Page 108 - Communication in Organizations Basic Skills and Conversation Models

12
Decision making

Practical example

The staff association of Dinner Ltd is very active and plays an important role in giving
shape to the culture of the organization. Its broadly shared mission is: ‘Working
together’. This means that the feeling of unity among staff members needs to be
developed. The goal of the staff association is to further such unity in a variety of ways.
However, the interests and priorities of the different staff members are varied. The
programme of the yearly personnel day is often a source of much criticism. For some it is
a successful day only if many sport activities are planned; for others the day cannot go
wrong as long as there is plenty of liquid refreshment to hand. It takes quite a bit of head-
breaking to make the programme varied enough to appease everyone. The committee of
the staff association is composed of representatives from all layers of Dinner Ltd. Bert
Berman is the chairman. He is not happy with the way the decisions are taken. The
meetings run some-what chaotically, with ideas flying back and forth across the table and
being immediately taken on or criticized. This is combined with much bickering, personal
observations and remarks. In Bert’s opinion, reactions are given much too quickly before
other alternatives have been thoroughly discussed. Bert wants decisions to be made in a
different way.

Introduction

When important decisions have to be taken in an organization, a number of people are
usually involved. The more people who take part in the decision-taking process, the more
opinions, experience and knowledge are involved concerning the points to be decided.
Therefore, there is a greater chance that a well-considered decision is reached than if only
one person had been involved. Besides, more people are likely to be inclined to carry out
the decision if they actually participated in the decision taking. They are aware of the
arguments that led to the decision, they know which general alternatives were named and
why these were rejected. In this way, it may appear that within an organization all
decisions are best taken by all concerned.
However, there are considerable drawbacks associated with decision taking when a
large number of people are involved. First, it takes a lot of time and input from all the
participants. Not only does it demand preparedness and the skill to listen to other
people’s opinions, but also the willingness to give up one’s own standpoint. Second, the
danger exists that group decisions are made on the grounds of a one-sided viewpoint,