates financial strategic
budgeting and forecasting systems with operations planning. It provides real time
visibility to all key elements of success such as product, supply, performance, demand,
supply etc. across company throughout extended supply chain.
 Embed sustainability into chain operations: - It is important to make various
innovation and modifications in several criterion of supply chain operations to maintain
its effectiveness. This will facilitate an organisation to sustain its productivity as well as
profitability to attain strong position at market competition amongst different competitive
firms. Every firm has triple bottom line of people, profit and planet which will never been
important than it is today. There are several substantial opportunities exist for
sustainability in supply chain operations. General Motors considered embed sustainability
as core strategic element and capability to conduct events of firm. This method helps in
reducing carbon inefficiencies, minimising energy consumption, less wastage with
recycle refurbish materials and optimising travel and transportation. Different businesses
can keep momentum by ensuring continuous improvement in systematic calculation,
audit, best practices and benchmarks. In addition, it provides governing framework for
sustainable supply chain operations. Ensure reliable and predictable supply: - Every firm have some of aspects facing by
stake holders who are able to meet agreed upon services levels. A manufacturer will tend
to hold inventory buffers to ensure attaining client preference levels. General motors
company have to analyse the costs of business and even worse which means wrong

products at incorrect place in improper time resulting in supply shortfalls (Fish, 2011).
The firms need to work on regular basis to attain continuous improvement and
operational excellence strategies for successful end-to-end supply chain operations.
Impact of appropriate processes, practices and tools
It is important to determine demands to facilitate supply chain managers so that they can
respond rapidly to change and improve profitability are greater then ever. Several effective
strategies and solutions exist which support each one of above strategies to deliver immediate
return on investment. The General motors company have to analyse causes and circumstances
behind it to make appropriate decision to solve it more efficiently.
P3 Apply simple multi-attribute rating technique to outlined decision making
There are various roles completed by decision support system in which one of desired
function is that it assists the decision maker in obtaining accurate alternative choice with relevant
aspect. The firm can implement SMART method which stands for simple multi-attribute rating
technique to outlined decision making (Daellenbach, McNickle and Dye, 2012). General motors
may apply this technique to build appropriate decisions to solve issues related to raw material
supply. There are several steps which can be utilised to make effective decisions which are as
follows:
 Identification of decision: - It is necessary to make decision to fulfil the particular aspect
as per requirement of circumstances. The firm have to clearly define the nature and tasks
of decision and it is very important step for doing any function which is desirable. This is
the first and key essential level of this process to make effective decision for attaining
desired goals and objectives set by them, this may facilitate to problems or issues of the
company.
 Gather relevant information: - The organisation needs to collect few of pertinent
knowledge which refers to the best sources of information. This stage includes both
internal and external work which can support procedure of self-assessment and many
more data to be utilised. It is important to collect various information or knowledge to
study and analyse it for building proper plan for solving particular threats of company
which results in improving profits and benefits.
 Identify the alternatives: - It is essential to collect information about various choices.
After that they have to observe and analyse several possible paths of action or available

alternatives to choose the best one for implementation. The firm's managers can use their
imagination and additional information to construct new choices (Gigerenzer and
Gaissmaier, 2011). Production costs are need to be analysed so that outsourcing can be
done in various countries such as Bangladesh, China, Europe, Germany.
Countries Labour cost per month
Bangladesh (A) £120
China (B) £50.00
Europe (C) £110
Germany (D) £280
 Weigh the evidence: - The firm has to draw its knowledge and emotions to predict for
carrying out each of alternatives till the end. Evaluate the need of identified step for
particular aspect would be sole issues and impacts on completing desired target. This
decision have to bear higher potential for reaching objectives. Overall, place the
alternatives in priority order which is based upon value of system. Total costs are listed
below-
Countries Labour costs Cost of materials Sum total
Bangladesh 120 5 125
China 50 3 53
Europe 110 2.65 112.65
Germany 280 6 286
 Choose among alternatives: - The company have weighed all kind of necessary
evidences relevant to that decision which is chosen from number of alternative choices.
However, the managers can select combination of choices which are helpful in attaining
goals and objectives of organisation. It is necessary to observe possible alternatives so
that they become able to make proper plan to attain better profitability of firm.

 Determination of values- Proper allocation of costs is required so that General Motors
may outsource in various countries and as such, ranking can be done.
Countries duty Quality
Consumer
satisfaction CSR
Level of
comfort
Convenienc
e of
consumers
Bangladesh 1 4 3 2 1 4
China 0 1 2 3 2 3
Europe 2 2 4 4 3 1
Germany 0 3 2 1 4 2
Bangladesh China Europe Germany
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
duty
Quality
Consumer satisfaction
CSR
Level of comfort
Convenience of consumers

 Assessment of criteria- Benefits out of locations is listed on the basis of attributes and as
such, weights have been allocated to each of the attributes.
Weight Locations
Attributes Weight
Convenient of
consumers 12 30 10 30 10
Quality 15 32 30 40 30
Consumer
satisfaction 18 0 20 10 20
Duty 21 10 30 40 20
CSR 11 50 0 30 30
Total
Aggregate 30.5 22.5 30.5 22
Attributes Weights (Original) Weights (Normal)
Convenient of consumers 20 12
Quality 30 15
Consumer satisfaction 60 18
Duty 70 21
CSR 50 11
230 77

 Take action: - After analysing the situational factors and needs of company, the leaders
have to implement that effective or efficient alternative to fulfil various prospect relevant
to desired targets. It is known as positive action because it is used to apply the plan for
solving issues or completing aspects of firm. The firm need to apply plans practically and
conduct desired activities or procedures to gain better profits for company (Zhong, 2011).
 Review the decision and its consequences: - After implementation, the organisation has
to re-check all the activities or procedures which are necessary to complete several
criterion of to identify such problems which may raise after implementation. These kind
of issues are generally arises in some of aspects for which they need to implement
second ready choice of plan for immediate action to reduce threats. It may be second
choice to be applied for reducing losses or threats generated by first alternative. This step
can involve results of decision and evaluate whether or not it has resolved needs and
desires identified at first step of this process.
 Decision making- Management can make decisions which country to select to extract
benefits.
Illustration 1: Line chart

In this above technique, the SMART ratings are alternatively assigned directly in natural
scales of criteria. It is important to assess such aspects like cost for choice between several road
layouts, natural scale would be range amongst most expensive and cheapest layout. After that, in
order to keep weighing of criteria and rating of alternatives as separate as possible, different
scales need to be converted into common internal scale (Politi and Street, 2011). In technique
implemented of SMART, it is done mathematically by decision maker by means of value
function. The simplest way is that which is widely used form of value function method as
additive model. This may be considered as most simple cases can be applied using liners scale.
The above process of making choices by identifying decision, gathering information and
assessing alternative resolutions to apply correct aspect. These methods should be utilised step
by step for decision making process. This can help to make more deliberate, thoughtful decisions
by organising relevant knowledge and defining alternatives. It is an essential approach which
improves the chances that they will choose the most satisfying alternative possible.
P4 Strengths and limitations of analysis
The term decision making has an important role or function to carry out different types of
activities and procedures. Under this aspect, organisations have to observe and analyse strengths
and limitations of it. There are various opportunities and threats which need to be controlled for
attaining profits for company. It is important to identify opportunities and try to grab it at right
time for gaining better profitability as well as productivity of organisation. Along with it, the
enterprises may observe several issues and problems which are needed to be controlled or solved
at a time to reduce possible loss of the company (Wierenga, 2011).
Strengths
Raw material are resources which are used in primary production or manufacturing of
goods. Strong supply chain of raw material is one of key point of company's success. Great
planning is required to supply raw material to companies. Regular improvement can be done for
strategies or policies to enhance abilities of firm by managing it properly. Without this chain,
there would not be any products on which society relies on such as food, clothes, groceries etc.
There are various strategies which a company can use to strengthen their supply chain. They are
as follows:
 Effective distribution of raw material should be encouraged by company for better
availability of resources for improved production.

 Supply chain management should be effective and continuous improvement should be
done by managers.
 It should possess great flexibility.
 Vendors should provide good quality of raw material to companies.
 Availability of resources should be faster and in accurate way.
 By formulating strategies, supply chain management can be improved and provided with
better resources to company.
 Strategies should be made to ensure economic purchasing of raw material by the
company.
 Organisation can tie up with the best supplier in the market which can provide the best
resources at reasonable prices.
 Proper recording should be maintained by the managers who supervise supply of
resources.
 Organisation should ensure whether suppliers are delivering their resources at right time
or not.
 When business has effective supply chain management, it has competitive advantage in
its industry and reduces the inherent risks at the time of buying raw material.
 By using this management, they can adjust more dynamically to fluctuating economies,
emergency market and shorter product life cycles.
 Strong management improves inventory system of company.
 It also improves system responsiveness to actual customer's requirement.
 It improves relationship with both vendors and distributors.
 When the quality of raw material is high, then quality of finished goods will be also high
and therefore, it increases revenue of company.
 They can use expert advice by involving them at the time of formulating strategies and
with the help of their ideas, supply chain management can be improved.
 By utilising various types of software or internal spreadsheets, easy tracking of raw
materials and inventories can be done by recording it on regular basis (Gregory and et.al.,
2012).

 Distribution channel of the company should be strong which enables good
manufacturing, capacity planning, develop and enhance flow of data. This may provide
support to conduct financial analysis and meet the needs of a global marketplace.
 Effective supply controls smooth flow of products, services, funds, information and
knowledge to the company.
 Company should have proper control over suppliers.
 Well-coordinated chain reduces costs and provides better customer services.
 Timely arrival of material initiates proper manufacturing of finished products.
 One person should be assigned to see all supplies no matter how small or big the
organisation is.
 Company should always formulate alternate strategies if any supplier fails to send, then B
plans can be used.
Limitations
The term supply chain refers to all process, people and companies which are getting involved in
delivering products and services of the company to their end users. In addition, supply chain
process began with methods and tools which aid to deliver a product to their end users. But
sometimes due to external factors the supply chain process can affect business organisations and
their working operations (Wang, Liu and Qin, 2012). If supplies are not much effective and
products will not be delivered on time to their customers, it can hinder market image of the
company which reduces its sales and profitability. For example- if suppliers are not capable to
locate stock in warehouse or delivery truck breaks down, then the entire business process may go
down to prevent bottlenecks.
In European countries, they focus on business organisations to capture global markets
rather than local areas. It decreases the market impact of the firm in domestic market where
future growth is predicted in international market scenario.
Outsourcing strategy for other business operations and practices cannot be defined clearly, which
hamper customer services of the company. Thus, service level as per the customer importance is
not well organised and well-structured as well.
On the other hand, asset network strategy is not well-established in production process or
activities.

 Supply chain: - It is important to build an effective supply chain for raw material in firm
so that it is easy to conduct several kind of activities or procedures related to
manufacturing aspects. This may facilitate to supply desired bulk of product in market as
per demand of people. Due to this, it will become time consuming and costly
(FentonO'Creevy and et.al., 2011).
 Managing supply chain: - Besides making efficient supply chain, it is more essential to
maintain its effectiveness so that it will provide benefits to firm for a long time. By this
aspect, the company can attain its pre-set goals and objectives. Due to this prospect, it
will not support to update with trends more properly.
There are various aspects which need to be evaluate for reducing negative impacts of weakness
of particular technique implemented in an organisation. It is important that they have to control
threats and problems to avoid possible losses and gain desired profits. This may facilitate to
attain productivity and profitability.
CONCLUSION
The report has concluded that analytical decision making helps in solving various
problems or issues of organisation so that it will facilitate to conduct activities or procedures
smoothly in right direction. It is included that strengths and limitation needed to be evaluated.
Because it is important to make proper decision and implement it appropriately to fulfil desired
aspects of company. The firms have to identify several problems of an organisation to solve it by
making proper plan relevant to it. There are various kind of techniques or methods which can be
implemented to sort out problems or issues of firm. They have to first analyse cause of threats
and then implement appropriate problem solving technique.

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