Decison-making process

First priority in making a decision is to establish who are the decision-maker and stakeholders in the decision or the audience for the decision. Identifying the decision-maker early in the process cuts down on disagreement about problem definition, requirements, goals, and criteria.

Although the decision-maker seldom will be involved in the day-to-day work of making evaluations, feedback from the decision-maker is vital at four steps in the process:
1. Problem definition [step 1]
2. Requirements identification [step 2]
3. Goal establishment [step 3]
4. Evaluation criteria development [step 5]

When appropriate, stakeholders should also be consulted. By acquiring their input during the
early steps of the decision process, stakeholders can provide useful feedback before a decision is
made.

It is the decision team’s job to make sure that all steps of the process are adequately performed.
Usually the decision support staff should include the help of skilled and experienced analysis or
facilitators to assist with all stages of the decision process. Expert facilitation can help assure
that all the steps are properly performed and documented. Their experience and expertise will
help provide transparency to the decision making process and help avoid misunderstandings that often lead to questions about the validity of the analyses which ultimately slow progress.

There have eight steps for the general decision-making process:

1. Define problem
2. Determine the requirements that the solution to the problem must meet
3. Establish goals that solving the problem should accomplish
4. Identify alternatives that will solve the problem
5. Develop evaluation criteria based on the goals
6. Select a decision-making tool
7. Apply the tool to select a preferred alternative
8. Check the answer to make sure it solves the problem