Introduction to Theories of Public Policy Decision Making

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PUBLIC DECISION MAKING

By

Emmanuel Kwesi Mensah



What is Decision Making

Decision-making is the study of identifying

and choosing alternatives based on the

values and preferences of the decision

maker. Decision-making is one of the

central activities of management and is ahuge part of any process of implementation



Is the process of identifying problems and

opportunities and then resolving them.

A decision is a choice from available

alternatives.



Decision making and problem solving are

used in all management functions, although

usually they are considered a part of the planning phase



MANAGEMENT FUCTION

Management Functions

Planning

Decision Making

Organizing

Leading

Controlling



Decision-Making Process



Step 1: Identify the decision to be made.

You realize that a decision must be made.

You then go through an internal process oftrying to define clearly the nature of the

decision you must make. This first step is a

very important one.



Step 2: Gather relevant information. Most

decisions require collecting pertinent

information. The real trick in this step is toknow what information is needed, the best

sources of this information, and how to go

about getting it.



Some information must be sought from

within yourself through a process of self-

assessment; other information must besought from outside yourself- from books,

people, and a variety of other sources. This

step, therefore, involves both internal andexternal “work”.



Step 3: Identify alternatives. Through the

process of collecting information you will

probably identify several possible paths ofaction, or alternatives. You may also use

your imagination and information to

construct new alternatives. In this step ofthe decision- making process, you will list

all possible and desirable alternatives



Step 4: Weigh evidence. In this step, you

draw on your information and emotions to

imagine what it would be like if you carriedout each of the alternatives to the end. You

must evaluate whether the need identified in

Step 1 would be helped or solved throughthe use of each alternative.



In going through this difficult internal

process, you begin to favor certain

alternatives which appear to have higher potential for reaching your goal. Eventually

you are able to place the alternatives in

priority order, based upon your own valuesystem.



Step 5: Choose among alternatives. Once

you have weighed all the evidence, you are

ready to select the alternative which seemsto be best suited to you. You may even

choose a combination of alternatives.



Step 6: Take action. You now take some

positive action which begins to implement

the alternative you chose in Step 5.



Step 7: Review decision and consequences.

In the last step you experience the results of

your decision and evaluate whether or not ithas “solved” the need you identified in Step

1. If it has, you may stay with this decision

for some period of time.



If the decision has not resolved the

identified need, you may repeat certain

steps of the process in order to make a newdecision. You may, for example, gather

more detailed or somewhat different

information or discover additionalalternatives on which to base your decision.



TYPES OF DECISIONS

Routine

Nonroutine Decisions.



Pringle et al. classify decisions on a

continuum ranging from routine to

nonroutine, depending on the extent towhich they are structured.



Routine decision maker can usually rely on

policies, rules, past precedents, standardized

methods of processing, or computationaltechniques. Probably 90 percent of most

management decisions are largely routine.



TYPES OF ROUTINE

DECISIONS

Payroll Processing

Reordering Standard Inventory Items

Paying Suppliers



Nonroutine Decisions

Nonroutine decisions, on the other hand,

“deal with unstructured situations of a

novel, nonrecurring nature,” often involvingincomplete knowledge, high uncertainty,

and the use of subjective judgment or even

intuition, where “no alternative can be proved to be the best possible solution to

the particular problem.



Such decisions become more and more

common the higher one goes in

management and the longer the future period influenced by the decision is



PART 2



Individual Decision Making

• Rational approach – ideal method for how

managers should make decisions

• Bounded rationality perspective – how

decisions are made under severe time and

resource constraints



Steps in the Rational Approach



Rational decision making consists of all

optimizing, or maximizing, the outcome by

choosing the single best alternative fromamong all possible ones,



Rationality requires a complete knowledge

and anticipation of the consequences that

will follow on each choice. In fact,knowledge of consequences is always

fragmentary.



Since these consequences lie in the future,

imagination must supply the lack of

experienced feeling in attaching value tothem. But values can be only imperfectly

anticipated.



Rationality requires a choice among all

possible alternative behaviors. In actual

behavior, only a few of these possiblealternatives ever come to mind

Introduction to Theories of Public Policy Decision Making

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