Dr Valentina Ferretti

This course is available on the BSc in Management, BSc in Psychological and Behavioural Science, International Exchange (1 Term) and International Exchange (Full Year). This course is available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit and to General Course students.

This course has a limited number of places (it is capped). Students who have this course as a compulsory course are guaranteed a place. Places for all other students are allocated on a first come first served basis.

Elementary statistical and mathematical concepts, as well as a true curiosity towards the fascinating field of decision making and a strong interest in rebooting your analytical “decision-ware”.

As this course embraces the two key stages of the decision making process, i.e. the initial divergent and creative stage and the subsequent convergent and analytical one, please, note that it is important to feel comfortable with interdisciplinary research, as well as with the use and discussion of both qualitative and quantitative strategies for successful decisions. Group work will also be a key component of the course.

This course is about making successful strategic decisions and building decision resilience during challenging times, in both the professional domain and the personal one. In this era of unprecedented uncertainty, learning how to make decisions against the backdrop of external factors that we cannot control or predict represents a fundamental skill for any sector of society and business. Knowledge of what it takes to develop a good decision making process is thus an invaluable part of everyone’s toolbox, particularly for rising stars who will be in positions of leadership in the future. This course introduces students to the key concept of decision quality and to cutting edge strategies and tools to integrate data and judgments and develop winning strategies.

This course’s lectures will entail a deep dive into the progressive stages of a strategic decision making process, with interactive experiments and puzzles to develop bias awareness and decision analysis expertise. Seminars will consist of interactive sessions, enabling you to master an actionable decision framework and become confident decision analysts. The learning outcomes of this course are twofold. First, to discover the key decision traps when framing, structuring and modelling decisions and why they are dangerous. Second, to understand and master cutting edge, replicable and versatile solutions for framing, structuring, modelling and communicating better decisions.

Teaching hours will be commensurate with a usual half unit undergraduate course but note that teaching may take a different format and/or structure in 2021/22.

Students on this course will have a reading week in Week 6, in line with departmental policy.

Two formative assignments:

1. Group project plan presentation (i.e. the selected decision context, due in week 7)

2. Group project pitch of the key decision analysis’ impacts observed as a result of the strategic decision making process developed as a group across classes 2, 3, 4, and 6. Students will present and discuss the key impacts of their decision making process (e.g. discovery of new objectives that were not in their original mental models, recommendation of a different solution to the decision as a result of the used elicitation protocols, etc.) and receive real time feedback, from both their peers and the lecturer. Feedback will be provided following specific criteria (i.e. the same criteria that will be used to evaluate the individual technical account of the group project’s impacts that is summative assignment n.2) and by completing a set of both descriptive and evaluative tasks (e.g. indicating the strongest part of the presentation, as well as parts that need revision, etc.). 

The above two formative assignments have been designed to prepare the students for the following two summative works: (i) the group project presentation of the chosen decision making problem/opportunity and (ii) the individual technical account of one key impact observed in the group project.

The topic of the group project (i.e. a decision making problem or opportunity to be modelled and analysed by means of Multicriteria Analysis) can be a personal decision (e.g. which job offer to accept when confronted with multiple ones, which master to apply for, etc.) or a real world case (e.g. how to reduce plastic consumption in the LSE new coffee place). Students will have to collect data, develop and apply a quantitative model, interpret the results and refer to the key scientific literature for the main steps in the development of the model. Students are allowed to work in groups of maximum 4/5 people. This summative assignment will help students develop their strategic problem solving skills by demonstrating their ability to apply both qualitative and quantitative tools to frame, structure and model a decision, interpret its results, and develop sound recommendations.

In the individual technical account of the group project’s impacts (max 1500 words), students will have to report on the developed process by focusing on the observed key impacts of the used tools.  This second summative assignment will help students develop their critical thinking skills.

Belton, V. and Stewart, T. (2002) Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis. London, Kluwer.

Keeney, R.L. (1992) Value-Focused Thinking: A Path to Creative Decision-making. Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press. HD30.23 K21 (Course Collection).

G.S. Parnell et al. (2013) Handbook of Decision Analysis. Hoboke, Wiley.

Spetzler C., Winter H., Meyer J. 2016. Decision quality: value creation from better business decisions. Wiley.

Group project (50%) in the WT Week 11.
Technical report (50%) in the ST Week 1.

The individual technical report (1500 words maximum) will provide an explanation and insightful discussion of one key impact observed in the developed group decision making process.