The Role of Decision in the Enterprise, Part 2

Decision-making is like any other great process: Part science, part art. The science that goes into a decision, however, is quite the feat: Including probability theory, risk assessment, and information theory, just to name a few disciplines that go into something that each of us practice each and every day.

Whereas just a generation ago information was usually consumed in discrete pockets: Morning newspapers, evening newscasts, and perhaps hourly news on the radio, for instance. Today, though, the amount of information in our everyday lives is only limited by our willingness to ingest it—or block it from our lives. The Internet, for instance, has democratized the access to information: Everyone with news facts to present or an opinion to offer has an outlet to readily remove barriers to getting this information to the widest audience possible.

Information is essential to making decisions, right? Yes. The more information, the better, right? Not necessarily.

A man that understood the science of a decision was a humble British Presbyterian Minister that also dabbled in mathematics. Thomas Bayes, known best by his theorem—aptly titled Bayes’ Theorem—is a result in probability theory whereas an event that is conditional on another happening is generally different from the second event being conditional on the first. Bayes’ Theory explores the relationship between the two: Essentially, it informs us how to update or revise beliefs in light of new evidence dependent on experience.

Can we have too little information with which to make a good decision? Yes. Is more information better when making a decision? Not necessarily. Perfect decisions are made with the perfect amount of information—that is, not too much, not too little. One of the ramifications of Bayes’ Theorem is that too much information can exist and befuddle the decision-making process native to the decision maker. My current studies into decision making are towards the end to develop a practical and reproducible process with which a decision maker can come to make the perfect decision.

Practically speaking, the perfect amount of information may not be easily achievable, for the attainment of information is something that can change from moment to moment. Take my Battlemaster experience, for example. Battlemaster is a lightweight, text-based online game which is set in the period of the middle ages; the game is part roleplaying, part strategy. I began playing mostly for the strategy elements, but have participated quite a bit in the roleplaying elements as well. Each group consists of characters, created by players, in realms. Each realm has knights, lords, dukes, and four members that are commonly called the realm council: The ruler, general, judge, and banker. Each performs duties that are commensurate with what you might think they might be—the banker is in charge of the economics of the realm, for example. When my first character became the general of the realm of the realm of Eston, he co-developed a battle doctrine with his aide de camp. The Kane-McKay Battle Doctrine was the culmination of experience in combat, producing a construct for waging wars and winning battles that created more undefeated military commanders than any other doctrine that I have ever come across in the entire game, in all my years there. The first thing that the Doctrine emphasized was:

“Combat is a fluid situation.

Strategy dictates tactics only loosely: Tactics are how strategy is adapted to the battlefield under the circumstances of the moment. As such, strong tactics drive good strategy, and vice versa.”

In other words: While staying true to your principles—don’t budge on your ethics or morals—be certain you can adapt your tactics to suit the environment of the moment. Every element of warfare may be able to be predicted down to the minutest detail; however, the entrance of the human component into any military plan renders it fluid, possibly chaotic, and definitely entropic.

So, when making decisions: Be sure to make them with the understanding that they are rarely made in a vacuum. Decisions are most often made as part of a larger context that changes with each passing moment.