Subjective stakeholder dynamics relationships treatment: a methodological approach using fuzzy decision-making

Since the stakeholder theory was proposed to explain the interaction among its agents, extensive approaches have been developed. However, the literature continues to suggest the development of new methodologies that allow an analysis of the dynamics and uncertainty of the relationships between each agent. In this sense, this research proposes a novel methodology for the treatment of subjective stakeholder dynamics using fuzzy decision-making. The study proposes a mathematical methodological perspective for the treatment of subjective relationships among stakeholders, which allows a predictive simulation tool to be developed for attitude and personal preferences to analyze the links among all stakeholders. (...

Simplified models for multi-criteria decision analysis under uncertainty

Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references.When facilitating decisions in which some performance evaluations are uncertain, a decision must be taken about how this uncertainty is to be modelled. This involves, in part, choosing an uncertainty format {a way of representing the possible outcomes that may occur. It seems reasonable to suggest {and is an aim of the thesis to show {that the choice of how uncertain quantities are represented will exert some influence over the decision-making process and the final decision taken. Many models exist for multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) under conditions of uncertainty; perhaps the most well-known are those based on multi-attribute utility theory [MAUT, e.g. 147], which uses probability distributions to represent uncertainty. The great strength of MAUT is its axiomatic foundation, but even in its simplest form its practical implementation is formidable, and although there are several practical applications of MAUT reported in the literature [e.g. 39, 270] the number is small relative to its theoretical standing. Practical applications often use simpler decision models to aid decision making under uncertainty, based on uncertainty formats that `simplify' the full probability distributions (e.g. using expected values, variances, quantiles, etc). The aim of this thesis is to identify decision models associated with these `simplified' uncertainty formats and to evaluate the potential usefulness of these models as decision aids for problems involving uncertainty. It is hoped that doing so provides some guidance to practitioners about the types of models that may be used for uncertain decision making. The performance of simplified models is evaluated using three distinct methodological approaches {computer simulation, `laboratory' choice experiments, and real-world applications of decision analysis {in the hope of providing an integrated assessment. Chapter 3 generates a number of hypothetical decision problems by simulation, and within each problem simulates the hypothetical application of MAUT and various simplified decision models. The findings allow one to assess how the simplification of MAUT models might impact results, but do not provide any general conclusions because they are based on hypothetical decision problems and cannot evaluate practical issues like ease-of-use or the ability to generate insight that are critical to good decision aid. Chapter 4 addresses some of these limitations by reporting an experimental study consisting of choice tasks presented to numerate but unfacilitated participants. Tasks involved subjects selecting one from a set of five alternatives with uncertain attribute evaluations, with the format used to represent uncertainty and the number of objectives for the choice varied as part of the experimental design. The study is limited by the focus on descriptive rather than real prescriptive decision making, but has implications for prescriptive decision making practice in that natural tendencies are identified which may need to be overcome in the course of a prescriptive analysis

A multiple criteria supplier segmentation using outranking and value function methods

[EN] Suppliers play a key role in supply chain management which involves evaluation for supplier selection problem, as well as other complex issues that companies should take into account. The purpose of this research is to develop and test an integrated system, which allows qualifying providers and also supplier segmentation by monitoring their performance based on a multiple criteria tool for systematic decision making. This proposal consists in a general procedure to assess suppliers based mainly on exploiting all reliable databases of the company. Firstly, for each group of products, their evaluation criteria are defined collaboratively in order to determine their critical and strategic performance, which are then integrated with other criteria that are specific of the suppliers and represent relevant aspects for the company, also classified by critical and strategic dimensions. Two multiple criteria methods, compensatory and non-compensatory, are used and compared so as to point out their strengths, weaknesses and flexibility for the supplier evaluation in different contexts, which are usually relevant in the supply chain management. A value function approach is the appropriate method to qualify providers to be included in the panel of approved suppliers of the company as this process depends only on own features of the supplier. On the other hand, outranking methods such as PROMETHEE have shown greater potential and robustness to develop portfolios with suppliers that should be partners of the company, as well as to identify other types of relationships, such as long term contracts, market policies or to highlight those to be removed from their portfolio. These results and conclusions are based on an empirical research in a multinational company for food, pharmaceuticals and chemicals. This system has shown a great impact as it represents the first supplier segmentation proposal applied to industry, in which decision making not only takes into account opinions and judgements, but also integrates historical data and expert knowledge. This approach provides a robust support system to inform operative, tactical and strategic decisions, which is very relevant when applying an advanced management in practice.This research has been partially developed with the support of the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (Ref. ECO2011-27369) and Ministry of Education (Marina Segura, scholarship of Training Plan of University Teaching).Segura, M.; Maroto, C. (2017). A multiple criteria supplier segmentation using outranking and value function methods. Expert Systems with Applications. 69:87-100. doi:10.1016/eswa.2016.10.031S871006

LSGDM Two Stage Consensus Reaching Process for Autocratic Decision Making using Group Recommendations

The decision making is a general and significant action in day-to-day life. In some cases, experts cannot express their preferences using precise value due to inherent unreliability. The utilization of linguistic labels creates expert judgement more informative and consistent for decision making. The group recommendation is considered as a significant factors of e-commerce domain due to their direct impact on profit. The personalized experiments improve the engagement and the count of purchases of the customer when the recommended products are matched to the current interest.In this paper, the Large-Scale Group Decision Making (LSGDM) two stage consensus reaching process is proposed by using three various Amazon real world dataset.This proposed method permits an autocratic decision maker to utilize a different group recommendation for a sequence of decisions at highest level of consensus. The performance of the model is estimated by applying parameters like Root Mean Square Error (RMSE), Mean Absolute Error (MAE), Precision and Recall. The obtained result shows that proposed methodology provides better result while comparing various other methods