Assignment Overview
In your text, the author introduced a decision-making model entitled the Vroom-Yetton Decision Making Flowchart. You may want take a few minutes and watch this quick, three-minute refresher video (also found in this week’s Exploresection) before you continue reading.
While both the text and the refresher video do a good job at describing the types of decision-making approaches a person can take, both seem to miss the mark in explaining how you determine which method is best. For this, we need to focus a bit more on the flowchart associated with the model. Your text provides you with a version (page 518), but it is unclear in helping to determine which method is best.
This brief article from Mind Tools The Vroom-Yetton-Jago Decision Model (Links to an external site.)summarizes the model and then provides a flow chart that specifically provides a process leading to a one of the five styles. It also provides a clear breakdown of what decision must be made at each of the seven levels. I would advise reading the entire article before continuing on in this assignment.
Using the flow chart referred to in the article (above), apply the decision-making process to each of the following cases. For each case, you need to answer three questions:
1. Which of the five strategies did you choose?
2. Why did you choose that strategy?
3. What benefits or consequences may result?
Case #1 – Janice
Janice is a floor manager for 10 nurses and medical staff. She has been asked to provide a schedule for vacations. She only has one week to develop the schedule. What decision-making strategy should she use?
Case #2 – Douglas
Douglas has been recently hired to help improve the online learning environment at Central Christian College. Specifically, he has been asked to develop an evaluation system that would allow students to rate faculty. The dean has given him full control to develop the system. Now all he needs to do is consider what questions to ask, how and when to allow students to complete, and how much weight the survey will have on future employment. What decision-making strategy should he use?
Case #3 – Tasheka
Tasheka is a dentist. She has a full support staff of hygienists and office personnel. Recently, she has been considering a new piece of equipment that will provide better imagery when assessing tooth decay. What decision-making strategy should she use?
Case #4 – Carlos
Carlos heads an IT work team in a healthcare system. He has been asked to create a list of goals for his team. Carlos views this request as a nuisance, since the company hardly ever holds teams accountable to the goals they submit. However, he is required to submit goals to maintain his employment. What decision-making strategy should he use?
Case #5 – Dante
Dante runs a small start-up company that partners with organizations to provide administrative support services. He has recently been approached by a company that represents a sizeable contract, but also represents a shift in the type of services provided. The new contract would allow Dante to enhance salaries and benefits for his current employees. At the same time, the size of the contract would force the culture of the small company to change and require workloads to expand. What decision-making strategy should he use?
Links:
The Vroom Yetton Model – A 3-Minute Crash Course
The Vroom Yetton Model – A 3-Minute Crash Course (Links to an external site.)
The Vroom Yetton Model – A 3-Minute Crash Course
The Vroom-Yetton-Jago Decision Model
http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTED_91.htm
