Final Report of the CGIAR Working Group on Deliberation and Decision-Making Processes

Report of a working group established at the mid term meeting of the CGIAR in May 1992 by the Chairman of the Group to examine deliberation, decision making, oversight, and information sharing processes in the CGIAR, and to suggest possible changes to accommodate the recent System expansion. The working group was chaired by Robert Herdt.It recommended the CGIAR continue to hold two meetings each year, with mid term meetings in countries where centers were located; also the use of topical parallel sessions at International Centers Week meetings, and streamlining of discussion procedures. The report urged the establishment of a finance committee composed of donor representatives, and a standing committee on system-level evaluation. It suggested combination of existing public awareness activities.Agenda document, CGIAR Mid Term Meeting, May 1993. A preliminary report was discussed at the CGIAR meeting in October 1992

Group Decision-Making

The present work explores improvements in group decision-making. It begins with a practical example using state-of-the-art techniques for a complex, high-risk decision. We show how these techniques can reveal a better alternative. Although we created an improved decision process, decision-makers were apt to protect their own organizations instead of the project. This tendency was reduced over the course of the decision-making process but inspired the first conceptual component of this work. The first concept describes the “Cost of Conflict” that can arise in a group decision, using game theory to represent the non-cooperative approach and comparing the outcome to the cooperative approach. We demonstrate that it is possible for the group to settle on a non-Paretto Nash equilibrium. The sensitivity of the decision-maker weights is revealed which led to the second conceptual portion of this work. The second concept applies social network theory to study the influence between decision-makers in a group decision. By examining the number and strength of connections between decision-makers, we build from intrinsically derived weights to extrinsically derived weights by adding the network influences from other decision-makers. The two conceptual approaches provide a descriptive view of non-cooperative decisions where decision-makers still influence each other. These concepts suggest a prescriptive approach to achieving a higher group utility

Incorporating stakeholders’ knowledge in group decision-making

International audienc

Analysis of a Group Decision-Making Process

The aim of this paper is to highlight the role of group decision and group thinking in the organization of a firm, taking as reference theoretical models and their practical applications. Organizational goals are often blocked by a pattern of thinking that develops within organizations. The article will also underline the importance of organizations' focusing on sub-goals, in order to reach, finally, to the desired result in the main goals of the organization.group decision, teamthinking, groupthinking, decision tree

Social Influence and Individual Difference in Experimental Juries

In a jury decision-making, individuals must compromise in order to reach a group consensus. If individuals compromise for non-rational reasons, such as a preference for conformity or due to erroneous information, then the final decision of the group may be biased. This paper presents original experimental data which shows that groups do have a significant tendency to compromise in jury-like settings. Econometric evidence also shows that features of groups, including the generosity of the group overall, will dictate the extent of compromise. The data also reveal that individual traits such as gender and capacity for empathy are associated with the extent of compromise in a jury-type setting. The implications are that interactions between individual and group characteristics limit the objectivity of decision-making