| anchoring and adjustment bias | The tendency to make decisions based on an initial figure.
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| availability bias | Tendency of managers to use information readily available from memory to make judgments; they tend to give more weight to recent events.
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| bounded rationality | One type of nonrational decision making; the ability of decision makers to be rational is limited by numerous constraints.
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| consensus | General agreement; group solidarity.
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| deciding to decide | A manager agrees that he or she must decide what to do about a problem or opportunity and take effective decision-making steps.
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| decision | A choice made from among available alternatives.
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| decision making | The process of identifying and choosing alternative courses of action.
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| decision-making style | A style that reflects the combination of how an individual perceives and responds to information.
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| decision tree | Graph of decisions and their possible consequences, used to create a plan to reach a goal.
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| defensive avoidance | When a manager cannot find a good solution and follows by (a) procrastinating, (b) passing the buck, or (c) denying the risk of any negative consequences.
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| Delphi group | A problem-solving technique in which a group of physically dispersed experts fills out questionnaires to anonymously generate ideas; the judgments are combined and averaged to achieve a consensus of expert opinion.
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| diagnosis | Analysis of underlying causes.
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| escalation of commitment bias | When decision makers increase their commitment to a project despite negative information about it.
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| ethics officer | A person trained about matters of ethics in the workplace, particularly about resolving ethical dilemmas.
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| explicit knowledge | Information that can be easily put into words, graphics, and numbers and shared with others.
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| goal displacement | The primary goal is subsumed to a secondary goal.
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| groupthink | A cohesive group's blind unwillingness to consider alternatives. This occurs when group members strive for agreement among themselves for the sake of unanimity and avoid accurately assessing the decision situation.
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| heuristics | Strategies that simplify the process of making decisions.
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| incremental model | One type of nonrational model of decision making; managers take small, short-term steps to alleviate a problem.
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| interacting group | A problem-solving technique in which group members interact and deliberate with one another to reach a consensus.
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| knowledge management | Implementation of systems and practices to increase the sharing of knowledge and information throughout an organization; also, the development of an organizational structure—and the tools, processes, systems, and structures—that encourages continuous learning and sharing of knowledge and information among employees, for the purpose of making better decisions.
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| nominal group | A group whose purpose it is to generate ideas and evaluate solutions by writing down as many ideas as possible. The ideas are listed on a blackboard, then discussed, then voted on.
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| nonprogrammed decisions | Decisions that occur under nonroutine, unfamiliar circumstances.
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| nonrational model of decision making | A model of decision-making style that explains how managers make decisions; they assume that decision making is nearly always uncertain and risky, making it difficult for managers to make optimum decisions.
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| opportunities | Situations that present possibilities for exceeding existing goals.
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| panic | Situation in which a manager reacts frantically to get rid of a problem that he or she cannot deal with realistically.
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| participative management (PM) | The process of involving employees in (1) setting goals, (2) making decisions, (3) solving problems, and (4) making changes in the organization.
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| problems | Difficulties that inhibit the achievement of goals.
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| programmed decisions | Decisions that are repetitive and routine. Contrast nonprogrammed decisions.
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| rational model of decision making | Also called the classical model; the style of decision making that explains how managers should make decisions; it assumes that managers will make logical decisions that will be the optimum in furthering the organization's best interests.
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| relaxed avoidance | The situation in which a manager decides to take no action in the belief that there will be no great negative consequences.
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| relaxed change | The situation in which a manager realizes that complete inaction will have negative consequences but opts for the first available alternative that involves low risk.
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| representativeness bias | The tendency to generalize from a small sample or a single event.
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| satisficing model | One type of nonrational decision-making model; managers seek alternatives until they find one that is satisfactory, not optimal.
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| tacit knowledge | Knowledge that is individual-based, intuitive, acquired through considerable experience, and hard to express and to share.
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