Digital Decisioning Effect

Question? What is the effect the digital age is having on decisioning in today’s economy and society? Considering all the tech advances, that question should have a totally positive answer. But, if we take a random sampling from across the decisioning spectrum, we may be surprised.

One example:
Information is Money in the Digital Age
Insight
By Ullrich Loeffler

According to their research, approximately three-quarters of companies suffer from information overload. In a recently released study Taming Information Chaos, IDC and Teradata quantified the gap between market leaders and average organizations' use of technology to support information-based decision making. Among findings of this study were that 75 per cent of the 1,072 respondents from 22 countries cited information overload, and many claimed that up to half of all information available to them is useless for their decision making.

Furthermore, respondents claimed that 37 per cent of all business decisions remain primarily 'gut' or instinctive. (Source: IDC White Paper, Taming Information Chaos, Nov 2007, sponsored by Teradata). These findings raise concerns about the business practices in many organizations and the urgent need for these companies to bring their information environments into order using technology.

It is common knowledge that business intelligence is one of the hottest technologies in the market and that many IT and business executives have included business intelligence solutions in their top 10 organizational priorities.

http://www.bdstrategy.com.au/information-management/business-intelligence/95-information-is-money-in-the-digital-age

Another source:
Decision Making in the Digital Age
Information Management Magazine
David K. Wessel

One of the characteristics that make us uniquely human is our ability to process information, make decisions and learn from the results of those decisions. However, the advent of the digital age has introduced a radical new element into the decision-making equation, especially in the corporate environment.

Today it is possible to access a seemingly limitless amount of data almost instantaneously. However, along with the need to wade through the daily media blitz comes the need to convert information into decisions and then into action at the "speed of thought." In this high-speed unforgiving environment, decision success or failure often falls straight to the bottom line.

How are managers and workers coping with the need for greater speed in decision making? And how are companies balancing the requirement for speed with the concomitant need for quality?
http://www.information-management.com/issues/20011201/4404-1.html

Another example:
Digital Age Decision-Making
Publication: Training

If conducting "business at the speed of thought" has left you feeling as though your "business" is getting away from you, you're not alone.

According to a recent survey on quality decision-making by Kepner-Tregoe (KT), Princeton, N.J., today's employees are being asked to make more decisions than ever before, but in less time and at the expense of quality, productivity and customer service, and now these beleaguered decision-makers are beginning to fall behind.

So why isn't all this "speed of thought" technology facilitating digital-speed decision-making? Because technology, with all of its decision-driving potential, still can't overcome the age-old barriers to quick, effective problem resolution, say KT's survey respondents. More than 40 percent claim that the culprits are organizational politics, changing priorities, and the need for multiple approvals that continue to impede the decision-making process.

Missing a Standard Model

Perhaps the most disturbing finding in KT's report involves the decision-making "memory" of most organizations. More than 90 percent of those surveyed believe that their companies are trying to reinvent the decision-making wheel, rather than capturing and sharing information about past decisions through modeling.

Full Article and Credits:
http://www.allbusiness.com/services/educational-services/4280609-1.html

ZDT Author’s Comments:
In just these three cases (with zillions more out there), we can easily see that even with all the tech advantages now available, we may well be only marginally better off. Here we find that information overload, pressure to perform and lack of a repeatable memory model are issues that can potentially make the decisioning process even tougher. So, as we go full circle from Adam and Eve’s original decision right up until today’s digital environment…we can still use all the help we can get.