Decision Making Model Analysis
Decisions are required in all that we think, do and say. In fact, it is impossible to go through a day without making a decision. Do I get out of bed today? Do I eat breakfast before leaving for work? What shall I eat for breakfast? These are simple examples, but we also face life-changing decisions as we go through life. We find ourselves asking such questions as, "Do I return to school?" "Do I want to have any children?" "What career path do I want to pursue?" Choosing a career path essentially boils down to a career-making process. Making this type of a decision requires relying on information available and systematically analyzing that information through critical thinking to come to a viable conclusion. A decision-making model can help a person to gather and analyze information. Colorado College has designed one such model for prospective career seekers on their Career Center website at http://www.coloradocollege.edu/CareerCenter/. This paper will describe the model used by Colorado College and incorporate my personal experience in how I chose to return to school to pursue a finance degree.
The model includes seven basic steps, with the first being to "Identify the Decision to be Made" (Colorado College, 2005). This may seem like common sense to most of us, but so often in our lives we don't properly identify the true issue or problem to be solved. We then end up trying to accomplish a task that hasn't been clearly defined and we spend an excessive amount of time and energy on trial and error to no avail. Therefore, before gathering information, it is important to clearly define what to gather information about. I did this by asking myself questions like, "What career do I want to purs ...