Decision Management

The decision making process is initiated when the current situation and past experience compels us to take some action. The purpose of the action is to somehow alter the conditions of the current situation to form a future situation that conforms to our desires. But the current situation is a consequence of previous decisions. Also, as we progress in time, our current situation will become part of that past. Therefore, decisions are made over time, with each current decision in some way predicated upon previously made decisions. Research to date has focused on the process of making a decision, whether as a structured rational choice or a more naturalistic decision making paradigm. What we will address in this paper is a concept of decision management; looking at the decision management process as a series of decision processes, aligned in time, with future decisions dependent on current decisions and current decisions impacted by past decisions. This decision management concept consists of three parts: reflective assessment that looks into the past, projective assessment that anticipates the future and decision making which reasons over the current situation. This paper will look at each of these parts in more detail and discuss relevant technologies that enable them. It is believed that by incorporating the decision process into a decision management scheme, we can mitigate the negative consequences of our decisions and reach our goal state more efficiently.