Management and Quality Services

The quality and timeliness of decision-making have a marked impact upon how effectively an organisation is managed and how well its people perform.

The decision-making process is simple enough:

The Steps of the Decision-making Process

* Initiate Decision
* Assess the Context
* Clarify Objectives
* Generate Alternatives
* Analysing Alternatives
* Validating Best Alternatives
* Plan for Action
* Implement solution
* Review Result

We all use this process (or something similar) on a regular basis and often without thinking very much about it.

So why is it that so many decisions don't get made or those that get made are often viewed as poor or ineffective decisions? There are many reasons for this, some of which include:

* No decision was made at all (the problem was ignored)
* The decision-maker lacked confidence to decide
* The problem situation was misunderstood or misinterpreted
* The problem was not given sufficient priority
* There were insufficient data to make a good decision
* Critical data was not interpreted correctly
* Complex problems are treated as simple problems
* The proposed solution is not workable
* Decisions are made according to ad hoc rules
* Unclear about objectives/goals (cannot decide importance)
* A hidden political agenda
* The decision-maker's credibility is at risk
* Insufficient desire for a solution to the problem
* Inadequate problem-solving skills
* People jumping to conclusions
* Decision-maker lacked enough authority

Carshaw offers three structured solutions:

Stepwise Decision-Making

This is a step-by-step workshop to guide people through commonly-occurring workplace problems and to deal with situations where one or more solutions will solve the problem and remedy the situation. Participants then take their own problems through the process, helping each other along the way as appropriate.

Decision-making and Problem-solving

This workshop looks at more involved problem situations and explores both the "closed" and "open" variations. It explores the difference between symptoms and underlying causes and can involve a high degree of detective work. A range of simple tools and techniques are applied to problem scenarios. Participants are encouraged to bring their live problem situations that require addressing.

Complex Problem-solving

A complex problem is usually one that has been around for some time, often involves people and working relationships, and may have arisen as a result of earlier problems not being resolved properly. A popular choice - by way of example - is staff absence. In this workshop the more advanced problem-solving tools are used. It also includes an element of negotiation coupled with making proposals and presentations. This is particularly suitable for groups who are involved in in-house improvement projects of various kinds. This workshop equips participants with the highest levels of problem-solving skills. It usually requires a high degree of customisation and there may be a need to carry out pre-workshop surveys.

Problem areas that have been successfully addressed include the following:

a)     Organisational problems

General and specific staff absence
General lack of teamwork and co-operation among staff
Specific groups underperforming
Dealing with merging cultures
Low motivation of staff
Lack of management credibility
Immature behaviour of staff
Handling difficult behaviours
Too much negativity among workforce
Quality system(s) not working properly
Projects regularly delayed/cost overrun
Organisational suspicion/lack of trust
Production hold-ups/missed deadlines
Too much workplace stress
Can't keep good staff
Conflict between teams
Various "indirect" behaviours of staff
Conflict between individuals
Staff won't follow H & S rules
Need to restore confidence in management after changes
Conflicting priorities between departments
Low staff productivity
Need better leadership
Dealing with workplace changes
General fault tracking
Staff too task-focused
Lack of management commitment
Need to handle privatisation
Lack of business controls

b)     Sales/Marketing Problems

Not enough customers
To many complaints or warranties
Customers being abusive
Marketing not working well enough
Sales people not performing
Major contract under threat
Lost major contract
Sub-contractors not meeting commitments
Customer satisfaction ratings falling
Need for faster/greater innovation
Need to increase level of customer service
Need to sell the company
Customer complaints rising/changing in nature
Physical & verbal abuse of staff by "customers"
Falling order volume or size
Ineffective marketing strategy
Need to develop/build marketplace credibility
Need to offload troublesome customers
Need effective low-cost marketing
Need to build/develop customer loyalty

The real benefit of Carshaw's problem-solving is that it can be used by the people in the organisation who have the appropriate experience and the solution is usually ready to implement with little or no other work being needed.

With Carshaw you get real solutions to real problems!


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Carshaw Management & Quality Ltd 4 Hutchinson Close, Rugeley, Staffs WS15 2RG
England
Tel: 0044 (0)1889 584147 - Fax: 0044 (0)1889 585416

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