Value-focused thinking as a problem structuring method

Markus Hartikainen (PhD)

Postdoctoral researcher

markus.hartikainen@jyu.fi

Phases of decision making

Decis

ion

pro

ble

m/o

pp

ort

un

ity

Imp

lem

en

tatio

n o

f

actio

ns

Inspired by:

Ana Barcus&Gilberto Montibeller: Supporting the allocation of software development work in

distributed teams with multi-criteria decision analysis, Omega 36 (2008), pages 464 – 475

Divergent and convergent phase may

alternate before the conclusion is reached!

Phases of decision making

Framing the decision

– ”What are we deciding about?”

Divergent phase

– ”Who are the stakeholders?”

– ”What do we care about (i.e.

our values)?”

– ”What are our options?”

– ”What are the risks?”

Convergent phase

– Modelling the problem

– Evaluating the options w.r.t. the

values

– Decision making

– Optimizing

– Evaluating and minimizing the

risks

Topic of this lecture

Stakeholder analysis

Franco LA and Montibeller G (2011) Problem structuring for multi-criteria decision analysis interventions. In: Cochran JJ, Cox Jr LA, Keskinocak P, Kharoufeh JP and Smith JC (eds). Wiley Encyclopaedia of Operations Research and Management Science.Wiley: New York.

Inte

rest

PowerHigh

High

Low

”Subjects” ”Players”

”Crowd” ”Context setters”

Problem structuring methods

Help answer the questions

– ”What do we care about (i.e. our values)?”

– ”What are our options?”

– ”What are the risks?”

Try to make sure that everything is accounted for

Simplify the jump to the convergent phase by having

structured information

Examples of problem structuring methods

*) Rosenhead & Mingers (editors), Rational Analysis for

a Problematic World Revisited, 2001, Wiley

**) http://cognexus.org/

SODA (Strategic Options Development and Analysis)*– Cognitive maps

SSM (Soft Systems Methodology)*– A seven-stage methodology

Strategic Choice Approach (SCA)*– A way to distinguish different elements of

the problem

Dialogue Mapping**

?Value-focused thinking (VFT)Cognitive map on restructuring an organization

from

http://www.banxia.com/dexplore/resources/whats-

in-a-name/

Value-focused thinking

” The standard way of thinking about decisions is

backwards … people focus first on identifying

alternatives rather than on articulating values”.

Values are what we care about. They should be the

driving force for our decision making. …

Alternatives are merely the means to better achieve the

values. (paraphrased)

Prof. Ralph Keeney 1996

Value-focused thinking is not a

single method, but instead a an

approach to decision making that

can employ different methods!

Alternative versus value-focused thinking

The typical way to make decisions

Alternative-focused thinking

1. Recognize a decision

problem/opportunity

2. Identify decision

alternatives

3. Specify values

4. Evaluate alternatives

5. Select an alternative

Value-focused thinking

1. Recognize a decision

problem/opportunity

2. Specify values

3. Create decision

alternatives

4. Evaluate alternatives

5. Select an alternative

Alternative versus value-focused thinking

Alternative-focused thinking

is

1. Backward

2. Constrained

3. Reactive

Value-focused thinking

is

1. Forward

2. Creative

3. Proactive

R.L. Keeney (2011) Value-Focused Thinking Tutorial. Informs

Conference, Charlotte, USA.

Why value-focused thinking for problem

structuring?

• Methods for expressing the real-world mess with a set of values

• value-trees

• workshops

• cognitive maps

• structured dialogue

• etc.

• There exists a nice theoretical

bacground

Ultimate values

(e.g., good product,

thriving business)

Fundamental values

(e.g., cost, CO2 emissions)

Specific

decision

context

Broader decision context

(i.e., all the decisions you make)

Ends

Means

Group excercise

Imagine that you are choosing your Master/PhD thesis topic

What are the values that you care about?

– I.e., what makes a topic good or bad?

Write down as many values as you can during 5 minutes.

Now select all the values relevant to you from the following list:

Is of interest to you

Allows you to work with interesting people

Is a good match with your talents

Improves you future career prospects

Allows you to learn new stuff

Is of interest to other people

Knowledgeable supervisors are available and are willing to teach you

Research freedom from supervisor

Involves travelling e.g. collaboration, collect and analyze data

Funding available to do research

Internationally reputed supervisor

Requires a reasonable amount of work to complete

Allows you to get a good grades

Is challenging enough

There is good literature available for you

Fits your previous studies

Has not been studies recently at your institute

Helps me make good networking contacts

Provides information to help select a job after graduation

Easy to finish thesis

Industry oriented

Now choose your top three most important values from all the

values that you have selected.

Now answer the following questions:

How many values did you generate when you first wrote them

down?

How many values did you select from the list?

How many of the three most important values were among

those you first write down?

Results of experiments on similar exercises:

We often generate about half of the relevant values

The values that are missed are not trivial, but instead roughly

as important as those identified at first

This phenomenon happens also if you think that you know the

problem well (e.g. professional and personal decisions)

First studies were conducted with MBA students selecting an

internship in [1]

[1] Samuel D. Bond, Kurt A. Carlson, Ralph L. Keeney, Generating

objectives: can decision makers articulate what they want?, Management

Science 54, pages 56-70, 2008

Devices for identifying fundamental values

Generating a wist list of what you would like to achieve

Comparing alternatives

Thinking about potential roblems and shortcomings

Thinking about consequences

Goals, constraints and guidelines

Thinking about different perspectives

Thinking about ultimate values (what do you care about the most in life?)

Generic values (what do you usually care about?)

Structuring objectives (why-how)

Quantifying objectives

Ralph L. Keeney, http://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/creativity-in-decision-

making-with-valuefocused-thinking/

Value tree

Allow you to structure

objectives

Can be filled by asking

why and how questions

A good thesis topic

Career

prospectsInterest

Networking

Why?

How?

Properties of a value tree

Value relevance: considers fundamental objectives

Undestandability: clear meaning to decision makers

Non-redundancy: avoid double values

Preferential independence: performance on one value should

not depend on the performances on other values

Balance completeness with conciceseness

(Measurability: possible to measure performances)

V. Belton & T. Stewart (2002) Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis –

An Integrated Approach. Kluwer.

Attributes

When defining values, one should not think about their measurability

Only once the values have been defined one should think about measurability of the bottom ones – often requires defining attributes

Natural attribute measures directly the achievement of a value (e.g. rental cost when selecting an office location)

Proxy attribute measures indirectly the achievement of a value (e.g. time for commuting as a proxy for distance between home and office)

Constructed attribute measures directly the achievement of a value when there isn’t a natural attribute (e.g. office comfort defined by a set of qualitative levels)

See: Ralph L. Keeney and Robin S. Gregory, Selecting Attributes to

Measure the Achievement of Objectives, Operations Research 53,

2005

4 “Sins” in defining a value tree and attributes

1. Excluding hard-to-measure values

2. Including non-essential values that have easy-to-measure

attributes

3. Making a proxy attribute, when a natural attribute is available

4. Trying to measure every consequence

Modified from Gilberto Montibeller, 7 ”sins” in assessing performance of

strategies, Jyväskylä International Summer School, 2013, Modelling

Strategic Decisions

From value-focused thinking to multiobjective

optimization

Optimization problems have objectives, constraints and variables

– The objectives are optimized by changing the values of the variables. The solution must satisfy the constraints.

Attributes should be reflected by objectives

Constraints should reflect (technical or other) requirements

Different alternativies should be described by different values of the Variables

Summary

Decision making has different phases before the conclusion is reached

In divergent phase the essential things about the problem are searched for

Value-focused thinking is an approach to decision making where the values are first identified

Methods are needed to find all the relevant values

The structured decision problems can often be represented as optimization problems