Decision-Making Process: Australian Pharmaceutical Case Study Analysis

This case study analyzes a decision-making scenario within the Australian Pharmaceutical Corporation, focusing on whether to release an experimental drug to West Africa. The paper employs an eight-step decision-making process to evaluate the situation, considering the drug's untested status on humans, potential benefits, and ethical implications. The analysis identifies key stakeholders, establishes goals, and explores alternative solutions. Applying Kantian ethical theory, the paper argues against sharing the drug, emphasizing the prioritization of human safety and the risks associated with an unproven treatment. The conclusion reinforces the importance of further research before widespread distribution, highlighting the ethical dimensions of the decision-making process and the need to balance potential benefits with inherent risks. The paper provides a comprehensive evaluation of the case, emphasizing the complexities of management decisions in the pharmaceutical industry.

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Fundamentals of Management
Student’s name
Name of the Institute

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Table of Contents
Introduction........................................................................................................................................... 3
Analysis................................................................................................................................................... 3
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................. 9
References............................................................................................................................................ 10

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Introduction
It would be correct to say that one of the key roles of managers is to make effective
decision. There are times when managers must make decisions in the tough times. It is expected
that managers would come out of their personal biases and take the decision that is best for the
team and the organization (Govindan & Rajendran, 2015). The objective of this paper is to
discuss the case study of Australian Pharmaceutical Corporation. The paper would use the eight-
step decision making process to solve the case study. In this paper, I would argue that the
manager should not allow the use of drug in Western Africa.
Analysis
The case study presents that the drug has not been tested on human beings. Therefore, it
cannot be said with 100% guarantee that the drug would be successful for humans. It would be
interesting to analyze the decision-making process with respect to the eight-step decision making
model. The eight-step decision making process for this case can be discussed as:
Step 1: Define the problem
In this case the problem is to decide if the drug should be allowed to launch in Africa. As
mentioned in the case, the drug is successful tested on animals in Australia. However, the drug is
not tested for humans and it would take another 10 years to test the drug on humans. At the same
time, the drug has the potential to cure the virus that is spreading fast in West Africa. Therefore,
the decision has to be made if the drug should be shared with West Africa or not. This drug or
vaccine is still at the experimental stage only.

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Step 2: Determine the requirements that the solution to the problem must meet
The solution to the problem must meet the requirement of making one of the decisions.
The case presents that the manager has to make decision between the two options. The first
option is that the drug should not be shared with the people in the West Africa. The second
option is that the drug could be shared with the people in the West Africa. It is also required that
the decision should be ethical in nature and the decision should be able to help others. However,
the problem in this case is that the end state could not be realized at the initial stage.
Step 3: Establish goals that solving the problem should accomplish
It is expected that the solution would be beneficial to different stakeholders. The three
key stakeholders in this case are:
i. The organization that has developed the drug, it would also include the decision make or
the manager in the organization that has to make the decision
ii. The organization or the people in West Africa that wants the drug, it would include the
health worker in West Africa.
iii. The people who would use the drug
The goal or problem solving would be to meet the expectations of these stakeholders. There
are other stakeholders also that should be convinced. For example, the government of both the
nations is also important stakeholders. It is important that the expectations of these governments
should also be met (Kabir & Sadiq, 2014). The goal should be to take this task as a project and
the larger goals should be broken down into smaller objectives. Thus, based on the scope, time
and cost, appropriate quality preparation should be made so that everything should be balanced

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and it should not happen that project team is focusing so much on quality initiatives and policy
that it impacted the schedule and project went into overrun.
Step 4: Identify alternatives that would solve the problem
At this moment, it appears that there are only two key alternatives to the problem. These
two alternatives can be discussed as:
Alternative 1: To give the drug to health workers in West Africa
Alternative 2: Not to give the drug to health workers in West Africa
There could be various reasons and logic to use either of the above alternatives. It is
important that the decision maker should analyze various reasons and logic before making any
decision (Ford & Richardson, 2013).
Personally, I can say that health care goal could be achieved with a combined and
integrated approach of different stakeholders. I can say that the strategy of increased focus on
healthcare technology is definitely a way forward for organizations to make themselves more
efficient. It is also important that organizations should have a long-term plan and vision in place
to implement health care technology system. Therefore, the alternatives should be thought
beyond these two alternatives also. In an ideal world, the best alternative would be one that could
satisfy the needs and expectations of all the stakeholders (Ho & Kraus, 2014).
Step 5: Develop valuation criteria based on the goals
It is important that the valuation criteria should be developed on the basis of the
alternatives. It is also important that the valuation criteria should be quantitative in nature and it

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should address public health. The three key valuation criteria for this decision can be discussed
as:
i. The decision should be beneficial for the people that would ultimately use the drug
ii. The cost or the risk involved in the use of the drug should be less than the benefits or the
utility that this drug can provide.
iii. The West African health worker should be ready to take the risks and the liabilities in
case of any unfortunate event.
Apart from this, there would be monetary value criteria also. For example, the organization
can take the step that is profitable for them. However, it would make sense to ignore the
monetary dimension when there is a question of lives of people (Paul & Muller, 2014).
Step 6: Select a decision-making tool
There are various decision-making tools that could be used in these cases. It is best to
analyze these decisions with respect to the ethical framework. Public health ethics deal with
issues of public welfare related to public health. It mainly deals with being issues related to
diseases and mainly focuses on health of the public. Thus the main points covered in public
health ethics are preventing the diseases and also promoting good health among the population.
There are frameworks related to prevention of diseases for public health but promoting good
health or monitoring the good health can involve many issues (Bratzke & Muehrer, 2015).
The pertinent question whether these aspects of drug decision should also be covered in
public health ethics. Ideally yes. These issues which directly affect the population should have at
least some relevance in public health ethics. These issues directly affect the public health and
public health officials should get involved in these aspects. Currently there are not much ethical

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imperatives to look into such issues as they don’t directly deal with health issues but there should
be a framework which brings in these aspects also under the ethical purview of the public health
ethics. Incidents which affect the public in a very significant manner should also be brought
under public health ethics (Pierce & Jameton, 2003).
There are various ethical theories like utilitarianism, virtue theory, Kantianism, etc. that
could be applied in this case. Ethical theory serves as the foundation for ethical solutions to the
difficult situations people encounter in life. In fact, for centuries, philosophers have come up
with theoretical ways of telling right from wrong and for giving guidelines about how to live and
act ethically (Johnson & Blumstein, 2013).
The decision making tool in this case would be Kantianism theory of ethics.
Step 7: Apply the tool to select the best alternative
The Kantianism theory of ethics emphasizes the principles behind actions rather than an
action’s results. Acting rightly thus requires being motivated by proper universal principles that
treat everyone with respect. In this case the action could be positive or negative. However, the
important thing is the principles. The principles suggest that it may not be a good idea to take the
risks worth the lives of thousands of people. Hospitals, health departments and the non profit
organizations can play a significant role in handling any events and thereby preventing the
disastrous consequences of these events. These departments cannot prevent nor predict these
events but they can be ready for serve the public whenever such event occurs. These institutions
should work with other institutions which can predict such events like meteorological department
(Ott, 2012).

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The best alternative in this case would be to not to go ahead with the drug sharing
mechanism. It is suggested that the organization should say no the west african health worker. At
the same time, it is recommended that the organization should work in collaboration with West
African helath worker. By working in coordination they can help the people, make them more
aware and also help them during the event. When such event occur a lot of people will require
medical help and these institutions can help people and also remain prepared to treat large
number of individuals. Also prevention of disease during such event is necessary. It is also
important that the organization should clearly explain the reasons for saying no. These
institutions needs to prepared before any major event takes as post the event it can be difficult to
handle the situation on the ground and hence these institutions need to be prepared and also
educate the public. This way they can help the people (Olasky, 2006)
Step 8: Check the answer/ solution to ensure that it solves the problem
Vaccination has been important issue for all the nations (developed and developing).
There are vaccines available for many diseases which otherwise could wreak havoc on the
human population. Giving vaccine can be both medical beneficial as well as can be an important
aspect in public health. Many of the vaccines are given at very young age when children don’t
have the understanding of importance of the vaccination and hence it becomes important that
parents take responsibility and give the children required medicines (Murana, 2014). There have
been various ethical issues arising in this aspect of public health. Many times parents are not
giving the children the required vaccination which can make them susceptible to these diseases
whose vaccines are already present and the individuals can be prevented from contracting those
diseases. The answer in this case is to say ‘No’ to the health care workers in Western Africa. The
main benefit of this decision is that organization has avoided the uncertainty associated with the

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lives of people. It may not be possible to foresee the future. However, based on the value criteria,
it appears that this decision is the best decision.
Conclusion
The objective of this paper was to use the eight-step decision making process to solve the
case study. With the above discussion it can be said that the West African health workers should
not be given the drug. It is correct that the drug has the potential to cure the population.
However, the risks associated with the use of drug us unknown. Therefore, it would make sense
to make further research before using this drug. The paper highlighted the eight-step decision
making approach for this case and also discusses the case with respect to ethics. The Kantianism
ethical theory is used to discuss the case and this ethical theory also suggests that the drug should
not be shared with the West African health workers as the risks outweigh the benefits.

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References
Bratzke, L.C., Muehrer, R.J., Kehl, K.A., Lee, K.S., Ward, E.C. and Kwekkeboom, K.L., 2015.
Self-management priority setting and decision-making in adults with multimorbidity: A narrative
review of literature. International journal of nursing studies, 52(3), pp.744-755.
Ford, R.C. and Richardson, W.D., 2013. Ethical decision making: A review of the empirical
literature. In Citation classics from the Journal of Business Ethics (pp. 19-44). Springer
Netherlands.
Govindan, K., Rajendran, S., Sarkis, J. and Murugesan, P., 2015. Multi criteria decision making
approaches for green supplier evaluation and selection: a literature review. Journal of Cleaner
Production, 98, pp.66-83.
Ho, A.S., Kraus, D.H., Ganly, I., Lee, N.Y., Shah, J.P. and Morris, L.G., 2014. Decision making
in the management of recurrent head and neck cancer. Head & neck, 36(1), pp.144-151.
Kabir, G., Sadiq, R. and Tesfamariam, S., 2014. A review of multi-criteria decision-making
methods for infrastructure management. Structure and Infrastructure Engineering, 10(9),
pp.1176-1210.
Johnson, D.D., Blumstein, D.T., Fowler, J.H. and Haselton, M.G., 2013. The evolution of error:
Error management, cognitive constraints, and adaptive decision-making biases. Trends in
ecology & evolution, 28(8), pp.474-481.
Ott, K. B. (2012). The Closure of New Orleans' Charity Hospital After Hurricane Katrina: A
Case of Disaster Capitalism.

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Olasky, M. (2006). The politics of disaster: Katrina, big government, and a new strategy for
future crises. Thomas Nelson Inc.
Murana, D. (2014). Ethics and the vaccination of workers. Occupational Health, 66(3), 21-23.
Paul, S., Müller, H., Preiser, R., de Lima Neto, F.B., Marwala, T. and De Wilde, P., 2014.
Developing a management decision-making model based upon a complexity perspective with
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Pierce, J., & Jameton, A. (2003). The ethics of environmentally responsible health care. Oxford
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