2. Modeling the decision-making process

Any decision is an action that can have an effect on actors, resources, constraints or objectives. Considering an objective as a target to be reached, a decision is a possible path (or process) towards this objective. A decision is therefore a process that leads an actor to answer a question.

Our model, the DTL, is sufficiently generic to apply to both product design and actor choice decisions. Variables can therefore represent products, projects, organizations, processes or resources, passing through all possible states, as illustrated in Figure 1.

DTL is a model of the decision-making process. It considers a decision lifeline, from consideration of a question to transmission of the answer. The DTL comprises six stages:

• Capture is the only step that initiates a TLD. Capture occurs when the...