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CONTENTS OF 48-PAGE BOOKLET:
  •  The Big Picture
  •  Problem Solving and Decision Making
  •  The Decision Making Process
  •  System of Decision Making and Problem Solving
  •  Intuitive Decision Making
  •  Short Formula for Decision Making
  •  Full Model and Formula
  •  Specific Individual “Sciences”


    • STAGES AS APPLIED TO DECISION MAKING:
    1. Curious Observation
    2. Is There a Problem?
    3. Goals and Planning
    4. Search, Explore and Gather the Evidence
    5. Generate Creative & Logical Alternative Solutions
    6. Evaluate the Evidence
    7. Make the Educated Guess (Hypothesis)
    8. Challenge the Hypothesis
    9. Reach a Conclusion
    10. Suspend Judgment
    11. Take Action

    SUPPORTING INGREDIENTS:
    12. Creative, Non-Logical, Logical & Technical Methods
    13. Procedural Principles & Theories
    14. Attributes & Thinking Skills

  •  Group or Team Decision Making
  •  Management Decision Making Technique
  •  Managerial Decision Making
  •  Behavior Decision Making Theory
  •  Accounting for Risks Involved
  •  Decision Making under Uncertainty, Forecasting and Predicting
  •  Miscellaneous Strategies
  •  Opportunities to Use My Non-copyrighted Material
  •  Bibliography
  •  Your Guide and Worksheet
    		•

    The Big Picture of
    Problem Solving & Decision Making

    Importance of Problem Solving and Decision Making

    On the entitled Problem Solving and Decision Making, I quoted Nobel Laureate Herbert Simon on the importance of problem solving and decision making. While he covered a wide area, there are many other instances in which it is of supreme importance. Just a very few are preserving the earth, preventing wars, human health, and improving government in all areas.

    What’s Going on in Teaching Decision Making

    Problem solving and decision making are taught to a limited extent in many schools and colleges. Various formulas for the stages are sometimes included and other times not. Many reports call for students to be proficient in problem solving and decision making. The need for teaching critical thinking is often mentioned without the realization that critical thinking is really problem solving and decision making. Not much action results from these reports to improve problem solving and decision making. Many businesses have various training courses for their employees. Government agencies have hurt rather than helped.

    To make a long story short, the teaching and use of today’s body of knowledge of problem solving and decision making is very poor. There is little or no recognition of the need for a standard model such as SM-14. As a result we are, as a nation, doing a very inadequate job of problem solving and decision making.

    Good Decision Making - What We Need to Do

    • Individuals should study this booklet and thus improve their problem solving and decision making. They should become life long students of the subject. They should encourage their children and friends to do the same.
    • Those in the teaching profession should do everything they can to teach problem solving and decision making following the SM-14 model.
    • Employers should institute training courses. Organizations should promote problem solving and decision making.
    • Design a national plan to improve problem solving and decision making for teaching in our schools and for the education of those already working.

    Coming up next - Divisions of the decision making.process

    • Intuitive decision making. This is explained on the next page.
    • Short formula for decision making, SM-4.
    • Full formula for the complete method of creative decision making, SM-14. This covers the 11 stages of mental activity and the 3 supporting ingredients of decision making.
    • Specific individual “sciences” of features of decision making.

    After these pages explaining the four divisions of decision making is a Condensed Guide and Worksheet for Applying the Complete Method of Creative Decision Making (SM-14). It is inserted there as an introduction to the two pages of each of the stages and ingredients of SM-14 that follows. This or the two-page guide should be used whenever you are working on an important decision.