Making decisions when confronted with complexity and emergency

Companies are evolving in a complex universe, in which systems interlock and interact. Today, complexity must be an integral part of every manager's thinking. Nothing is self-evident, everything is interconnected, and events cannot all be viewed from the same angle.

In today's global society, formal and informal media coverage is changing the consequences of every decision. Every day, management is expected to formulate a course, a vision. It is up to them to transform this vision into objectives and action plans, and to guide their teams towards the goal. The manager has the power of direction, and his or her duty is to formulate and translate a decision into action, even in inextricable situations.

It's obvious that managers have to deal with complexity. Often, beyond this complexity, it's up to them to steer the ship in a storm, to formulate decisions without having the time to apply tried and tested methods. Decisions taken in complex, emergency situations can lead to a breakdown in the decision-making process, thus creating a crisis (in the sense of a lack of decision) within the organization.

The problem of decision-making in emergency and complex situations can thus be approached from several angles. From a reformulation of the meaning of decision-making, urgency and complexity, we propose an approach to the fragility of decisions. From there, doors will be opened to what needs to be developed to "weather the storm".