Meeting and AGM of the Business and Industrial Section of the Royal Statistical Society

Roland Caulcutt (Caulcutt Associates) "Data, Managers and Decisions"

We all make decisions.  Many of our decisions lead to actions and we hope that the results of these actions will match our expectations.  Unfortunately, we are sometimes disappointed with the outcome and may then feel that different decisions could have led to better results. 

Managers make decisions, knowing that the actions that follow may affect lots of other people.  So, it would be comforting to believe that management decisions lead to actions that have a high probability of producing good results.

However, recent research in neurology has shown that manager’s decisions often lead to disappointing outcomes.

This presentation will review the many ways in which managers respond to available information.  Various interactive exercises will be used to demonstrate that managers need guidance on how to avoid bias and how to make better use of data.  This guidance could be provided by analysts, who can communicate in ways that managers can understand.

      Registration required