Assignment

1. "Heuristic strategies use learned and evolved core capacities such as memory and recall" (Mousavi & Gigerenzer, 2014, p. 1673). Creating this into a method is how people work to train themselves to have the ability to make fast and accurate business decisions. This can also work the other way and how consumers make purchasing decisions as well. "A heuristic decision method is used to obtain the desired result" (Tian et. al, 2016, p. 2). This can turn the decision making method into a bias decision made for the company. This method can also make impacts all of the decisions being made and turned into a trend.

"Researchers have begun to propose methods to identify heuristic decision rules from directly measured consideration of product profiles" (Dzyabura & Hauser, 2011, p. 802). If a heuristic decision is used to benefit the end result for a business decision, this method can also be used by people on how they make their decision on who to hire. Having a solid background with good reasoning on why this type of decision is made should be obtained. In the long run this can only benefit you on why the decision is made and could end up being a learning experience.

When it comes to making a decision with who to hire there are many considerations that should be taken into consideration. "The simple heuristics include conjunctive, disjunctive, lexicographic, take-the-best, and elimination by aspects. The more complex heuristics include subset conjunctive and disjunctions of conjunctions" (Dzyabura & Hauser, 2011, p. 803). All business decisions can be complex decisions that need to be addressed. Sound judgment decisions should be made after having solid information. A good way to make the sound judgment would to document the information that would support the business decisions that are being made. The end result can be stacked in someone's favor, but this decision needs to be made that ensures that the company's best interests are considered as well.

References

Dzyabura, D. & Hauser, J. (2011). Active Machine Learning for Consideration Heuristics. Marketing Science (Providence, R.I.), 30(5), 801-819. doi: 10.1287/mksc.1110.0660.

Mousavi, S. & Gigerenzer, G. (2014). Risk, Uncertainty, and Heuristics. Journal of Business Research 67(8), 1671-1678.

Tian, Y., Pan, Y., Duan, F., Zhao, S., Wang, Q., & Wang, W. (2016). Automated Segmentation of Coronary Arteries Based on Statistical Region Growing and Heuristic Decision Method. BioMed Research International, 1-7. doi: 10.1155/2016/3530251.

2. Merriam-Webster defines heuristic as involving or serving as an aid to learning, discovery, or problem-solving by experimental and especially trail-and-error methods. Also, of or relating to exploratory problem-solving techniques that utilize self-educating techniques (as the evaluation of feedback) to improve performance. Basically what we in the military refer to as scar tissue learning, learning through trial-and-error or through some harsh "feedback" provided by those who have learned the lesson before you. Sometimes we do not turn to those that have gone before us because we think we know how to do something, and when it turns out we did not, our lack of communication deserves the level of feedback we receive.

Herbert Simon argued that when faced with complex decisions, individuals resort to heuristics (Economics Online, n.d.) Heuristics are decision-making devises that simplify the process of coming to a reasonable decision when the "perfect" solution is unknowable (Economics Online, n.d.). His point is that we use mental shortcuts, or rely on what we think we know to make decisions rather than not making a decision which is a decision.

According to Recruiter.com one of the interviewer biases that recruiters must be aware of is affective heuristic; this is where interviewer's decisions are influenced by quick and superficial evaluations, such as the attractiveness of a candidate, or race, gender, etc. (Ladimeji, 2013). This is the reason we have laws against this type of discrimination. As a potential future employer of a hauling business I may utilize this bias and discriminate against someone who is less muscular than another, thinking I need strength over everything else. When in reality a smaller person can be just as effective with lifting tools to assist and may have a better personality that my clients would appreciate and gain repeat business, versus someone who may be all brawn and less tact. AND NO I'm not stereotyping or bias toward brawny people, just giving and example!

Economics Online. (n.d.). Decision making bias. Economics Online News Analysis Theory

Comments. Retrieved from: http://www.economicsonline.co.uk/Behavioural_economics/Decision_making_bias.html

Merriam-Webster. (n.d.). Heuristic. Merriam-Webster. Retrieved from: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/heuristic

Ladimeji, K. (2013). 4 types of interview bias - and how to eliminate them. Recruiter. Retrieved from: https://www.recruiter.com/i/4-types-of-interviewer-bias-and-how-to-eliminate-them/

3. Heuristics can be explained as when people are using decision making strategies which are based on limited information. How ever the little information used can be correct. According to Shah and Oppenheimer (2008), heuristics are often used as mental short cuts which minimize the cognitive activity which is done when one is making a decision. A heuristic method for hiring someone can be when a person looks at a resume and because the person has a degree, one might want to hire them before interviewing them. The degree makes their decision put more value on that person with out considering other things such as if they have any experience, a criminal background, or have been fired from previous jobs. Mentally it would make sense but that is a short cut that one is willing to make.

According to Shah and Oppenheimer (2008), heuristics can be a negative thing because a person will typically work less when they are in the decision making process. Heuristics can be bad because they lessen the ability for a person to retrieve and store information into their memory (Shah & Oppenheimer, 2008). Heuristics offer the user the ability to scrutinize few signals and/or alternative choices in decision making, this can make a big impact when one is making a judgmental decision (Shah & Oppenheimer, 2008).

Another example is when one is buying a car. If one is presented with a car that costs $25,000 and with another car that costs 18,000, one might make the decision that they want the more expensive car. This is without knowing what the more expensive car offers. This is a heuristic, where one judges an item based on their price. If their price is higher then it has more value. According to Shah and Oppenheimer three important heuristics are the representative, availability, and anchoring and adjustment heuristics.

Referenes

Shah, A. K., & Oppenheimer, D. M. (2008). Heuristics made easy: An effort-reduction framework. Psychological Bulletin, 134(2), 207.

4. When time and cost are factors in making a decision, the heuristic method gives better support to the decision maker than mathematical models. (Ridha, 2015) Often times, a heuristic decision can be made quicker, without a lot of mathematical analysis, and often times with limited information.

A heuristic method for hiring someone could be confirmation heuristics. In other words, a person decides on the candidate they wish to hire and bases the decision on something they can justify to others. For example, human resources will look at education level and years of experience before sending a candidate on to a manager for an interview. They can confirm the validity of that candidate based on the information they read.

The manager may chose the candidate based on their professional appearance and the way the conducted themselves during the interview. They will justify their decision on what they saw.

Resources

Merriam and Webster Dictionary. Retrieved from https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/heuristic

Ridha, M. B. (2015) The role of heuristic methods as a decision-making tool in aggregate production planning. International Journal of Business Administration, 6(2), 68.