Decision Making - Decision Making Stages

Decision Making Stages

Developed by B. Aubrey Fisher, there are four stages that should be involved in all group decision making. These stages, or sometimes called phases, are important for the decision making process to begin

Orientation stage – This phase is where members meet for the first time and start to get to know each other.

Conflict stage – Once group members become familiar with each other, disputes, little fights and arguments occur. Group members eventually work it out.

Emergence stage – The group begins to clear up vague opinions by talking about them.

Reinforcement stage – Members finally make a decision, while justifying themselves that it was the right decision.

It is said that critical norms in a group improves the quality of decisions, while the majority of opinions (called consensus norms) do not. This is due to collaboration between one another, and when group members get used to, and familiar with, each other, they will tend to argue and create more of a dispute to agree upon one decision. This does not mean that all group members fully agree — they may not want argue further just to be liked by other group members or to "fit in".