11/02/16

Organizational Behavior and Leadership

Sohrab Makker (Core-C)

Memo: Decision-Making Reflection Exercise

I thought I was fully equipped to take on my first job after completing my

undergraduate degree, and assumed the role of International Business Manager at

Marc Ecko Enterprises. Working with a team of six, I had conducted extensive

research into European and Asian markets to understand the consumer and target

segment. We were working on the launch of a new line of clothing, a retro-fashion

Star Wars and MEC co-branding capsule in 2011, to be released simultaneously

domestically and internationally. In the past, most of the Co-branding capsules were

a hit both internationally and domestically, and we decided to continue with the trend.

The team worked diligently and tirelessly to put out the best collection, and establish

awareness about the line through various marketing activities.

The response was slow, and in a fervent attempt to bolster the lagging sales, I

continued brainstorming potential marketing activities without analysing the root

cause of the slow response. By the end of week two, we had a meeting with the

President of the International division, and we unanimously decided the reduce the
retail prices to bolster sales. Mid-way into week four, we offered more discounts.

However, to no avail. The line had seemed to be completely rejected by the

International market, even though domestically it was a hit. By week 8, we had cut

our losses and remove the line from the stores and salvage the inventory.

Dissecting the causes of the revealed that my team was suffering from the

cognitive biases of Confirmation Bias, as well as the Gamblers Fallacy (Dvorsky

4). The team was compromised with people who held similar tastes and opinions,

and hence the out of the box thinking or alternative view poinrs were limited. Further

the team was a victim in believing the past results of success had a direct correlation

to future results, without fully taking into account the different details of present and

previous fashion capsules. Additionally, we have kept going further with the

discounts in hope that the sales of the product would turn around; something that

never happened. As a manager, I was sub-conciously influenced in my decisions by

the theory of social determinants of escalation, which talks about sticking to ones

guns, in the face of opposition and seemingly bleek odds (Staw and Ross 218).

Similar to the Milgram experiment, which shows us how ordinary people can end up

doing harmful things through a chain reaction of behavior and subsequent self-

justification (Tarvis and Aronson pg. 37).

 Looking back in hindsight, using the Devils Advocate Decision Program in the

International team would have been a good idea. The conflict generated by the

devils advocate approach may have caused the team to avoid false assumptions

and closely analyze the information (Cosier and Schwenk pg. 72). The team and I

would have realized the retro-fashion doesnt sell as well in Europe as North

America. Additionally, we would paid more attention important details such as

release of the Co-branding capsules were always close to the release of a film of the

same brand, which was not the case with the Star Wars line.

Sources:

1) Tavris, Carol, and Elliot Aronson. Mistakes Were Made (but

Not by Me). Orlando: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2007. Print.

2) Cosier, Richard A., and Charles R. Schwenk. "Agreement and

Thinking Alike: Ingredients for Poor Decisions." Academy of

Management Executive 4 (1990).

3) Staw, Barry M., and Jerry Ross. "Understanding Behavior in

Escalation Situations."
4) Dvorsky, George. The 12 Cognitive Biases That Prevent You

from Being Rational. io9, 9 Jan. 2013,

io9.gizmodo.com/5974468/the-most-common-cognitive-biases-

that-prevent-you-from-being-rational.