Browsing by Subject "decision making"
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Item Affect and Decision Making(University of Baltimore, 2009-04) Stickney, Lisa T.Intellect is to emotion as our clothes are to our bodies; we could not very well have civilized life without clothes, but we would be in a poor way if we had only clothes without bodies. [Alfred North Whitehead] S ixteen years ago, Fineman (1993a) called for a more contextualized view of affect and emotion in research. Among the questions he asked were how are de-cisions and decision making impacted by people's emotions, and how does affect alter or guide the decision path? Few have attempted to answer his questions. Instead the prevailing view is that emo-tionality is the antithesis of rationality. In addition, organizations, places where decision making routinely occurs, have been viewed as fundamentally rational places with emotional displays consid-ered unacceptable and disruptive (Ash-forth & Humphrey, 1995). Both of these beliefs are inaccurate. Organizations are not bastions of reasoned discourse, but "emotional arenas" (Fineman, 1993b), and the myth that organizations are ra-tional places devoid of affect can impede effective decision making. As for the link between reason and affect, it is much closer than many think. Neurobiological research demonstrates that affect is an essential component of rational decision making. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex is the part of the brain that is home to affective reactions. When dam-aged, individuals consistently make poor decisions or no decisions, suggesting that emotionality and decision making are inexorably intertwined (Damasio, 2005). In the words of LeDoux (1996), "cognition is not as logical as it was once thought, and emotions are not always so illogical" (p. 35). This brings us back to Fineman's (1993a) basic question: How does affect influence decisions and decision making? Before taking a closer look at the relationship between affect and decision making, we need working definitions for the terms associated with emotionality. The definitions used in this article are fairly standard and accepted in the emo-tion literature. Affect is a generic label that encompasses both moods and emotions. Moods are low-intensity, relatively endur-ing feelings usually without a known an-tecedent, while emotions are more intense, short lived, and have a clear cause. Both moods and emotions are relevant to deci-sion processes in organizational contexts because they have the potential to influ-ence judgment and decision making in organizations. Emotions can have a direct effect on decision making because they come with an awareness of their origin, so a response can be consciously planned. Moods are important to study because their effects are often subconscious. Thus, emotions and moods may infuse bias into the decision-making processes.Item ERM Ideas & Innovations: How to Evaluate and License an E-Resource During a Pandemic (Without Scheduling a Meeting)(2020-12-02) Lowe, Randall A.The COVID-19 virus pandemic of 2020 thrust libraries into managing situations many never imagined they would have to face. The author details one academic library’s experience in successfully evaluating, trialing and licensing a faculty-requested electronic resource subscription during the health pandemic in the face of significant fiscal challenges and describes the ways in which following established procedures as well as a set of principles that encourages open dialogue with faculty, administrators and vendors contributed to the positive outcome.Item Local Government Decision Making(2022-01-01) Cannizzaro, Vincent; Edwards, Lauren; School of Public Policy; Public PolicyMost of the theoretical foundations related to the public policy process and public policy decision-making are rooted in the experiences and processes within the federal government. While some theorizing is based on state-level systems, there has been little to no theorizing based on local governmental structures. This three-paper dissertations aims to add evidence, information, and context to the literature on the public policy and decision-making process of local governments. Through a systematic literature review using the Cochrane-Campbell procedure, Understanding Local Government: A Systematic Review of Political Decision-Making distills the published research on political decision-making of local governments to create a more unified understanding of the factors influencing local governmental policy action in the United States. In addition, this paper provides an analysis of the application of these themes to common theoretical public policy frameworks and models, creating a new theoretical model to define and predict local government policy action�the Municipal Action Framework. Utilizing an autoethnographic methodology, The Heavy Weight of Policy Inaction: An Autoethnographic Analysis of a Lead Hazards Ordinance provides a first-hand account of attempted policy action at the local level. Through the personal experiences of the author, this paper retells the events and circumstances creating both a hospitable, and eventually unhospitable, policy environment for momentous policy change. Through this writing, this paper applies the theoretical model of the Municipal Action Framework to better understand its applicability and practicality. Through quantitative methodologies, Showing Up: An Analysis of Uncontested and Write-In-Only Elections on Local Policy Action seeks to understand the policymaking implications of uncontested, write-in-only, and write-in winner elections for either executive or legislative seats within small local governments in York County, Pennsylvania. Findings suggest that winners of uncontested elections may increase the likelihood of policy actions, while winners of write-in-only elections have a decreased or null-level effect.Item Towards Effective Technical Debt Decision Making in Software Startups: Early-Stage(Association for Computing Machinery, 2019-11) Aldaeej, AbdullahTechnical Debt (TD) is a metaphor used to describe outstanding software maintenance tasks or shortcuts made in the software development to achieve short-term benefits (i.e. time to market), but negatively impact the software quality in the long term. TD is quite common in a software startup, which is characterized as a young company with low resources and a small client base, aiming to accelerate time to market. Decisions related to TD can be critical for startup success. Objective: I aim to understand the relationship between TD decisions and the success or failure of software startups, and explore the best practices related to TD decisions that would better contribute to the startup success. Method: I plan to apply multiple retrospective case studies in different software startups that succeed or failed to pass the startup period and become a mature organization. Semi structured interviews will be used to collect data from the team who was involved in the software development in the startup era. Contribution: The outcome of this study will help software founders/entrepreneurs to make effective TD decisions during the startup timeframe; that can better contribute to the startup success and decrease the risk of the startup failure.