Implications for Decision Support Systems

Understanding the culture of decisions in an organizational context is imperative for the successful design and delivery of decision support systems. The cultural paradigm is especially important in the context of strategic decisions. This paper develops a framework for emphasizing the cultural distinctions around decision processes that semantically articulates those distinctions through four culturally-embedded decision modes: making a decision, taking a decision, baking a decision, and faking a decision. The paper then articulates the multidimensionality of decisions around the types of actors, the reach and range of the decision, and the decision's central metaphor. Using those dimensions, the paper shows the implications of those four decision modes for the design and delivery of decision support systems. This is illustrated by an example of an enterprise using DSS/EIS for strategic decision making. The paper concludes with the observation that the critical leverage points for the successful design and delivery of DSS may be different depending on the dominant decision culture.