COURSE CONTENT
Day 1 Decision-Making
9:00 – 9:30 am Introduction, ice-breakers and warm-ups
9:30 – 1:00 pm Internal and External Decision-Making Mode (InEx)
There are people who make decisions based on external circumstances (eg. colleague approval, group concensus etc) while others rely on personal conviction to come to a decision (eg. personal integrity, self-approval etc). This session helps the participants find out which are they (external or internal mode) and how to utilize both modes of thinking to be balanced in terms of reaching effective decisions.
What-Is and What-Can-Be Decision-Making Mode (WiWc)
Some work teams reach decisions based on what resources are available (eg. present circumstances, available resources, client's present requests) while other teams work on future scenarios (eg. direction of the industry, client's projected needs etc). Activities will focus on developing both types of thinking skills.
Tea Break
Head-wise and Heart-nice Decision-Making Mode (HwHn)
Another approach in decision-making is the Head vs Heart platform,
wherein some organizations are more head-inclined (eg. analytical, evaluative, objective etc). On the other end of the spectrum, some organizations are more heart-inclined (eg. relationship-based, subjective etc) when making decisions. This session will discuss how each mode affects a company's decision-making process.
Sequential and Wholistic Decision-Making
Mode(SqWh)
When we look at situations and decisions, we can see events and circumstances one step at a time, and also look at the situation as a whole. This session will showcase how the participants can use both approaches in reaching decisions via sequential analysis of a decision (eg. evaluate the effects of individual steps in a process) and also from a more systemic approach (eg. evaluate overall effect of the process and the interactions between each step of the entire process).
1:00 – 2:00 pm Lunch
2:00 – 3:00 pm The 3Ps Perspectives Decision-making Modality
This session analyses the conflicts that teams face when personal priorities are in conflict with corporate concerns. Participants will discuss real-life scenarios and attempt to solve such a debacle if ever it happens in their workplace.
Also discussed is the importance of clarifying what are the values a
company holds that serve as the underlying fundamentals for decision-making. More often than not, companies make decisions in default as a result of such entrenched values.
Participants are also asked to differentiate personal values from team values, values from principles, and personality values from character values. These distinctions help to clarify which platform decisions are made on.
3:00 – 4:00 pm The Democratic Modality in Decision-Making
A well-thought of decision is nothing if the team leader cannot communicate this idea / decision to his team for execution. This session uses group exercises to evaluate the importance of leadership-based persuasion in decision-making, while giving ample emphasis to the essence of team-member participation in ensuring the decision is transformed from paperwork to people-at-work.
Tea-Break
The session continues with how leaders can use certain selected methodologies to garner the support of team-members in reaching an agreement. What kind of situation requires a top-down decision (Prescriptive) and when is a bottom-up approach (Participative) warranted?
4:00 – 5:00 pm The 'V-M' Decision-making Modality
This last session for the day stresses on how a team / leader can achieve personal congruency when a decision has been made. Should post-decision misgivings be taken into consideration? Here, participants use coaching tools to help each other feel more comfortable and confident in making major decisions. Good decisions without the conviction to carry them through will end up with dismal results.
Day 2 Creative Problem-Solving
9:00 – 9:30 am Warm-up and recap
9:30 – 10:30 am The Analogy-Analysis Problem-Solving Modality
This session helps the participants use simple tools such as analytical diagrams and metaphorical analysis (eg. comparing present situation with parallel situation from another industry) in solving problems. Simple activities to assess creativity will also be included.
Tea-Break
10:45 – 11:45 am The Linkage Problem-Solving Modality
Using the principles of Deductive Thinking (1-problem : many solutions) and Inductive Thinking (many problems : 1 solution), the participants will undergo various problem-solving activities as a group. They will also be taught how to transfer such skills to immediate work applications via discussions. Also emphasized here will be the skill of how to see common factors in many seemingly unrelated problems (eg. low sales, low worker morale, glitches in delivery etc due to bad road conditions).
11:45 – 12:45 pm The Vicarious Modality
Using unique psychological activities, the participants are introduced to various techniques of how to analyze a problem from at least 3 different (and contrasting) perspectives. This session is highly experiential and participants will be duly prepared mentally.
12:45 – 1:00 pm Talk and Think (general discussion)
1:00 – 2:00 pm Lunch
2:00 – 3:00 pm The Isolation – Isometric Modality
This session uses more graphs compared to the previous sessions. Problems are viewed using different mathematical approaches so that issues such as principal problem, core cause and the most probable / possible solution can be identified and diagrammatically illustrated.
3:00 – 4:00 pm Crisis-Management : what if the Solutions don't Work?
The Network Modality of Preparedness
Using a systemic approach, participants are taught how to link solutions into a series / network of solutions (eg. if plan A does not work, how to activate plan B without negating the influence of what plan A has already achieved?)
Tea-Break
After the tea-break, participants will discuss what are the essentials needed
to be inside a contingency plan.
4:00 – 4:45 pm Mini Project and Final Presentation
Time permitting, participants will conduct a simple and brief experiment to utilize a selected problem-solving technique to illustrate how it can be used in a practical sense.
4:45 – 5:00 pm Q & A Session