 A warm welcome to your learners. My name is Chainika Sinapati and I am from Maniram Devan School of Management. So today we are going to discuss about a unit that is on decision making and this is the first part of the video on unit decision making and in this part of the video we will discuss about the meaning of decision and decision making then we will discuss about the different types of decisions and the process of decision making. In the next part of the video that is in the second part of the video on the unit decision making we will also take into account the advantages and disadvantages of decisions taken by an individual and by a group and at the end of the video we will focus on some techniques of decision making. So let's start this video with the meaning and definition of decisions and decision making. In planning we face some situations like who will do it, how we will do it, how it will be done, where it will be done so there are some questions that arises. So answering these questions means taking some decisions. So thus decision making is an element in the planning process and decision making is important in our life as well as in business organization. In our life we make various decisions, some of them may relate to our day to day activities which need little thinking for example attending the class or meeting a friend so on the other hand some other decisions are taken once in a lifetime. These decisions need considerable amount of thinking and let us take an example before taking admission in a program. A student might think of various alternatives so which university they will select, where they are going to have their education so you may have spent much time in taking this kind of decisions. So similarly in an organizational context the managers have to make various decisions which may relate to the day to day operations of the organization as well as the decisions of making huge investment in a new project or a construction of a factory or construction of an organization etc. Decisions what we mean is that decisions may be defined as a choice which is made out of available alternatives. It implies that to make a decision there must be some alternatives at least two. So these alternatives are analyzed and finally a particular alternative is selected so that is the decision is taken. So if there are no alternatives we have no option to select. To arrive at a decision we follow certain steps which begin with the analysis of the problem and finally we select the best alternatives out of it. So this process of making a decision is called decision making process. So here you will find some definitions given by the management experts. So Trivatha and Newport defines decision making process as a decision making involves a selection of a course of action from among two or more possible alternatives in order to arrive at a solution for a given problem. According to George Artere decision making is the selection based on some criteria from two or more possible alternatives. According to Louis A. Ellen decision making is the process which a manager performed to arrive at conclusion and judgment. So thus decision making is number one an action selecting the best alternatives and number two a process that has steps to select the best alternatives out of it. Now let us discuss some of the types of decisions. So here in this video we will discuss two types of decisions that is program decisions and non-programmed decisions. So let us discuss first about the program decisions. So these decisions are taken on the basis of organizational policies and these policies are pre-established and depending on the terms of the policy the program decisions are taken. These decisions are taken at the lower level of the management by following the predetermined procedures. Let us take an example if we want to purchase an inventory. So purchase of inventory for the production department is an example of it. Then releasing the materials from the Godam is another example. So let us now discuss about non-programmed decisions. So these decisions are non-recurring in nature and they relate to unusual situations for which there is no predetermined organizational policy. And the decision makers have to consider different alternatives before taking the non-programmed decisions. These decisions have long term impact on the organizations and they are taken at the top level management. For example taking over an existing company then introducing a new product in the market some example of the non-programmed decisions. Now here in this video you will find a distinction between the program and the non-programmed decisions. So here you can see that in the program decisions the decisions are recurring in nature and in the non-programmed decisions the decisions are non-recurring in nature. Then the decisions in the program are guided by organizational policies and procedures and in the non-programmed decisions the decisions are guided by the factors of a particular situation. In the program decisions the decisions are taken by the lower level management while in the non-programmed decisions the decisions are taken by the top level management. In the program decisions the problems are structured whereas in the non-programmed decisions the problems are unstructured. So, these are a few distinction or difference between the program decisions and non-program decisions. Now, let us discuss about the steps in the process of decision making. So, here is a flow chart where you can see that there are certain steps that are in the process of decision making. First is the identification of problem or opportunity, then the identification of the alternatives, then evaluation of the alternatives, then selecting the best alternatives out of it, then implementing the decisions and then follow up. So, let us discuss these steps one by one. The first one is the identification of problem or opportunity. In this step, the decisions making situations arise if we confront with some problems or perceive some opportunities, if some opportunities are there. So, when the difference occur between the standard of performance and the actual performance, it indicates the existence of a problem and the manager wants to solve the problem. That is, he or she needs to take some decisions to solve the problem. And therefore, the first step in the decision making process is the identification of the problem or the opportunity. The next step in decision making is to identify the viable alternatives to solve the problem or to capture the opportunity. Then the next step is the evaluation of the alternatives. In this step, the alternatives selected are analyzed in detail with the motive of selecting the most viable alternative. So the next step in the decision making process is to select the best alternatives. The evaluation of alternatives help the manager in considering their consequences. So after comparing the consequences, the manager can choose the best alternatives. Then comes the implementing the decision. So this is the step of implementing the decision that has been taken to solve the problem or to capture the opportunity. The manager must ensure the effective implementation of the decision in the organization. Then the last step is the follow-up. The aim of implementing the decision is to solve the problem or to take the opportunity. Therefore, the manager must evaluate the results of the decisions and the follow-up of the decisions will help him or her in adjusting the decisions for any distorted result. So dear learner, with this we have come to the end of the part one of the video on the unit decision making and in the next video that is in the part two we will discuss about the individual and group decision making and also we will discuss about the techniques of decision making. Thank you so much for watching this video.