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Structure before solutions
Avanti Academy / Complexity, decisions and innovation / Solving Complex Problems and Decision Making / Focus
Focus

Structure before solutions

Groupthink, Kepner Tregoe and decision rights.

A focused two and a half hours on bringing structure to messy, contested choices: designing in dissent, problem structuring methods, two speeds of analysis and clear decision rights.

Level
Focus
Learning time
2 hours 30 minutes
Where
Solving Complex Problems and Decision Making
Price
£69

When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Read the full terms

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About this course

Overview and Outcomes.

Who It's For

Leaders of teams, boards and groups that decide together

Overview

Many poor decisions come from capable, cohesive groups that never designed in dissent or agreed who should decide. Structure before solutions addresses both. It draws on Irving Janis's work on groupthink and the Bay of Pigs, with countermeasures matched to each failure. Problem structuring methods, including Checkland's Soft Systems Methodology, the Strategic Choice Approach and SODA, help when people disagree about what the problem is. Kepner and Tregoe's thorough analysis sits beside Boyd's fast OODA loop, and the Vroom Yetton Jago model and decision rights frameworks clarify involvement and ownership so decisions do not drift.

Aims

This programme aims to develop leaders who bring structure to messy and contested choices, designing dissent into group decisions, choosing the right speed of thinking for the situation and making involvement and ownership clear, so that their organisations decide well together rather than by default.

In summary, you will be able to:

  1. Diagnose the symptoms of groupthink in a team and select countermeasures, such as independent sub groups, matched to the failure observed.
  2. Apply problem structuring methods, Kepner Tregoe or the OODA loop to a messy problem, choosing the speed of thinking it requires.
  3. Design involvement and decision rights for a significant decision using the Vroom Yetton Jago model and clear ownership roles.

What you'll develop

Through this Focus course, you will build the ability to:

  1. Describe groupthink and identify its four symptoms while a decision is still open.
  2. Explain why capable, cohesive groups are especially vulnerable, using the Bay of Pigs case.
  3. Identify the signs that a situation needs problem structuring before any option is chosen.
  4. Compare Soft Systems Methodology, the Strategic Choice Approach, SODA and Robustness Analysis and what each contributes.
  5. Describe the Kepner Tregoe method, including problem analysis, must and want criteria, and the separation of facts from assumptions.
  6. Apply the Vroom Yetton Jago questions to choose a level of involvement suited to a specific decision.
What is inside

Built from 2 parts.

2 hours 30 minutes of learning.

  1. 01The value of a dissenting voiceGroupthink and problem structuring methodsBitesize2 modules
  2. 02Fast thinking, slow thinkingKepner Tregoe, OODA loop and decision rightsBitesize2 modules
Where it fits

Keep going.

Part of the Solving Complex Problems and Decision Making topic, also sold whole as Clear calls in complex times.

How credit works

Go deeper, and pay only the difference

  1. You are hereFocus, 2 hours 30 minutes, £69
  2. Next stepExplore, How decisions really get made, 6 hours 30 minutes, £129. Already own the Focus? You pay £60.
  3. The whole topicImmerse, Clear calls in complex times, 13 hours 30 minutes, £249. Already own the Focus? You pay £180.

When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Prices per person. Read the full terms

Other Focus in the Solving Complex Problems and Decision Making topic

See all in Solving Complex Problems and Decision Making

What's inside