Reason and courage

Are we rational beings? The answer is no, we're not. We need reason because we need a minimal understanding of the world - patterns can give, and they give, some predictability into existence, without which we would live a reality into an always uncertain future and into an intolerable anguish - and because we need to communicate with each other.

But we can't make the mistake of imagining that our reason enough, in most cases, will pass the surface of things. And even when it does, we can't make the mistake of imagining that this means a support basis for the final decision-making.

The managers' work must indeed be grounded in as many data as possible - this ensures a thought minimum based on the past and even on the present. However, it's his or her personal history, ultimately, the basis for the administrator take the elements for decision making. And this will be much more intuitive than rational.

There is here no disregard for logical reasoning, either for the use of logical methods to support decisions. The cumulative value of such data to civilization is undeniable. The point is that analysis alone is not enough. Rather, it is a smaller, yet very important, in the process of decision making by managers.

The pressure level at which directors are subject, precisely because the need for intuition, it is large and permanent. The ability to work effectively by intuitive processes requires an attitude to life which can be defined as courage. Chester Barnard says: "In an emotional sense, it may be necessary to envisage more courage than calculation, if something important is at risk, but if there is no basis for any calculation, it is much smarter conjecture than manufacturing data by false calculations"(Cyrus Fogg Brackett's conference in Princeton, 1936).

i like administration a lot