Communication &

Decision making

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 Communication

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• the activity of conveying information
• Communication is the process by which people
attempt to share meaning via the transmission of
symbolic messages.
• communication is a process by which an idea is
transferred from a source to a receiver with the intent
to deliver message
• It consists of a wide range of
behaviors that include listening, reading, writing,
talking and thinking.
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Types of communication
• Verbal – involves talking & listening
• Non verbal – communication not
involving words e.g. faecal
expression

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 Elements of communication
1. Source (Encoder) - Originator of message
Individual or group; Institute
2. Message - the idea communicated In the form
of words/verbal or symbols
Every message has three interpretations
1. The message the communicator meant to convey
2. What the communicator did say
3. What the receiver thought he/she has heard

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3. Channel- physical means by which the message
travels from source to receiver
4. Receiver(decoder): person or group for whom
the communication is intended
5. Effect: change in receiver’s attitude, knowledge
and practice
6. Feedback: the mechanism of assessing what has
happened on the receiver after delivery of
communication
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 The communication process

Sender Message Channel Receiver

Context

Feedback

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 Communication model
Linear (One-way) Model
Messages from experts, educators and mass media
No feedback mechanism

Systems (Two-way) Model

– Bidirectional information flow
– Behaviour change via interactive communication
• Eg. patient counselling/ telephone conversation/
discussion/ panel discussion

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 Seven Cs of effective communication:
1. Command attention: The materials should get
noticed
2. Clarify the message: The message should be simple
and direct.
3. Communicate a benefit: Messages should tell the
consumer what they will get in return for taking an
action for in the message.
4. Be consistent: All the materials in a campaign should
convey the same themes in all forms of media.

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5. Carter to the heart and head: The materials
should offer emotional values as well as
practical reasons to change.
6. Create trust: Communication starts with a
climate of credibility.
7. Call to action: The materials must ask the
consumer to do something.

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 forms of communication
1. Intrapersonal: - Communication with one self.
2. Interpersonal: - person to person
communication
3. Mass communication: - Communication
through the mass media
4. Organizational communication : -
communication with in an organization and
among organizations

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Importance of communication in management are

– Common need for management process:

planning, organizing, leading and controlling.
– Help to identify and utilize talents available
– Arrange the work so that right things are
done , in the right place, at the right time,
in the right way , by the right People
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To encourage communication, the team leader
should always observe certain principles:
– All team members should be free to express and
explain their views and should be encouraged to do
so.
– A message or communication, whether oral or
written, should be expressed clearly and in
language and terms that can be understood by all
concerned

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 – Communication has two elements— sending and
receiving. When the message that is sent is not
received, communication has not taken place.
Therefore, the team leader (or other
communicator) should always use some means of
checking that the intended effect has taken place.
– Conflict or disagreement is normal in human
relationships; it should be managed in a way that
will achieve productive results.

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Difference between effective and non effective
communication depends on
• Perception differences
• Emotions
• Inconsistencies between verbal and non verbal
• Prior trust (distrust) between parties

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Vertical communication in hierarchical ladder
Down ward: advice, informs, direct, instruct,
evaluate employees, and provide information
about policies, goals. Problem: information may
be filtered, modified or halted.
Up ward: supply information what is happening,
progress reports, suggestion, explanation,
requests for decision.

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Horizontal and informal communication

• Follows the work flow than the chain of

command Communications by organizations
• To external stakeholders

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 Communication in organizations
• Organizations are necessary to help people to
communicate
• Effective communications can be considerable
asset to an organization

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 Factors affecting organizational communication

• Formal channels of communication

• The organizations authority
• Job specialization
• In formation ownership
• News letters
• Regular memos
• Reports & staff meeting
• Others
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 Decision-Making

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• Decision-making: the process of identifying
and selecting a course of action to solve a
specific problem.
• Decision must be made at many levels in an
organization from executive decisions
(policy/goal formulation) to the day to day
repetitive operations performed by lower level
managers.

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 The Four Functions of Management

Planning

Directing Decision Organizing

Making

Controlling

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Decision – making is
– Time related
– Affected Human relationship
– Influenced by other decision – makers
or decisions

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 The Significance of Decision Making

• Decision making is the one truly distinctive characteristic of managers.

• Decisions made by top managers commit the total organization

toward particular courses of action.

• Decisions made by lower levels of management implement the

strategic decisions of top managers in the operating areas of the
organization.

• Decisions always involve organizational change and the commitment

of scarce resources.

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 Characteristics of decision making
• It’s the process of selecting the best
alternative
• It’s a rational process, involving application of
intellectual ability.
• A goal oriented process
• Always related to the environment
• Involves all actions like defining the problem
etc.
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 Decision Making Process
 Decision Making involves a sequence of steps
 Identifying, analyzing and evaluating the alternatives
 Selecting the best alternative
 Implementing the decision
 Limiting factors help to rule out many possible choices.
Time and resources are usually major limiting factors to
possible decisions.
 Alternatives are the potential solutions that can be
identified after considering the limiting factors
 Analyzing the alternatives identifies the consequences,
the pros & cons for each possible choice.

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Decision Making Process…

 Selecting the best alternative is making the choice that

offers the most advantages & the fewest disadvantages
 Implementing the decision requires taking action to get
results.
– Includes;
• Communicating the decision to appropriate personnel
• Putting plans, procedures into effect
 Establishing control system provides a feedback
mechanism for tracking the implementation of the
decision and allows for adjustment to be made
accordingly.

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 Types of Decision Making
1. Organizational and Personal
2. Strategic and Routine
3. Non Programmed and Programmed
4. Policy and Operative
5. Major and Minor
6. Individual and Group
Key
• Senior managers decision
• Middle level/ front line managers decision
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Types of Decision Making …..

 Organizational and personal

– When a person takes decision in an
organization as an executive ,it’ll be an
organizational decision.
– Personal decisions are those taken by a manager
about himself.
 Routine and strategic
– Routine decisions are made by following
certain established rules and policies, usually made
at lower and middle level of management.
– Strategic decisions are made by senior
level managers and are related to policy
matters.

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 Programmed and non Programmed
Programmed decisions
– Are structured decisions ,which applied to
routine problems.
– Relay basically on previous established criteria.
Non Programmed decisions
– Open and novel decisions.
– All strategic decisions are non programmed
decisions.
• Resource allocation, customer satisfaction
improvement
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Types of Decision Making……
Policy and operative
• Policy decisions
– Determines the basic organizational policies
– Responsibility of top officials
• Operative decisions
– Related to daily routine activities
Individual Vs group decision
• Individual decisions
- Are programmed
– Unilateral actions
– Avoids group thinking and risky shifts
• Group decisions
– Unprogrammed decisions
– Participative decision making
• Enhances commitment of subordinates and quality of problem identification

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 Decision Making Summary
Unique / Senior Manager Routine/Frontline /Middle
Decisions Level Managers Decisions
• Administrative Decisions • Operational Decisions
• Organizational Decisions • Personal Decisions
• Non-Programmable • Programmable Decisions
• Strategic Decisions • Routine Decisions
• Policy Decisions • Operational Decisions

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 Managerial problem solving
 Problem solving:
– Conscious process of closing the gap between
actual and desired situations
– Problem solving and decision making are used
interchangeably.
– Problem solving involves decision making
• Are they synonymous?
– All problem solving requires decision making;
but all decision makings are not the result of
problem solving.

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 The problem finding process emanate from

o Deviation from the past experience

o Deviation from a set of plans
o PHC principles
o Other people
o Community, media people
o Competitors
o Private /non governmental HSOs

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 Problem solving and decision-making model

Predecision situation analysis

Problem
Problem Decision Identifying, Evaluating alternative analysis
solving making solution and giving decision

Post decision alternative solution

Implementation and evaluation

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 Problem solving process & model
• Prospective problem solving: anticipating
organizational results to be more or less like
desired.
• Retrospective: identifying and corrects
previous causes of deviation from desired
results
• Concurrent problem solving :occurs as a
result of commitment to philosophy of
continuous improving quality and productivity

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 Conditions that initiate problem solving

•Opportunity Problem Solving

•Threat Problem Solving
•Crisis Problem Solving
•Deviation Problem Solving
•Improvement Problem Solving

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 Conditions that initiate problem solving
• Opportunity/threat(Prospective - might)
– Opportunity problem solving
• Prospective and anticipatory
• Occurs when favorable internal/external situations
enables to achieve org. goals
– Threat problem solving
• Prospective and anticipatory
• Opposite of opportunity problem solving
• Not in response to competitors

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Conditions that initiate problem solving….
• Crisis problem solving
– Immediate
– Respond to current or predictable threat
– Failing to act promptly may cause untoward result
• Deviation problem solving
– Retrospective
– Occurs when actual and desired results differ
• Improvement problem solving
– Concurrent
– Seeks to reduce future deviation
– Strategic planning Model
• Similar to those of traditional problem solving (SWOT analysis)

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 Managerial problem solving activities
1. Problem identification
2. Making assumptions
3. Developing tentative alternative solutions
and selecting those to be considered in
depth
4. Evaluating the alternative solutions by
applying decision criteria
5. Selecting alternatives that best fits the
criteria
6. Implementing a solution/alternative
7. Evaluating results
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 Problem Analysis
• Problem analysis, problem recognition and
definition includes data collection and
evaluation
• It is divided into
– Problem identification and definition
– Developing problem statement
– Assumptions are made upon it

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 Problem identification and definition

• Occurs in 3 stages
– 1st gestation/Latency: Cue/triggering events
indicate a potential problem
– 2nd categorization: managers become aware that
something is wrong but can’t fully describe it.
– 3rd Diagnosis

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Problem identification and definition……

• Problem recognition includes gathering

systematically evaluating and judging the
importance of information
• Problem statement
– Puts what is learning during the definition stage into
brief description of the problem to be solved
• An invitational stem ‘’in what way can/how can ..’’
• An ownership component ‘we’
• An action component ‘improve/increase…’
• A goal component “quality of patient care”

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Problem identification and definition…..

• Give an example ( problem statement)

– In what way can we increase the number of
antenatal care attendants receiving PMTCT
service ?
– In what way can we improve quality of patient
care in Black Lion Hospital?

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 Developing Assumptions
• Problem solving is a focus in developing assumptions
– Structural assumptions
• Related to the content of the problem
• Boundary assumption; lies outside or within the
responsibility of a manager,
• Additional resources to solve the problem needed
• The problem is caused by which unit
• Uncontrollable internal or external factors such as job
design, technology.

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Developing Assumptions ….

– Personal assumptions
• Unique to the manager
• Biases based on previous experiences and knowledge
• Willingness to deal with Risk and uncertainty
– Problem centered
• Relative importance
• Degree of risk posed by the problem
• How urgently a solution is needed
− Assumptions about political implications
•Repercussions from actions and inactions
•The degree to which superiors will accept the solutions

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 Identifying tentative alternative solutions
• Accept/ reject : use general criteria
– Ethical
– Consistency : with organizational policy
– Resources

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 Factors Influencing Problem Solving and
Decision Making

1. Attribute of the problem solver

2. Nature of the situation
3. The environment

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Factors Influencing Problem Solving and Decision Making…….

A. Problem solvers attributes

1. Experience, knowledge and judgment
2. Perspective personality and biases
• Narrow ( tunnel eyed )
• Managers general outlook (temperament , aggressiveness,
self assurance and self confidence)
3. Values, philosophy.
• Personal morals and ethics to define alternatives

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Factors Influencing Problem Solving and Decision Making…….

B. Nature of the situation

1. Urgency of results and time pressures
• Delay (costly)
• Rapid use of tentative alternative
2. Magnitude and importance
• Administrative Vs operational
• High resource /cost commitment
 More time and more resources will be spent

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Factors Influencing Problem Solving and Decision Making…….

3. Risk /Uncertainty
1. Structured :- clarity of the situation, the degree to which
the scope and nature of the problem and alternative are
precise
2. Non structured/uncertain
• Greater time /resource will be spent

•
Risk is a function of certainty, If a manager is certain
about a situation he has complete information.
4. Cost benefit analysis

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Factors Influencing Problem Solving and Decision Making…….

C. The environment
– Manager may be unable to control their
environment, affecting feasibility of alternatives
and constraining implementation
• External
• Internal
– Organizational objectives
– Organizational characteristics
» Traditional
» Action oriented
– Acceptance by peers, superiors and subordinates

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Thank you
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