1. Decision Quality
2. Decision Implementation
3. Cost of Making the Decision
4. Development of the Group or Team

In addition, you are provided with an overall estimate of the effectiveness of each choice termed Overall.

To some extent, you can control the weights attached to each of these outcomes in the overall total by your judgements on four of the eleven situational factors. Thus your judgement on Decision Significance affects the weight attached to Decision Quality; your judgement on Importance of Commitment affects the weight attached to Implementation; your judgement on the Value of Time reflects the weight attached to Cost; and your judgement on the Value of Development reflects the weight attached to Development. Selecting the lowest of the five possible values (No Importance and No Significance) for one of these factors will result in assigning no weight to the corresponding outcome. For example, attaching no importance to Development will render all alternatives equal (and zero) reflecting the irrelevance of contributions to the development of group members.

As you increase your judgement of the importance or significance of an outcome, you will note that the numbers on the vertical axis of the bar graphs increase but the relative position of the five alternatives remains the same. You should note, however, that there are limits to your ability to control the importance of each of these outcomes. For example, the same rating (e.g., High Significance or High Importance) will assign more weight to Decision Quality followed, in turn, by Implementation, Cost, and Development. In other words, holding constant your judgement of importance, the byproducts of the decision process (cost and development) are deemed less consequential than implementation which, in turn, is less consequential than decision quality.

Let us now turn to how the software converts your judgements to predictions about the few outcomes. This is accomplished via four equations — one for each of Quality, Implementation, Cost, and Development. In the section which follows, we will briefly summarize the factors in each of these equations and the way in which they effect the recommendations. You may test each of these by observing what happens when you change your judgements.

Decision Quality

1. Decision Significance: This term interacts with all other terms to follow in this equation. The effects of each term will be zero when the factor has no significance and will reach a maximum when significance is critical.
2. Leader Expertise: Assuming some degree of significance, the predicted quality of decision will decrease if "Decide" is selected. A low level of leader expertise not only penalizes autocratic behavior but it also drives a search for the likelihood of synergy in the group (see Term 5 below).
3. Goal Alignment : Assuming some degree of significance, the quality of the decision is predicted to decrease when either "Facilitate" or "Delegate" is employed in situations in which the group does not share the organizational objectives.
4. Group Expertise and Team Competence: Assuming some degree of decision significance, the quality of the decision is predicted to decrease when either "Facilitate" or "Delegate" is employed in situations in which the group lacks the knowledge and/or the ability to work together collaboratively in using that knowledge.
5. Group Expertise, Team Competence, and Goal Alignment: These three situational factors are believed to produce a high level of synergy when all are present. They are believed to interact multiplicatively so that a deficiency in any one will reduce the benefits from the other two. As mentioned previously, the amount or value of synergy declines as Decision Significance declines and as Leader Expertise increases.
6. Goal Alignment and Likelihood of Disagreement: There is increasing evidence that dissent and disagreement may play a key role in postponing premature agreement and in increasing the depth of analysis before making a decision. We believe that disagreement and conflict may contribute constructively to decision quality when group members possess a common goal. Thus these two terms combine multiplicatively and predict progressively higher Decision Quality for "Consult Group," "Facilitate," and "Delegate" in situations in which there is shared support for the objectives.

Decision Implementation

1. Importance of Commitment: As was the case for Decision Significance, this term interacts with each of the terms in its equation. Commitment to the decision and the understanding of it by the group (both of which result from participation) is of value only to the extent to which group members are affected by the decision. This is most likely to be true when the group will be responsible for its implementation.
2. Likelihood of Implementation: While Importance of Commitment is a necessary condition for the positive effects of participation, it is not a sufficient condition. Sometimes the group`s commitment to a decision can be treated as a "given." The group members are likely to enthusiastically support the leader`s decision because they view him/her as the expert or as the person with the legitimate right to make the decision. When the groups' commitment to the leader`s decision is certain (i.e., Likelihood of Commitment is Very High), all styles are equally effective in achieving effective implementation. As the likelihood of the leader`s decision being accepted becomes less certain, the contribution of participation increases.
3. Likelihood of Disagreement and Likelihood of Commitment: The benefits of the more participative styles are also dependent on the initial level of disagreement among group members. A high level of such disagreement poses more of a threat to implementation and increases the desirability of the more participative styles aimed at working out differences before decisions are made.

Cost

1. Value of Time: As was the case for Decision Significance and Importance of Commitment, this factor interacts with those which follow. The effects of other terms become more important as the Value of Time increases. It is assumed that the style consuming the least amount of time is "Decide," that "Consult (Individually)" and "Consult (Group)" will consume approximately the same amount of time, and that the most time consuming are "Facilitate" and "Delegate" (both approximately equal).
2. Likelihood of Disagreement: The length of the group meeting and the number of hours consumed should increase with the amount of disagreement among group members about the nature of the problem to be solved or about the steps to be taken to solve it.
3. Team Competence: The length of the group meeting and the number of hours consumed should decrease with increased competence and experience of group members in working together.

Value of Development

1. Value of Development interacts with all other terms in the equation. As the importance attached to development increases, the difference in development associated with style increase; as it approaches zero, these differences disappear. It is assumed that the relationship between participation and development is linear, being minimum at "Decide" and increasing progressively to "Delegate".
2. Decision Significance: The amount of development is assumed to depend on the importance or significance of the decision. Development of group members does not occur on trivial decisions but is increasingly likely with enhanced significance of the decision.
3. Goal Alignment and Likelihood of Disagreement: Disagreement among group members about their positions on issues is likely to be a source of learning when there are shared goals and when leadership styles (such as "Consult Group," "Facilitate," and "Delegate") are used, giving them opportunities to work together to resolve differences. Furthermore, resolution of such differences is likely to contribute to the ability of the group to work together. We also acknowledge that differences can also weaken the ability or motivation of the group to work together and, consequently, their value to the organization. This outcome is predicted by the model when there is a high level of disagreement accompanied by no shared objectives.

A Note on Interaction Constraint

When there are serious time constraints (as in emergencies) and/or insurmountable geographical distances among group members, leadership styles requiring interaction among group members ("Consult Group," "Facilitate," and "Delegate") are inefficient, if not impossible. The interaction constraint equation imposes a penalty on those processes over and above the time used in the cost equation. The operation of this variable may be observed by selecting "yes" for Interaction Constraint.

We believe that there is a theoretical or empirical basis for the mechanisms that we have built into the model. We do not deny the existence of other situational factors to be considered or that the particular manner in which we have integrated them is the only way in which this could be done.

If you desire to inspect the equations themselves, click on Technical Data.