Preliminary Schedule for MgS 8130 Summer 2005 , Monday-Wednesday 4:45-7:30 224 Aderhold

Click here for Syllabus

Accessing Assigned Readings in Library Reserves

1; 6/13

Course Introduction; What is Decision Science; Herbert Simon's Normative Problem Solving Model ........... intelligence -- design -- choice -- implementation

Taxonomy of ProblemsDisturbance return to normal & prevent recurrence Opportunity maximize something

Assign cognitive style test on Internet Group Project .... Individual Take-Home Final Exam

2: 6/15

Nominal, Delphi, Interacting

"Effectiveness of ..." in eReserve

Harnessing Heuristics: Confirmation, Groupthink, Motivational ............ Videos Groupthink ............ Challenger and Columbia Encouraging Creative Conflict Structured Dialog

3: 6/20

Dewey Todd's MBTI slides

Handout

Come to class with your type scores Rational, Idealist, Artisan, Guardian . . . . Cognitive Style & Management Summary of Kiersey Types

4: 6/22 Video: Apollo 13: "Houston, we have an Opportunity"

Printer-Friendly Version

Intelligence Phase5: 6/27 The hidden traps ...: in eReserves

Early Group Behaviors" in eReserves

Hidden Traps (Cognitive Biases)

Intelligence Phase

Come to class with your type scores ............ group assignment Overview Of Heuristics and BiasesReal Differences and Random Differences REVISED Random vs. Assignable Deviation Prospering in an "Information Economy" Harnessing Heuristics: Representativeness, Availability Full Moon Effect Drug Testing Example

6: 6/29

Early Group Behaviors

Jones Box & Label case

Harnessing Heuristics: Selective Perception & Availability ........... Heterogeneous Groups ........... Diagnostic Worksheet Curious incident of the dog in the night Diagnostic Worksheed:: Jones Box & Label

7/4

7: 7/6 "Can you analyze this problem" case Diagnostic Worksheet, continued: The Case of the Burred Panels

Design Phase

8: 7/11

"Creatiivity in ..." case on eReservesCreativity& Decision Making Ryan Dornbos Case

Harnessing Heuristics: Anchoring, Concreteness Pyramid of ideas "Creativity Techniques" - a contradiction? Creativity Techniques

Discussion group exercise: Intelligence phase

(Ryan Doornbos)

9: 7/13

Creativity and Sleep Objectives, Alternatives, Consequences Consequence Matrices, Payoff Matrices

Nominal group exercise: Silent writing, round robin, idea clarificati

Printer-Friendly Version of Intelligence and Desigh

Choice Phase10: 7/18

"Even Swaps" on eReservesEven Swaps

Even-Swap Tradeoffs, Weighted-Sum Tradeoffs

Nominal group exercise cont'd:discussion & approval voting

11: 7/20

Harnessing Heuristics: Motivation, Function, Authority Social Choice Social Choice Videos Vroom/Yetton Theory of Leadership Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics

Delphi group exercise Part 1 Instruction (Choice phase)

12: 7/25

Ecclesiastes 9:11 Harnessing Greed and Fear Which Flight? Janet's Summer Party

Delphi: review the results of Round 1 and the requirements for Round 2

Implementation Phase13: 7/27 Implementation phase Implementation & Counter-Implementation

Resistance to Change: Article Slides Delphi: review the results of Round 3 and the requirements for Round 3

14: 8/1

Video: 12 Angry Men Summary of the Course

Turn in: Group writeup on structured dialog

8/3 Trun in (email) individual Take-Home Final Exam

1

Body http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/Swaps.html

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Even Swapsmaikng tough compromises when you can't achieve all your objectives at once

Find create a Verbal Consequences Table free form description of the consequences of each alternative on each objective

Ben Franklin's "Moral or prudential Algebra"

Table of Rankings: rank the consequences of each alternative from best to worst on a given objective, independent of any otherobjective. Do this separately for each objective.

Check for Dominance Pairs a dominance pair is a pair of alternative actions where the dominant action has a rank better than or equal tothe rank of the dominated action on every singly objectuve, and strictly better on at least one. Eliminate thedominated alternative.

Make trade-offs using even swaps

The essence of the even swap method p.144-145 determine the change necessary to cancel out an objective assess what change in another objective compensate for the needed change make the even swap cancel out the now irrelevant objective eliminate dominated alternatives

Simplify a complex decision with even swaps Alan Miller's Office Choice p.145-147

Practical advice for making even swaps make the easier swaps first concentrate on the amount of the swap not perceived importance of the objective value an incremental change based on what you start with make consistent swaps If you would swap A for B and B for C, would you swap A fo C? seek out information to make informed swaps practice makes perfect

2

Objectives Job A Job B Job C Job D Job EMonthly Salary $ 2,000 $ 2,400 $ 1,800 $ 1,900 $ 2,200 flexibility of work schedule moderate low high moderate none

business skills development computer

manage people, computer

operations, computer organization

time management multiple tasking

vacation, annual days 14 12 10 15 12

benefitshealth, dental, retirement

health, dental health

health retirement health, dental

enjoyment great good good great boring

Alternatives

Vincent Sahid's Job Decision (p. 70-71 & 86-88)"Verbal Cosnequences Table"

3

Add rankings from page 87

Objectives Job A Job B Job C Job D Job EMonthly Salary 2000 /3 2400 /1 1800 /5 1900 /4 2200 /2 flexibility of work schedule moderate /2 (tie) low /4 high /1

moderate /2 (tie) nono /5

business skills development computer /4

manage people, computer /1

operations, computer /3 organization /5

time management multiple tasking /2

vacation, annual days 14 /2 12 /3 (tie) 10 /5 15 /1 12 /3 (tie)

benefitshealth, dental, retirement /1

health, dental /2(tie) health /5

health retirement /4

health, dental /2(tie)

enjoyment great /1(tie) good /3(tie) good /3(tie) great /1(tie) boring /5

Alternatives"Table of Rankings"

4

I have sorted the columns to illustrate dominance and practical dominance; see p. 87-88

Objectives Job A Job D Job E Job B Job CMonthly Salary 2000 /3 1900 /4 2200 /2 2400 /1 1800 /5 flexibility of work schedule moderate /2 (tie)

moderate /2 (tie) nono /5 low /4 high /1

business skills development computer /4 organization /5

time management multiple tasking /2

manage people, computer /1

operations, computer /3

vacation, annual days 14 /2 15 /1 12 /3 (tie) 12 /3 (tie) 10 /5

benefitshealth, dental, retirement /1

health retirement /4

health, dental /2(tie)

health, dental /2(tie) health /5

enjoyment great /1(tie) great /1(tie) boring /5 good /3(tie) good /3(tie)

B Dominates EA "Practically Dominates" D"Check for Dominance Pairs"

5

I have eliminated jobs D and E

Objectives Job A Job B Job CMonthly Salary $2,000.00 $2,400.00 $1,800.00flexibility of work schedule moderate low highbusiness skills development computer

manage people, computer

operations, computer

vacation, annual days 14 12 10

benefitshealth, dental,

retirement health, dental healthenjoyment great good goodWhat improvement in some other objective would just make up for droppingJob A's enjoyment from "great" to "good?"Heuristic: pick an objective Job A is weak at this may make the later steps easier

6

I have traded off enjoyment for skills in Job A; now I can eliminate enjoyment.

Objectives Imaginary A Job B Job C Job AMonthly Salary $2,000.00 $2,400.00 $1,800.00 $2,000.00flexibility of work schedule moderate low high moderate

business skills development

operations, computer

manage people, computer

operations, computer computer

vacation, annual days 14 12 10 14

benefitshealth, dental,

retirement health, dental healthhealth, dental,

retirement

enjoyment good good good great

What improvement in some other objective would just make up for droppingJob B's skills from perple & computers to operations & computers?

7

I have traded off flexibility for skills in Job B; now I can eliminate skills

Objectives Imaginary A Imaginary B Job C Job A Job BMonthly Salary $2,000.00 $2,400.00 $1,800.00 $2,000.00 $2,400.00flexibility of work schedule moderate moderate high moderate low

business skills development

operations, computer

operations, computer

operations, computer computer

manage people,

computer

vacation, annual days 14 12 10 14 12

benefitshealth, dental,

retirement health, dental health

health, dental,

retirementhealth, dental

What improvement in some other objective would just make up for droppingJob C's flecibility from jogh to moderate?

8

I have traded off flexibility for vacation in Job C; now I can eliminate flexibility

Objectives Imaginary A Imaginary B Imaginary C Job A Job B Job CMonthly Salary $2,000.00 $2,400.00 $1,800.00 $2,000 $2,400 $1,800flexibility of work schedule moderate moderate moderate moderate low high

vacation, annual days 14 12 14 14 12 10

benefitshealth, dental,

retirement health, dental health

health, dental,

retirementhealth, dental health

9

Imaginary C is now dominated bu imaginary A; therefore real C is also dominated by real A!

Objectives Imaginary A Imaginary B Imaginary C Job A Job B Job CMonthly Salary $2,000.00 $2,400.00 $1,800.00 $2,000 $2,400 $1,800vacation, annual days 14 12 14 14 12 10

benefitshealth, dental,

retirement health, dental health

health, dental,

retirementhealth, dental health

If two extra vacation days a year and a retirement plan are worth $400 a month, take Job AIf not, take Job B!

10

Objectives Job A Job B Job C Job D Job EMonthly Salary $ 2,000 $ 2,400 $ 1,800 $ 1,900 $ 2,200 flexibility of work schedule moderate low high moderate none

business skills development computer

manage people, computer

operations, computer organization

time management multiple tasking

vacation, annual days 14 12 10 15 12

benefitshealth, dental, retirement

health, dental health

health retirement health, dental

enjoyment great good good great boring

AlternativesVincent Sahid's Job Decision (p. 70-71 & 86-88)

11

Add rankings from page 87

Objectives Job A Job B Job C Job D Job EMonthly Salary 2000 /3 2400 /1 1800 /5 1900 /4 2200 /2 flexibility of work schedule moderate /2 (tie) low /4 high /1

moderate /2 (tie) nono /5

business skills development computer /4

manage people, computer /1

operations, computer /3 organization /5

time management multiple tasking /2

vacation, annual days 14 /2 12 /3 (tie) 10 /5 15 /1 12 /3 (tie)

benefitshealth, dental, retirement /1

health, dental /2(tie) health /5

health retirement /4

health, dental /2(tie)

enjoyment great /1(tie) good /3(tie) good /3(tie) great /1(tie) boring /5

Alternatives

12

Convert Numbers or Rankings to Ratings

Importance Objectives Job A Job B Job C Job D Job E15% Monthly Salary 33 1/3 100 0 16 2/3 66 2/3

25%flexibility of work schedule 62 1/2 25 100 65 1/5 0

15%business skills development 25 100 50 0 75

20%vacation, annual days 80 40 0 100 40

15% benefits 100 62 1/2 0 25 63 1/2 10% enjoyment 87 1/2 37 1/2 37 1/2 87 1/2 0

64.1 57.4 36.3 51.3 38.8

Alternatives

13

Social Choice http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/SocialChoice/SOCIAL.html

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"Objectives" in Various Flavors of Decision Making

Type of Decision: Conflicting "Objectives"

Multiple Objectives My car should have a low price It should also be roomy & luxurious

Risky Decisions Do well in rain; Do well in shine

Games Do well if opponent attacks on left Do well if opponent attacks on right

Social Choice Satisfy you Satisfy me

Nonzero-Sum Games Prisoners' Dilemma Tragedy of the Commons

Paradoxes of Voting Arrow's Impossibility Theorem

Voting Schemes: Plurality Plurality with Runoff Sequential Runnoff ("drop the lowest") Borda Count (top 10 football teams) Condorcet (avoid agenda effect)

Median Voter Theory

I often think it's comical--Fal, lal, la! How Nature always does contrive--Fal, lal, la! That every boy and every gal That's born into the world alive Is either a little Liberal Or else a little Conservative!-- Fal, lal, la! --Iolanthe, Act II Scene 1,by Gilbert & Sullivan

Approval Voting

14

Science News Online, Ivars Peterson's MathTrek (10/31/98): How to Fix... http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc98/10_31_98/mathland.htm

1 of 3 7/19/2005 9:16 PM

Recently on MathTrek:

Unfair Dice -- 10/24/98

License Codes -- 10/17/98

Arithmagic -- 10/3/98

How to Fix an Election

Voting sounds like a simple matter. Just pick a candidate, then count the ballots andannounce the tally.

When there are three or more candidates (or choices), however, the results may notactually reflect the true preferences of the voters.

Suppose that a group of 15 people must decide which one of three beverages (milk,beer, or wine) to stock in the communal refrigerator. Six people prefer milk to wine tobeer; five people prefer beer to wine to milk; and four people prefer wine to beer to milk.

If each person were allowed to vote only for his or her favorite beverage, milk wouldwin, beer would come second, and wine would end up third. A close look at thepreferences, however, reveals that nine voters actually prefer beer to milk. Similarly,nine voters prefer wine to milk, and 10 prefer wine to beer. These pairwise comparisonssuggest that the voters really prefer wine to beer to milk—a ranking opposite to theplurality outcome.

What if there were a runoff election when the initial round doesn't produce a winner withmore than half the votes? In this case, wine would be dropped from the ballot. In ahead-to-head contest, beer would defeat milk.

"The voters don't change their opinions at all," notes mathematician Donald G. Saari ofNorthwestern University in Evanston, Ill. "You just change the voting procedure, and youget a different result."

Saari and Fabrice Valognes of the University of Caen in France describe votingparadoxes and mathematical methods for studying these outcomes in the October Mathematics Magazine.

Such problems with elections bothered a number of mathematicians in 18th-centuryFrance. In 1770, Jean-Charles de Borda (1733-1799) wondered whether the use ofplurality voting by the Academy of Science distorted the membership's preferences,allowing "inferior" candidates to get elected. He proposed a voting system now calledthe Borda count, which assigns points to different preferences.

In a three-candidate race, two points would go to the voter's first choice, one point to thesecond, and zero to the third. The winner would be the candidate with the highest pointtotal.15

Science News Online, Ivars Peterson's MathTrek (10/31/98): How to Fix... http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc98/10_31_98/mathland.htm

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Applied to the beverage example, wine would win, beer would come second, and milkwould be third. That outcome happens to agree with the pairwise rankings.

However, there appears to be no particular reason to choose a 2-1-0 weighting schemeover another set of weights, such as 6, 5, 0; 4, 1, 0; or even 1, 1, 0.

In the 1780s, Marie-Jean-Antoine-Nicolas de Caritat, Marquis de Condorcet(1743-1794) argued in favor of an alternative scheme in which the winner is thecandidate who beats all other candidates in pairwise elections. In the beverageexample, wine would win a majority vote over each of the other beverages. Milk wouldbe the clear loser.

The Condorcet procedure can fail, however. For example, suppose 5 people prefer A toB to C; 5 people prefer B to C to A, and 5 people prefer C to A to B. A natural way toproceed is to run A against B, then run the winner against C. In this case, A would winthe first round overwhelmingly, only to lose to C by a landslide. It seems obvious that Cshould also easily defeat B. Yet B convincingly defeats C.

"Whichever candidate is voted upon last, wins—decisively," Saari and Valognes remark."In particular, there is no Condorcet winner or loser."

So, which voting method is best?

Saari used mathematical ideas from the study of dynamical systems, sometimes looselycalled chaos theory, and algebraic geometry to identify situations in which differentvoting systems fail. The results indicate that, for more than two candidates, you canalways find examples of voting procedures where the election results favor a specifiedoutcome.

"You can get whatever result that you want," Saari says. Yet "nobody changes his orher mind."

It turns out that, despite some problems, the original Borda count is the best votingscheme. "It significantly reduces the number of paradoxes that might arise," Saari says.Moreover, "if something goes wrong in the Borda count, it will go wrong in every otherprocedure."

The worst scheme is the simple plurality vote. In elections in which voters must selectcandidates to fill two or more positions, giving the voters the option to choose anynumber of candidates up to the full allotment (approval voting) messes up the resultseven more.

That may explain the quirkiness often found in lists of the 100 best U.S. films or the topmathematicians of all time.

"Manipulating elections means taking advantage of voting paradoxes," Saari says. It'suseful to be able to identify what can go right and what can go wrong.

In general, "who you elect reflects the procedures you use more than who you want," headds. "Bad procedures can lead to lousy elections results."

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Science News Online, Ivars Peterson's MathTrek (10/31/98): How to Fix... http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc98/10_31_98/mathland.htm

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References:

Saari, D.G. 1995. Basic Geometry of Voting. New York: Springer-Verlag.

______. 1995. A chaotic exploration of aggregation paradoxes. SIAM Review 37(March):37.

______. 1992. Millions of election outcomes from a single profile. Social Choice and Welfare 9:277.

Saari, D.G., and F. Valognes. 1998. Geometry, voting, and paradoxes. Mathematics Magazine71(October):243.

Additional information is available at Donald Saari's Web page at http://www.math.nwu.edu/~d_saari/.

Comments are welcome. Please send messages to Ivars Peterson at ip@sciserv.org.

Ivars Peterson is the mathematics/computers writer and online editor at Science News. He is the author of *The Mathematical Tourist, Islands of Truth, Newton's Clock, Fatal Defect, and The Jungles of Randomness. His current work in progress is Fragments of Infinity: A Kaleidoscope of Mathematics and Art (to be published in 1999 by Wiley).

NOW AVAILABLE IN PAPERBACK: The Jungles of Randomness: AMathematical Safari by Ivars Peterson. New York: Wiley, 1998. ISBN0-471-29587-6. $14.95 US (paper).

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17

Social Choice Videos http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/SocialChoice/soc-vid.htm

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Title: For all practical purposes. Social choice [videorecording] / Consortium for Mathematics and Its Applications. Publisher: Santa Barbara, CA : Intellimation, 1988. 3 videocassettes (150 min.) : sd., col. ; 1/2 in.VHS Performed by: Solomon Garfunkel. LC Subject(s): Social choice--Mathematical models. Voting--Mathematical models. Planning--Mathematical models. Game theory. Games of strategy (Mathematics) Prisoner's dilemma game. Decision making . Summary: Deals with how mathematics can be used to make social choices ranging from a fair voting system,determining award winners, and setting economic and governmental planning priorities. Uses computergraphics, animation sequences, and live action. Intended for entry-level liberal arts students. Notes: Includes programs 11-15 of a 26 pt. television course. "An Annenberg/CPB project." Main title has subtitle: Introduction to contemporary mathematics. [Tape 1]. Program #11: Overview (30 min.) ; Program #12: The impossible dream (30 min.) -- [Tape 2]. Program #13: More equal than others (30 min.) ; Program #14: Zero sum games (30 min.) -- [Tape 3]. Program #15: Prisoner's dilemma (30 min.).

Location: Pullen Video Tape (LS 2) Call Number: Video Tape QA269 .F67 1988 Number of Items: 3

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Body http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/GROUPS/vroom.html

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Vroom's Taxonomy of LeadershipStyleA1 Autocrat: You solve the problem or make the decision yourself, using information available to you at thattime.

A2 Consultative Autocrat 1: You obtain the necessary information from your subordinates, then decide onthe solution to the problem yourself. You do not necessarily tell your subordinates what the problem is whilegetting the information from them. The role played by your subordinates in making the decision is clearlyone of providing the necessary information to you, rather than generating or evaluating alternative solutions.

C1 Consultative Autocrat 2: You share the problem with relevant subordinates individually, getting theirideas and suggestions without bringing them together as a group. Then you make the decision that may ormay not reflect your subordinates' influence.

C2 Consultative Autocrat 3: You share the problem with your subordinates as a group, collectively obtainingtheir ideas and suggestions. Then you make the decision that may or may not reflect your subordinates'influence.

G2 Consensus Seeker: You share the problem with your subordinates as a group. Together you generate andevaluate alternatives and attempt to reach agreement (consensus) on a solution. Your role is much like that ofa chairman. You do not try to influence the group to adopt "your" solution and you are willing to adopt andimplement any solution that has the support of the entire group.

Decision Table for Leadership Style

Vroom/Yetton Decision Tree

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Decision Tree for Vroom's Theory of Leadership http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/GROUPS/VROOMPIC.HTML

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Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/Aristotl.htm

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From Aristotle's NICOMACHEAN ETHICS

Book 1: The Aim Of Man

i. Definition of the good Today we'd call this "means-ends analysis"

ii. Primacy of statecraft Application: "politics"="management," "citizens"="stakeholders"

iii. Two observations on the study of ethics Not an exact science Not suitable for immature minds

iv. The good as happiness Health, money, leisure, entertainment are all means to this end

v. Conflicting views of happinessPleasure? no. Honor? close, but not quite. Money? ridiculous!

vi. Criticism of Plato's doctrine of archetypes Skip

vii. Definition of man's highest good

An activity of the soul in accordance with virtue Compare Gary Becker's repacement of 'consumption: with "householdproduction"

viii. Confirmation by popular beliefs

A person who does not enjoy doing noble actions is not a good person at all Requires external goods, for it's not easy to act nobly without the proper equipment

ix. Sources of happinessIt would be altogether wrong that what is greatest and noblest in the world shouldbe left to chance

x. Happiness and "time and chance""good decisions" versus "good outcomes" (make the best shoes you can out of the leather that is available)

xi. The happiness of the dead Skip

xii. Happiness: praised or prized Skip

xiii. Two kinds of human excellence Skip

21

Ecclesiastes 9:11 http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/eccles.htm

1 of 1 7/19/2005 9:20 PM

Eccl 9:11 "The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all."

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Body http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/riskavrs.htm

1 of 1 7/19/2005 9:21 PM

Risk AversionEconomic Effects of Risk AversionMicroeconomic Benefits minimize "probability of ruin"

Macroeconomic Costs entrepreneurship vs. "Failure of nerve" "A nation of risk averters is a nation at risk" -- Brightman p.175

Von Neumann Morgenstern Utility TheoryBasic Reference Lottery: win $W with probability p, otherwise $L

get X for certainif these are equivalent, U(X) = p

Risk Neutrality for Lottery TicketsYour chance of winning the lottery is identical if you have 1 ticket for sure,

10%chance at 10 tickets, 1%chance at 100 tickets, etc

Model Utility Curves for Money Gains increasing (the pig principle) concave downward (risk aversion)

Utility Curves for Gains and Losses: risk-seeking for losses is common (framing heuristic)

Risk SharingSyndicate: members share all winnings & losses

Mutual Insurance winners cover losers' losses, keep what's left

The Value of Human Life Dollar Value of Life Itself Dollar Value of Life-Span Lost Income Lost Consumption "You're gonna miss me when I'm gone" "A terrible way to go"

car crash - plane crash - nuclear accident

The Value of SafetyNo Dollar Value of Life is Required .0001 risk for $100 may be OK (cash in I-285 median)

.5 risk for $500,000 is not OK

.9999 risk for $1M is ridiculous

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Whigh Flight HKR p120-122 http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/Flight.htm

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Which Flight? p. 120-122 of HKR

Mark originally considers three alternatives See game and reschedule London trip Miss game and take early flight to Dulles See game and gamble on later flight to Dulles.

Because the first alternative is worse than the second, he can eliminate it without bothering to compare itwith the third. He is now evaluating a single sure thing, missing the game ot take the early flight., against a gamble, takingthe flight to Dulles after the game and gambling that it will not be more than 30 minutes late. He has hard data that the probability that the flight will NOT be more than 30 minutes late is "much morethan 80%" Call this probability P, P>.8

Create a utility scale of 0 to 100% by defining its endpoints: the best consequence, seeing the game and catching the flight to London, = 100% gain the worst consequence, seeing the game but missing the flight to London, = zero gain.Define G (between 0 and 100%) to be the gain of the middle alternative, missing the game to take the earlyflight to Dulles.The expected gain of the gamble is 100%*P + 0*(1-P) or P, which is much more than 80%.

If Mark is certain that G < 80%, then G is much less than P and he should watch the game and gamble on the late flight to Dulles.

If he is certain that G>80%, or if he is uncertain which is true, then he needs to refine his estimate of G and/or P.

The statement in the book that "After more thought, he decides he'd take the chance if the risk of missing theLondon flight is less than 15%" is equivalent to saying that G=85%

This decision has one alternative that is treated as uncertain and another that is treated as a sure thing. This isknown as a "Go-No Go" decision, though "Risk-No Risk" would be more precise.

24

Janet Ellingwood's Summer Party (HKR p.114-116, 123-125)P(rain) U(picnicU(danc U(best)

0 1 0.75 10.1 0.9 0.725 0.90.2 0.8 0.7 0.80.3 0.7 0.675 0.70.4 0.6 0.65 0.650.5 0.5 0.625 0.625

75% 0.6 0.4 0.6 0.650% 0.7 0.3 0.575 0.575

0.8 0.2 0.55 0.5533.3% 0.9 0.1 0.525 0.525

1 0 0.5 0.5

0.333 0.667 0.667 0.667

Imagine that Janet had to choose between one of the four outcomes of her decision and a gamble where "winning" means a sunny picnic and "losing" means a rainy picnic

Obviously, the suny picnic outcome is exactly equal to a 100% chance in the gamble.It is also obvious that a rainy picnic in exactly equal to a 0% chance in the gamble.Experiment with various values for Janet's subjective judgments in the green boxes belo

What probability of winning the gamble is neither more nor less preferable than each of the four outcomes?

chance of winning the gamble is just as good as a sunny dinner dancechance of winning the gamble is just as good as a rainy dinner dance

Using these numbers, she should have the picnic of the forecast of rain is belowand the she should have dance of the forecast of rain is above that amount.

00.20.40.60.8

1

0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1Probability of Rain

Util

ity

Picnic Dance Best

25

Nominal Groups http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/GROUPS/nominal.htm

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Nominal Group TechniqueSilent Writing Members generate ideas before comparing with others.

Round Robin

Share ideas but do not debate them. Each person gives one idea then the next person gives one idea and so on,going around the circle until everyone is out of ideas. Low status introverts speak first, leader goes last or not at all

Idea Structuring

Merge similar ideas but do not debate them; If A can stand alone but B only makes sense with A,

have "A but not B" and "A&B" as two entries on listDo NOT eliminate silly ideas since this requires debating which are andare not silly, and it's not time for that yet!

Discussion

Compare ideas and debate their pros and cons. An idea is good or bad as is is helpful or harmful (or simply useless) withrepsect to one or more SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES.(Note debate is NOT allowed before the discussion stage!)

Voting Secret ballot helps avoid groupthink or "Abilene paradox."

Note that the nominal group technique can be used at various stages of decision making,depending on what the "ideas" in the table above refer to. You can have one nominal group session to decide on the Problem scope and definition,another to decide on Objectives or "measurbles," a third to decide on a list of Alternatives to be considered. The Consequences phase is probably the least suited; Delphi is ideal for this. But nominal groups could be very good for the Tradeoffs phase.

26

Creativity (creative) Tools and Techniques - Delphi http://www.mycoted.com/creativity/techniques/delphi.php

1 of 1 7/19/2005 9:23 PM

Delphi

Delphi

The Delphi technique was developed in the 1950’s by the RAND Corporation as a tool for harnessingthe views of a group of experts to forecast the potential damage from atom bomb attacks.

Other users for Delphi are in the surfacing and judging components of messy issues. Its maindisadvantage being its high administrative overhead, however the method has been successfullyincorporated in some computerised problem solving systems.

Between 2 – 5 consecutive questionnaires to a group of perhaps 15 – 25 people (occasionally up to100) selected either as experts in the matter being investigate (if the intention of the exercise is togather expert opinions on some issue) or as people directly concerned in some issue (if the purposeis to surface social or organisational concerns). E.g. a business creation agency used their voluntarysteering group of local small business experts as a Delphi panel when trying to identify thepsychological barriers inhibiting people from starting up their own businesses.

Nominate the Panel; assuming they are experts and busy people, it is likely that they willrequire reassurance that there are advantages to their accepting the considerablecommitment involved.

1.

Develop, send out, and get back the opening questionnaire; one or two broad open-endedquestions are sent out initially and responses are preferred in the form of a list of separatesentences or short paragraphs rather than continuous text. A reminder letter may berequired to encourage late responders.

2.

Develop, send out, and get back the second questionnaire; this subsequent document iscreated in light of the responses to the initial questionnaire. The responses to the firstquestionnaire are collated into a single anonymous list (using the original wording sinceparticipants will recognise their own contributions), the respondents’ are the asked to rateevery item in the list (e.g. on a five point scale of importance, priority, feasibility, relevance,validity…) and finally to include any additional items suggested by the combined listing.

3.

A brief Delphi might end at this point; (in which case conclude), however a more extendedDelphi may profit from additional rounds. The response ratings to questionnaire 2 areaveraged and questionnaire 3 may ask the panel members to indicate where they felt theorder of ratings need could be improved. There is no reason why this cannot be repeatedfor further questionnaires until a steady pattern materialises, but few expert panels havethe patience for many further rounds unless the issue is crucial to them. Alternatively, theitems rated above a certain threshold could be printed on separate cards, with a request foreach panel member to sort the cards into related clusters.

4.

Thank the participants; the panel members will have been selected for their expertiseand/or direct involvement, they are likely to have strong interest in the outcome, so asummary report and letter of thanks is usually forwarded to each member following theproject. Some individuals may have given up substantial amounts of time to the project inwhich case a suitable ‘executive gift’ is often appropriate.

5.

When the Delphi method is used to address a single, well defined, problem (such as its original usein estimating likely damage levels from nuclear war) the outcome may be easily summarised.

However, when used to surface and prioritise concerns, the output can be quite large (a panel of 20can easily generate 15 – 20 concerns each – perhaps 2 – 300 distinct items) so as in any form ofbrainstorming or brain writing, some type of convergent post-Delphi analysis may be needed.

See also Collective Notebook (CNB), Estimate-Disucss-Estimate and Using Experts

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Instructions for Delphi Exercise http://www2.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/GROUPS/HowToDelphi.htm

1 of 1 7/19/2005 9:47 PM

Instructions for Delphi Class Exercise

Before or durning the July 20 class: Set up a matrix like http://www.gsu.edu/~dscthw/x130/CHOICE/WgtSum.xls specifying the objectives and alternatives, with blank squares to fill in the numbers for achievement scores and importance weights.

In class on July 20 Working individually

For each objective:

Assign an "achievement score" of 100 to the best alternative for that objective, ignoring all other objectives. Write it in the consequence matrix in the cell for that objective and that alternative.

Assign an "achievement score" between 0 and 100 to all of the other alternatives for that objective, ignoring all other objectives, and write it in the corresponding cell. 50 = irrelevant, 0 = totally harmful.

Do this for each objective separately.Assign an "importance weight" for each objective so that all the importance weights add up to 100%.

Between the July 20 and July 25 Classes:Round 1 Delphi coodinator does the following: (You can rotate coordinators or keep the same one from round top tound.)

For each cell defined by one alternative and one objective:.Find the "round 1" average achievement score given by group members for that alternative for that objective separately, independent ofany other alternative or objective

For each objectiveFind the "round 1" average of the importance weights for each objective separately, independent of every other objective

Before the next class, email the results as an excel spreadsheet to the group address. (That way I also get a copy.)

Try to do the individual round 2 work too.

In class on July 25We will review the results of Round 1 and the requirements for Round 2

Between the July 25 and July 27 classes (or earlier of possible_

Each individual prepares a new matrix with your new "round 2" assessments of all the achievement scores and importance scores. For at least five of the estimates, including the ones where your new estimates differ most from the averages, type your reasons.in the body of your email to the group address

The round 2 Delphi coordinator finds averages as above, and also puts all the written comments without names in the body of the email to theteam address/

In class on July 27 We will review the results of Round 2 and the requirements for Round 3

Between the July 27 and Auguat 1 classes

Read your teammates' new "round 2" assessments and their reasons email your "round 3" assessments for all achievement scores and importance weightsto the rouond 3 coordinator

Round 3 coodinator finds the new average of each of these multiply the importance weights by the achievement scores and add for each alternative.

In class on Auguat 1We will review the results of Round 3 or resolve any problems that have delayed completion.

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