Decision Support in Participatory Contexts

Abstract

Organizing the participation of multiple stakeholders in decision processes is now a widespread request with a visible consequence being the expansion of the analyst's role from problem solver to facilitator of stakeholder interactions. Within this evolutionary movement, this article claims that an analyst creates the organisation through which the set of stakeholders involved in the decision process interact. This article also claims that the ability of this organisation to fit contextual requirements is of utmost importance for the success of an analyst's intervention. This article is organised to support these two claims. Firstly, it describes the terms of organisational design and the mechanisms through which it may influence the decision processes. Secondly, the authors review how these aspects are already discussed within OR/MS literature so as to highlight current limitations and future possibilities for greater investigation of the place and role of organizational design in OR/MS research and practice.