Management
A manager’s job is based on what type of decision he or she makes daily. He is tasked with ensuring that the decisions he makes help to grow the organization not to retard it. One of the steps in decision making process is problem identification. A problem in the offing means that there is a decision at stake to be made, whether positive or negative. Decisions should not be arbitrary but should be directed to a certain problem at hand.
After problem identification, a manager then goes ahead and seeks information so as to ensure that he does not make a decision based on emotions, but based on the issue at hand. He needs to understand the people involved, process involved, and constraints involved in the decision making process. The manager then needs to brainstorm for solutions amongst the ones offered (Williams, 129). He then needs to choose one of the solutions offered after weighing the pros and cons of each. Some decisions may need further consultation before any alternative is chosen.
Any chosen alternative needs to be implemented; therefore the next step is implementation of the decision adopted. Implementation does not include any more backward step to consultation since that route has already been bypassed. The manager then to be keen to analyze the outcomes of the decision made. The company may be faced by a downward trend.
Cognitive biases that can cause managers to make poor decisions
The best managers also make mistakes. However, there are some factors that cause managers to make poor decisions. The failure to ignore sunk costs forms the basis for poor decisions made. Sunk cost is an already paid price which has no effect on future decisions. However, individuals consider these costs, though irrelevant, when making decisions.
Managers also make poor decisions owing to recent event, which refers to decisions made based on recent events. Some increase in the cost of shares in the stock exchange could be informed by some certain political deals which are temporal (Walter, 87). A manager may also make a poor decision based on the confidence that he or she has on himself or herself. An overconfident manager rarely consults, and rarely takes counsel.
Business level strategies
These are plans or models used by companies in their quest to perform various business operations. One such strategy is coordination of activities in various units. A certain company may be sub-divided into several sections which are easy to manage as compared to the organization as a whole. Another strategy that organizations must properly apply is effective use of human resource. Employees need to be enough for certain number steps to be achieved.
A company should develop and maintain unique advantages over rival companies in the market. This ensures that the products of such a company are always better than the ones for the rival companies. Another strategy is to identify and conduct a market economic analysis, and discovering a specific consumer need that is unmet. The company then goes ahead and utilizes this gap to gain abnormal profits before competitors penetrate the market. A company needs to monitor the product strategies. This involves proper market analysis to check for any gaps in capital spent on businesses. In case of any gap, the company moves in and meets the need thus scooping the profits therein.
Work cited
Walter, D. The Decision Making Process: The Four-Step Decision Making Process as simple way to arrive at rational decisions. GRIN Verlag. Munich. Print.
Williams, C. Effective Management. Cengage Learning. Massachusetts
