Decision‐making Case Studies in Administrative Training
| Author | C. M. Chadwick |
| Date | 01 October 1965 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1002/j.1099-162X.1965.tb00651.x |
| Published date | 01 October 1965 |
Decision-making
Case
Studies
in
Administrative Training
by
C.
M.
CHADWICK
IN Administrative
Behaoiour-
Professor
Herbert
Simon examines the distinction
between
the
'factual'
and
'value' elements in decision-making
and
shows how
this clarifies the
broader
distinction commonly
made
between questions of
policy
and
questions
of
administration.
He
points
out
that
the selective or
'value'
element affects the process
of
ascertaining
and
organising
the
facts
in a given situation in such a way
that
one
cannot
properly speak of 'correct'
decisions, only
of
what
may
eventually be seen to be 'good' ones. Arising
froJI1
this
are
the
asswnptions
that
while
the
laying down of objectives
and
the
definition of values lie in the sphere
of
policy-making,
"the
function
of
deciding
may
be distributed very differently in
the
body politic from the final
authority
for resolving disputed decisions",»
and
secondly
that
"the
task of deciding
pervades
the
entire organisation
quite
as
much
as the task of
'doing'
-indeed,
it is integrally tied up
with
the
latter"."
Professor Simon's
argument
is a useful theoretical framework for a discussion
of
training in decision-making.
It
is accepted
that
the
foremost emphasis
of
this
training should be on logical thinking
and
clarity
of
expression.
Lord
Bridges
puts
'the
power
of
rapid
analysis'
at
the
top
of
his list of the qualities of a
general administrator.
"He
must",
he says,
"be
able to grasp all the facts in a
complicated situation; to sort
them
out
and
set
them
in their
proper
relation
one to another,
and
present
the
whole to his Minister in the fewest possible
words." But analytical methods by themselves, however carefully formulated
for training purposes,
tend
to fall short
of
what
is required of them. Whereas
at
one extreme there is the decision
that
is not a decision
at
all
but
the choice
of
acourse of action based on
an
incomplete analysis, at the
other
extreme is the
situation where knowledge
and
arrangement
of
the 'facts'
are
so confused by
probabilities, conjecture
and
questions
of
'value'
that
no analytical procedure,
however thorough,
can
contain it.
In
these terms it should also be possible to
identify
with
some precision such
important
imponderables in the objectives
of
administrative training as unwillingness to accept responsibility, a lack of
decisiveness
and
imagination,
and
the tendency to shed the
burden
of uncertainty
by constantly sending files sideways or upwards 'for decision'.
What
is involved
is exploring the scope
of
analytical methods in dealing with administrative
problems in relation to the
nature
and
process of decision-making as a whole.
Underlying this is the need to recognize
that
it is not
enough
in a developing
country
such as
Zambia
with its need for a dynamic local public service to
Mr.
Chadwick
is a
Lecturer
in Administrative Practice at the
Staff
Training
College, Lusaka,
Zambia.
1"Administrative Behaviour: A Study
of
Decision Making
Processes
in Administrative Organisation."
Macmillan (New York).
znd
edition, 1957.
2Ibid., p. 57.
3Ibid., p.
I.
'Lord
Bridges, Administration: What is it? And how can it be learnt? in A. Dunsire (ed.), The
Making ofan Administrator, Manchester University Press, 1956, p. 12.
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