Factors Influencing Personal Decision Making: A Detailed Essay

This essay delves into the multifaceted factors that shape personal decision-making, encompassing self-awareness, personality traits, values, motivators, emotional intelligence, leadership qualities, and the dynamics of power and politics. It explores how these elements interact to influence individual choices and behaviors. The essay examines key concepts such as the Big Five personality traits and their impact on workplace interactions, the role of values and motivators in leadership, and the significance of emotional intelligence in understanding and managing emotions. Furthermore, it discusses leadership aspirations, risk-taking, and the importance of continuous learning. The essay also addresses the influence of power and political behavior in organizational settings and examines various decision-making and planning theories, including rational and behavioral approaches. By analyzing these factors, the essay provides a comprehensive understanding of the processes that underpin personal decision-making and its implications in various contexts.

Running head: PERSONAL DECISION MAKING
PERSONAL DECISION MAKING
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Introduction:
The aim of this paper is to discuss the factors that develop the personalities of a
person and allow them to make decisions according to the situation. There are numerous in
the human psychology that either instigate to learn new things constantly and achieve all the
goals one by one or discourage to utilise all the skills and potential properly. Therefore
knowing about these factors help people to learn the self and capabilities and transform the
weaknesses into strength. This paper will be discussing self-awareness, personality, values
ad motivators, emotional intelligence, leadership and power and politics as the factors for the
proper decision making process in the people and analyse important theories related the
planning and decision making.
Self-awareness:
Self-awareness is the process of having clear perception of the personality that
includes strengths, weaknesses, beliefs, thoughts, motivation and emotional aspects of the
persons. This allows people to realise their own self, as well as of the personality of the other
people around them. This enables people to understand how others are perceive one, their
attitude and response to the moment of the situation. People thus develop better
understanding of the self as a unique and separate individuals.
Personality:
Personality is the characteristic way of feeling, thinking and behaving that embraces
opinions, moods and attitudes. This helps in interacting with other people that includes the
behavioural characteristics both acquired and inherent which differentiate one person from
the other. Personality is observed in the relation of the people to the environment and social
groups. In order to operate in the business scenario more effectively, it is important to

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understand the personality types so that communication process becomes easy (Azucar,
Marengo and Settanni 2018). The conflict among the employees can affect the growth of the
organizations for which the managers prioritise the understanding of the personality types of
the employees so that the conflicts are easily resulted. Understanding of the personality
becomes easy if the individuals use various tools available like Myers–Briggs Type Indicator
or big five personality indicators. From the big five personality indicator, it is understood that
there are basically five types of personality found in the human beings that are extraversion,
agreeableness, openness, neuroticism and conscientiousness.
From this personality test, o have found that I have very low percentile in the
extraversion and openness factors and high in the agreeableness, neuroticism and
conscientiousness factors. My openness level is very level that leads me to have an extremely
rigid person. I am an introvert person that has limited me to mix with the people in my
surroundings. I prefer solitude and feel exhausted when need to socialise a lot. I dislike to be
the centre of attraction and never start the conversation by myself. However, I often feel
anxious and nervous about many things in life and career. Despite all these, I feel empathetic
to people I like and assist them in need.
Values and motivators:
From the studies of Antonakis and Day (2017), it has been understood that the
leaders of this business context need to possess different types of attitudes, values and
motivations so that they can reach the goals set and perform better in the competitive world
of business. These attitudes of successful leadership includes curiosity, power, idealism,
creativity, communication and accountability. Motivation is a goal oriented feature which
helps an individual to achieve the objectives (Dong et al. 2017). This also pushes the
individuals to work hard for achieving the goals. The executives must have he needed

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leadership quality for keeping themselves motivated. In addition to this, the attitude of the
persons for performing better in the workplace need to be incorporated. The openness in the
attitude help the leaders to keep on learning continuously.
To operate effectively, the individuals need to have a confident attitude in their minds
that helps in being sure about the own decision making and actions. The passionate attitude
enhances values of the persons and keep them motivated to overcome the hurdles one by one
(Hawkins 2017). If the person is passionate about the job they never fail to maintain
commitment. Thus the individuals gain respect from the others and inspire the others as the
leader.
Positive attitude and value system help the employees to become capable in the
decision making process that empower them effectively. The values of the individuals also
include the creativity and empathy. This is due to the fact that the more they are creative, thy
try to mix with people and learn from others and incorporate others’ ideas in the solving of
the issues (Avolio et al. 2016). However, creativity level of the leaders can differentiate the
leaders from the common employees. The attitude of the persons also include the empathy
towards the others that attracts the others to support the value system of the others.
Emotional intelligence:
Emotional intelligence has an important role in the development of a person in the
career because this helps in the recognition and understating of the emotions and their impact
on the attitudes and behaviour. The people who have a higher degree of emotional
intelligence can understand their own emotions as well as of the others to control ad manage
them (Beach and Lipshitz 2017). This factor is essential for the carer growth of the person.
The modern workplaces are characterised by the process of open team work, communication,
and the mutual respect of the employees along with their supervisor. From the employee’s

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points of the view empathy is attractive feature of the leaders which enable them to enter the
minds of the employees as opposed to the dictatorial or oppressive leadership qualities.
My own emotional control is average which means I can understand the emotions of
myself in certain situations. It is also true that I cannot control them always and manage them
before others. In certain cases, I lose temper or become very much overwhelmed by the
situation. These often leads me to the wrong decision making process. As mentioned before, I
am truly empathetic to different people when I see them in problematic situations but I also
know that for becoming an effective management employee I need to enhance my control
over my emotions (Shogren et al. 2018). However, I can also understand the emotions of the
others which can give me an advantage to motivate others. The leaders if understand and
respect the emotions of the followers are supported by them and grow.
Leadership:
The leaders in in this competitive business scenario have developed various
skills and excellence which can differentiate them not only from their followers but exceed
all the set framework of leadership. For the leadership aspirations I have understood that
there are some factors which help the potential leaders to achieve their goals. A successful
leader strategically know when they must take risks. As the risk taking capability is one of
the most important aspect of successful leadership. Through to the fore sight and
determination the leaders take risks when they judge the moment to yield a worthwhile return
on the investment.
Leadership aspiration also continues to develop and invest in the professional skills
because learning is the only key to remain competent in the competitive world of business.
Learning process helps the leaders to be able to build on their strengths and grow faster

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(Shogren et al. 2018). There will not be a huge number of opportunities around them but the
successful leaders know how to utilise these small chances for big cause.
Leadership aspiration also includes making impact in the minds of the followers
through proper communication style and good decision making skills. For the growth in the
career the leaders aspire to ask questions continuously so that they can open different layers
of an incident or case. The gather information on the issues from variety of sources and
reflect on what they have learnt. For the aspiring leaders experimentation is one of the most
important factors. Here the leaders are not afraid to take non-traditional approach for solving
any problem (Kochenderfer 2015). With few exception there is no single way for achieving a
goal. In this regard the path of radical thinking and decision making can lead to unexpected
improvement in the professional career of the leaders. Finally prioritising of the workflow
and knowing when to collaborate with whom has to be understood. On the basis of
collaboration and prioritising of the tasks the leaders overcome hurdles in achieving their
goals.
Power and politics:
The term power is associated with the leadership that measures the ability of the
persons to control the environment around them that includes the behaviours of the people.
Here power is associated with authority which is seen to be legitimate by the social structure.
Now leadership is directly associated with power in situation. This does not mean that the
leaders will be having or executing the power over the people (Dong et al. 2017). To most of
the theorist of leadership, power is the rights to provide leadership. As the leaders are the
head of many people, they are usually given power to execute. Similarly, the group can take
away power if it wants from their leaders. The exercise of power is a complex process as well
as appears to be dependent on the context, personality and expertise.

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In the leadership process, power comes third after knowledge and trust. Therefore the
effective leaders execute power appropriately and know that they must be directive and know
when to delegate. Now in the question of management of the organization to overcome
difficulties, the leaders utilise different tactics and strategies. The political behaviour of the
leaders include gaining power, building relationship with the superiors and the co-worker and
avoiding political problems that may affect the interest of the organization. In order to gain
and manage power of the successful leaders follow techniques like developing powerful
contacts, controlling line of communication, bringing experts to legitimise power
(Kochenderfer 2015). For maintaining power the leaders ask for advice and manage their
impression. In this regard open communication is effective for constraining the impact of the
political behaviour.
Decision making and planning:
The problem solving and decision making process belong together because one
cannot solve a problem without making decision. There are two types of decision makers
who use systematic and rational approach and others depend upon intuition. In order to solve
problems there are various methods applied either following the rational path or intuitive.
Firstly the problem is identified then searching for the alternatives are done. Doing of
alternatives help to make choice and their implementation. By evaluating the results the
process is lead for decision making.
There are two types of theories of decision making and problem solving these include
rational or normative and behavioural. The contributors of normative decision making theory
are Peter Drucker and Ansoff (Kochenderfer 2015). This particular theory is concerned with
how the managers must make decisions if effectiveness and efficiency have to be maximized.
According to the theorists the underlying assumptions of normative or rational theory of

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decision making provides perfect information and certainty. This maximizes behaviour and
consensus over the values.
Rational decision making process favours the objective data and the formal process
for analysing over the intuition and subjectivity. The model of the rational decision making
process assumes that the decision makers must have perfect information about every
alternative present in the situation (Avolio et al., 2016). This also assumes that they have
cognitive abilities, time and the resources for evaluating each of the choices against the others
stuff the rational decision making process also as rooms that people who are making
decisions will maximize their benefits for themselves in one hand and minimise any type of
cost on the other. The rational decision making process is a logical and multi-step model that
helps to choose between the alternatives for following and orderly Path from the
identification of problem through solution.
The behavioural theory of decision making on the contrast is developed by Simon, an
economist. This is perfectly dependent upon the behaviour of the individuals and the groups.
The main concern of this theory is how the managers are making decisions. This theory deals
with the process of perceiving things by the managers and how they react to solve the
problems aligning the human behaviour. The managers have limited view of the problems
because they may not have complete information about the problem. They do not possess
knowledge of every possible alternative solutions therefore they do not have the ability for
processing environmental as well as Technology information.
The behavioural approach to decision making is also known as the descriptive
approach model because it focuses on the ability of the managers for processing the
information taking sufficient time and resources for exhaustive research (Avolio et al. 2016).
These reveal alternative solutions to the problems this model is based on the two concepts

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like satisfying and bounded rationality. There were the task oriented behaviour and employee
oriented approach at to be followed by the managers in the companies for solving any
problem and find solutions.
People make decisions about different things under different circumstances and
situations. The leaders and managers in the companies you really weigh all the necessary
options and their outcomes while being aware about each of these possibilities evicting there
organisation as a whole. for the decision making in the internship for graduation position the
factors of problems will be e the geographical location of the organisation the employee
rights, payment nature of the organisation opportunities for professional development through
training and opportunity for the ongoing employment . In my case the opportunity of training
and development will be the main focus for decision making. The companies that arrange
training and development process can make motivated workforce and there turnover is less.
This factor will be affecting my decision making process because I want to develop
constantly in my career (Antonakis and Day 2017). While working in a company if I do not
get the scope for learning I will not what gain knowledge about the changing business
scenario around me for the incorporation of Technology in my field. In this regard I shall not
be able to develop my professional skills and lose ground for competitiveness. This is the
reason why the training process and development of the employees will be in my decision
making factor based on which I will choose companies for work. Secondly the paid and
unpaid nature of the business organisations I think important factor because everything
depends upon financial support. If I do not get proper which in exchange of my labour, I will
consider the company to be unethical.

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Conclusion:
Therefore, it can be concluded that the self-awareness is a mandatory subject
possessed by al the successful people in the world. This enables people to understand how
others are perceive one, their attitude and response to the moment of the situation. This
reveals the personality, emotion and values of the persons that help them the make decision
by eliminating any scope for problem solving. There are theories of decision making which
are followed by the leaders of different personalities for the achievement of their personal
goals.
References:
Antonakis, J. and Day, D.V. eds., 2017. The nature of leadership. Sage publications.
Avolio, B.J., Keng-Highberger, F.T., Schaubroeck, J., Trevino, L.K. and Kozlowski, S.W.,
2016. How follower attributes affect ratings of ethical and transformational leadership.
In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2016, No. 1, p. 16854). Briarcliff Manor, NY
10510: Academy of Management.
Azucar, D., Marengo, D. and Settanni, M., 2018. Predicting the Big 5 personality traits from
digital footprints on social media: A meta-analysis. Personality and individual differences,
124, pp.150-159.
Beach, L.R. and Lipshitz, R., 2017. Why classical decision theory is an inappropriate
standard for evaluating and aiding most human decision making. Decision making in
aviation, 85, pp.835-847.
Conger, J., 2015. Charismatic leadership. Wiley encyclopedia of management, pp.1-2.

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Dong, Y., Bartol, K.M., Zhang, Z.X. and Li, C., 2017. Enhancing employee creativity via
individual skill development and team knowledge sharing: Influences of dual‐focused
transformational leadership. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 38(3), pp.439-458.
Hawkins, P., 2017. Leadership team coaching: Developing collective transformational
leadership. Kogan Page Publishers.
Kochenderfer, M.J., 2015. Decision making under uncertainty: theory and application. MIT
press.
Shogren, K.A., Wehmeyer, M.L., Martinis, J. and Blanck, P., 2018. Supported decision-
making: Theory, research, and practice to enhance self-determination and quality of life.
Cambridge University Press.

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