Eating our own dog food

University business professors teach strategic decision making but unfortunately we are not immune to common decisions traps that can derail even the best and most experienced decision makers.  Strategic decisions, such as whether or not to introduce a graduate program or a create new business minor, can have long term consequences on the quality and sustainability of current undergraduate programs.  Complex decisions that involve a large amount of uncertainty are difficult to get right and, as the research clearly shows, bad business decisions are common across industries. 

The recipe for a bad strategic decision is pretty clear –just step into some common decision traps.  For the case of deciding whether or not to introduce a graduate programs or new business minors at the Monfort College of Business, here's a recipe for getting it wrong:

1.     .    First, assume that experiences with undergraduate programs will directly translate to experiences with graduate programs and minors.  Do not explore the differences and only seek information that confirms the bias that our experience in offering a quality undergraduate programs will apply to new graduate or business minor programs. 
2.          Put personal interest above the needs of  the college's other  stakeholders.   A graduate program would lend prestige to graduate faculty, confer benefits to individual departments, and a business minor would enhance the reputation of the business college across campus in the eyes of administrators.
3.            Let our current attachment to colleagues or our individual departments rule our emotions.  If the decision could upset our friends, that have an interest in new programs, then we should avoid confrontation and hide negative information that could upset these relationships. 
4.          Don’t evaluate risk/return trade-offs between different options.  Do not ask for any contrary information that should be weighed.  Those developing the plans should not have members that holds contrary or opposing views.  Don’t use outsiders to provide an unbiased analysis.
5.           Don’t challenge key assumptions and avoid any formal analysis of alternatives using 'what if -scenarios', financial, statistical or simulation modeling. 
6.            Finally, remove all governance safeguards such formal committee review processes.   Promise that a plan’s details will be provided latter.  Present one alternative at a time and solicit for its quick approval. 

Business people make bad decisions all the time. We teach our students to avoid  traps to help them make better decisions and we need to make sure that, as business professors, we eat our own dog food.* 

*See the origin of this phase at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eating_one's_own_dog_food