Security World

Reordering familiar supplies and choosing a new supplier are different decisions. The first may be handled by an established rule; the second may require comparing costs, reliability and the consequences of a failure. Treating both as a matter of instinct—or giving both an elaborate investigation—wastes effort in different ways. A useful approach is to ask what kind of decision you face, what information could change it and how you will learn from the result. Rules, analysis and intuition can all contribute, but they do different work. A team meeting photographed on 5 June 2013, illustrating the setting in which colleagues can exchange information. Photo: woodleywonderworks , CC BY 2.0 . Commons thumbnail; no new crop. Routine decisions: use a rule when the situation fits OpenStax distinguishes programmed decisions from nonprogrammed decisions . Programmed decisions recur and can be guided by established criteria. Nonprogrammed decisions involve unfamiliar or insufficiently defined...