Rational Decision Making

Abstract Rational decision making requires executing an appropriate decision‐making process to select the best alternative. This can be challenging when information is uncertain or when time is limited. This article describes three important perspectives on decision making: (i) the problem‐solving perspective, (ii) the decision‐making process perspective, and (iii) the decision‐making system perspective. This article describes important concepts from these three perspectives, including rationality, multicriteria decision making, group decision making, decision making under uncertainty, game theory, contexts for decision making, decision‐making processes, and techniques for modeling and improving decision‐making systems. Understanding and applying these concepts can improve decision making. The article will first consider the challenge of selecting the best alternative, which is the problem‐solving perspective. Then, the article will discuss the decision‐making process perspective: how people make decisions. Finally, the article will describe decisions from the decision‐making system perspective by considering the decision‐making behaviors and information flow within organizations and how to improve those decision‐making systems. This article also provides numerous references to sources that provide additional details about rational decision making.