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DECISIONS INVOLVING GROUPS OF INDIVIDUALS

Reading Summary | Chapter 12

Making decisions is a large part of doing business. When there is only one person
involved or affected by a decision, making that decision is relatively easy. But when
coworkers or employees need to be taken into consideration, a group decision could be the
best solution. Deciding between individual and group decision making methods depends on
the decision that needs to be made
Two simple advantages arise from obtaining group judgments in decision analysis.

More information about possible ranges of utilities and probabilities can be obtained,
and it is then possible to perform sensitivity analysis on these ranges to see if the
decision specified by the analysis is changed by these variations.

A group of people who are involved in such a decision process may become more
committed to implementing the decision which is eventually made. As we shall see in
the section on decision conferencing, this latter advantage can be a major one.

MATHEMATICAL AGGREGATION
applied mathematics and decision making, the aggregated indices randomization method
(AIRM) is a modification of a well-known aggregated indices method. targeting complex
objects subjected to multi-criteria estimation under uncertainty. AIRM was first developed by
the Russian naval applied mathematician Aleksey Krylov around 1908.
The main advantage of AIRM over other variants of aggregated indices methods is its ability
to cope with poor-quality input information. It can use non-numeric (ordinal), non-exact
(interval) and non-complete expert information to solve multi-criteria decision analysis
(MCDM) problems. An exact and transparent mathematical foundation can assure the
precision and fidelity of AIRM results.

The methods involved are relatively straightforward, so more complex and timeconsuming procedures of behavioral aggregation are avoided.

The group members do not have to meet. Their judgments can be elicited by telephone,
post or computer and therefore the influence of dominant group members is avoided.

AGGREGATING JUDGMENTS IN GENERAL

Single-value estimates of factors such as costs, sales or times to complete a project are
often used in decision analysis models when the use of a probability distribution for every
unknown quantity would lead to a model which was too complex to be useful. Below are two
methods of combining individual estimates of unknown quantities.

Taking a simple average of the individual judgments

Taking a weighted average of the individual judgments

AGGREGATING PROBABILITY JUDGMENTS

Alternative procedures have been suggested for aggregating probabilities.

One approach is to regard one group members probability estimate as information

which may cause another member to revise his or her estimate using Bayes theorem.

Another approach is to take a weighted average of individual probabilities, using one

of the three methods of weighting which we referred to earlier.

AGGREGATING PREFERENCE JUDGMENTS

Aggregating preference orderings
One obvious way of aggregating individual preferences is to use a simple voting
system. However, this can result in paradoxical results.
Aggregating values and utilities
It is important to note that Arrows Impossibility Theorem refers only to situations
where individuals have stated the order of their preferences. A statement giving an
individuals preference order does not tell you about that persons intensity of preference for
the alternatives.
STRUCTURED GROUP PROCESSES
Essentially, Delphi consists of an iterative process for making quantitative judgments.
The phases of Delphi are:
(1) Panelists provide opinions about the likelihood of future events, or when those events
will occur, or what the impact of such event(s) will be. These opinions are often given
as responses to questionnaires which are completed individually by members of the
panel.

(2) The results of this polling of panelists are then tallied and statistical feedback of the
whole panels opinions (e.g. range or medians) are provided to individual panelists
before a repolling takes place. At this stage, anonymous discussion (often in written
form) may occur so that dissenting opinion is aired.
(3) The output of the Delphi technique is a quantified group consensus, which is usually
expressed as the median response of the group of panelists.
DECISION CONFERENCING
Decision conferencing brings together decision analysis, group processes and
information technology over an intensive two- or three-day session attended by people who
wish to resolve a complex issue or decision. The fundamental objective behind decision
conferencing is to provide a synthesis of decision analysis techniques and the positive
characteristics and dynamics of small-group decision making.