FROM DECISION TO ACTION IN ORGANIZATIONS - DECISION-MAKING AS A SOCIAL REPRESENTATION

How should we understand decision-making in organizations? And how imp ortant is it for our understanding of organizations? A wide body of em pirical and theoretical research-labeled here as the decision-making p erspective-assumes that decision-making is a fundamental element of or ganizational processes, and aims to identify different types of decisi on-making processes in organizations. But what exactly is decision-mak ing? The paper argues that this perspective suffers from insufficient debate on the definition of its research object. One of the main limit s of the decision-making perspective is its understanding of organizat ional decision-making as series of separate decision-making episodes. Stressing the continuity of organizational processes, an emerging ''ac tion perspective'' challenges this view. It argues that decision and d ecision-making are either rare, marginal phenomena, or artificial cons tructs producing biased observations. Thus, some authors suggest that we would better do without decision-making. The paper argues that, bec ause people in organizations think of decision and decision-making as realities, the concept of organizational action should not be opposed to decision and decision-making. Decision and decision-making are best understood as social representations: they influence organizations' m embers' ways of understanding and behaving in organizations. They infl uence processes, they facilitate action, and they give meaning to what happens in organizations. As organization members think and act in te rms of decision-making, a theory of organizational action cannot simpl y do without a theory of decision-making.