1. What were the reasons behind the poor decisions? Which framework did the poor decisions fall under (rational or social)? Were the poor decisions the result of using an incorrect decision-making model? Analyze the same issues for the good decisions that you found.
2. Could the decisions be improved by using one of the group decision-making techniques discussed in your text? Don't forget to consider the downside to this, such as increased time to make the decision.
3. Did you find any specific organizations that had a pattern of wrong decisions? If so, discuss the possible reasons for this.
Real Case: Online Communication to Share Knowledge
At the heart of Buckman Laboratory's knowledgesharing system is an online discussion forum called K'Netix. It has 54 discussion groups that focus on Buckman's main products-chemicals for papermaking, leather-tanning, and water treatment. A salesperson might survey colleagues around the world for the inside skinny on a particular client, say, or get ideas on how to solve a customer problem. Typically, employees post 50 to 100 messages a day. That has helped the company amass an easily searchable database of in-house expertise and past lessons learned that now contains more than 15,000 documents-all accessible by employees or customers via a Web browser. Before the online system was in place, "you would always be reinventing the wheel," says Cheryl Lamb, manager of Buckman's Knowledge Center.
Robert Buckman began experimenting with what he dubbed "knowledge sharing" in the mid-1980s, when he took charge of the company his father, Stanley, founded in 1945 and led until his death in 1978. Buckman's old way of distributing technical information-hiring PhDs and putting them on airplanes, Robert Buckman says- was getting too expensive as the company expanded globally. So Buckman began stationing people overseas. Today, 86 percent of its 1,300 employees work outside the home office.
With its staff scattered so far and wide, the company needed a way to keep people in touch. But getting the right information to the right people-fast-is easier said than done. For starters, in 1985, Robert Buckman told senior managers in Memphis to swap examples of innovative ideas through the company's e-mail system. But soon, the system became a network for chit-chat and gossip, and little else. "I realized the managers weren't going to share," he says. "They had information, but feared giving it up," because they felt they wouldn't get credit for their ideas.
So the CEO decided to adopt a more revolutionary strategy: empower the field staff to communicate with each other, rather than routing all information through managers in Memphis. He wanted his employees to share not just written reports but also the knowledge inside their heads gleaned from years of working in paper mills, tanneries, and treatment plants. "That's the real gold inside companies," he says. To pull that off, he set up a new computer system that linked the senior managers in Memphis plus Buckman1,300 employees around the world.
Once again, Buckman's efforts met resistance. Many managers resented having to yield their control over the flow of information-and refused to participate. "They didn't want to open their cabinets to people," says Dean Didato, vice president for leather chemicals. So the CEO decided to get tough. First, he ordered marketing manager Alison Tucker to start compiling weekly statistics detailing each employee's use of the knowledgesharing network.
Finally, Robert Buckman set up a system to promote those who shared information-and to punish those who did not. The clincher: A few years ago, he took the system's 150 most frequent users to a Scottsdale, Arizona, resort for a week. Only then, he recalls, did the holdouts start getting the message.