A632.1.4.RB_LarsonKurt, Multistage Decision Making

In my experience as an aviation safety inspector/aviation safety officer, the use of or application of formulas for the investigation into the probable cause, criticality, and events leading to the accident and/or incident would not have a great impact on the outcome of a mishap investigation. What does have a positive impact is the ability to look several steps ahead, also known as foresight with a hint of intuition. As discussed in Hoch (2001) most decision makers do not possess the ability of looking beyond one step ahead of a given situation or problem, hence a good hypothesis for the mindset of our political leadership… if you so choose to call it that.

As with any decision-making process as discussed in Hoch (2001) there are no right or incorrect answers. I equate this to Thomas Edison’s trial and error of invention of the light bulb. He (Edison) did not fail in his attempts in finding the right filament to sustain light. He simply had not found the correct one to consistently sustain light. The accumulation of knowledge like Edison will evolve over time and by keeping things simple there will be a new discovery with certainty of the decision policies that guide those with the knowledge.

An example from Hoch (2001) discussed large firms and software upgrading as a stopgap between Y2K and loss of data, money and organizational well being. The fact that nothing happened and organizations were unable to make sense of the fact that nothing occurred leaves a gap in future responses to software threats, is relatively inconsequential.  The fact that organizations say a potential threat and took what was considered to be appropriate precautions is a testimony to forward and proactive thinking.

I firmly believe that we as critical thinkers have an innate ability toward problem solving through reviewing past solutions to similar or like instances. Critical thinking is dependent upon creating analogies like described in Hoch (2001) we as humans tend to look upon when problem solving, and that the ability to determine the point of difference from similarities of past experiences or in my case past accidents/incidents and the ability to self correct from those previous solutions while maintaining any and all details of an investigation are critical to a complete and concise chain of events leading up to an accident/incident. In other words, never discount details that are not relevant today because they might become relevant tomorrow.    

Reference:

Hoch, S., Kunreuther, H., & Gunther, R. (2001). Wharton on Making decisionsdoi:www.wiley.com