Dec 16, 1999 - University of Virginia ... professional life, therefore, should exercise students' skills in ... derives from a Greek verb meaning, "to draw out.
December 16, 1999 PRESENT VALUE: AN INFORMAL COLUMN ON TEACHING "Decision Focus, Action Orientation" BY: ROBERT F. BRUNER University of Virginia Darden Graduate School of Business Administration
Turning analysis into effective action is a hallmark of the professional. Preparation for professional life, therefore, should exercise students' skills in drawing out action insights from analysis. Analytic work is, by its nature, descriptive. The role of the teacher is to take it farther, to motivate students to extract the actionable insights. The verb, "educate," derives from a Greek verb meaning, "to draw out." It might be said that a complete education in Finance draws out the action insights from analysis. What makes this hard is that the teacher cannot do this for the students; they must do it themselves. Making decisions and developing action implications cannot be served up the way a teacher might derive a formula. Students must discover it themselves. To compound ma tters, one cannot trust that students will do this unprompted. While most students have an appetite for Finance tools and concepts, they show an aversion for decisions and action. Making meaning of one's work is hard, and feels awkward to the novice. One builds skills of decision and action taking through trial-and-error exercise. As the former CEO of Citicorp, Walter Wriston, once wrote, "Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment." To produce new professionals in business and finance, we need to exercise their skills in the classroom. The teacher can help students in both case and lecture courses, by drawing judgments from them: 1. At the start of the course, announce in the syllabus and orally that students must come prepared to make recommendations regarding the business decisions embedded in the case or problems. 2. Choose cases and teaching materials that require decisions and recommendations. Problems that pose a dilemma or choice between alternatives will offer rich decision opportunities. Alternatively if the materials for the day are descriptive or purely analytic, the teacher could shape a decision problem around them. 3. Offer homework questions for each class that stimulate the decision-orientation. At the very least, ask students what they would recommend that the case protagonist should do? What are the managerial implications of his or her analysis?
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PRESENT VALUE “Decision Focus, Action Orientation” Robert F. Bruner
4. In each class, ask a student for his or her recommendations on the problem of the day. This is most easily accomplished in the cold-call at the start of a case discussion. Invite others to comment or expand on those recommendations. At the very end of the case discussion, one can ask the student who opened the class to reflect on any changes in recommendations that he or she might make, based on insights that emerged during class. 5. Encourage students to take a stand. Be careful not to belittle the efforts of novices to make managerial recommendations-they are, after all, novices. Look instead, for the seeds of good action ideas, and invite them to rethink less worthy elements. 6. Each day include in your teaching plan questions that emphasize decision and action. These include: What do you recommend? What will you do? What will you say? When will you say it? To whom will you say it? How might others react? How might the market react? What will you do if the reaction is adverse? Asking why is a natural follow-up to any of these questions. Decision-oriented classes have their detractors. Requiring decisions on the basis of incomplete information and partial or flawed analysis would seem to encourage hasty judgment: "ready, fire, aim." We all laugh at Yogi Berra's advice, "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." But the polar opposite, the analysis paralysis of "Ready aim, aim, aim . . ." is equally pernicious. Most practical business people commend decisiveness of any sort over indecision. The business world needs action-oriented professionals. Educational programs should prepare students for the requirements of practical life. The classroom is an important laboratory in which to practice extending analysis into recommendation and action. Be decision-oriented and action- focused in your teaching.
Past columns by Robert Bruner may be found by search at the SSRN website at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/search.taf or by going to his Author Page at SSRN at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=66030
Copyright © 1999 by Robert F. Bruner and the Trustees of the University of Virginia Darden School Foundation.
