The Link between perception and individual decision making

Individuals in organisations make decisions, which are choices made between two or more alternatives.
Decision making occurs as a reaction to a problem. That is, a discrepancy exists between the current state of affairs and some desired state, requiring us to consider alternative courses of action.
- Every decision requires us to interpret and evaluate information. The decision maker's perceptions will answer that question
- Throughout the entire decision-making process, perceptual distortions often surface that can bias analysis and conclusions.

Decision making in organisations
Business schools generally train students to follow rational decision-making models.
While these models have considerable merit, they don't always describe how people actually make decisions.
This is where organisational behaviour enters the picture.
To improve how we make decisions in organisations, we need to understand:
- the decision-making errors that people commit
- the perception errors discussed.