Reason and intuition: recovering the illogical theory of managerial decision

Abstract

The 1980's have been prodigal for the administrative literature. Books on business excellence and en top decision-making have reached great popularity and impact. Nevertheless, these recent books, proposing the re-introduction of intuition and common sense in management, have contrasted with most of the classical literature on management, which stressed the need for rational decision-making. Also, the modem perspective tends to disdain the idea of rational decision-making as well as the academic teaching of management, on account of their bias for the rational approach. The article tries to show that the contemporary management perspective overstresses the value of intuition as much as the traditional approach used to exaggerate the value of rationality. Thus, the article searches to recover the significance of the illogical and intuitive dimensions in decision-making by showing that these dimensions have always been present in administrative theory.

Authors who studied top decision-making generally concluded that management decision always occurred within a fragmented process where rational and intuitive criteria were combined. Thus, the article points out that 10 management decision- making it is important to consider separately the decision's issue – where rational analysis can prevail - and the decision's process - where organizational irrationality is the common feature.