Management of Uncertainty: Theory and Application in the Design of Systems and Organizations (Decision Engineering)

The handling of uncertainties stemming from internal processes and the environment is a core issue in organizational and system design. Management of Uncertainty examines the necessity of living with technical and organizational uncertainties, or even taking advantage of them without losing the stability created by reducing uncertainty.

Building on concepts from organization theory, control theory, decision theory, and work and organizational psychology, a decision process is proposed that supports systematic evaluation of the costs and benefits of reducing, maintaining, or increasing uncertainty in a particular context.

Management of Uncertainty will be a useful tool for postgraduate researchers, as well as for operational and strategic decision-makers in organizations. It offers a number of concrete instruments for organizational and system design, which are further illustrated by a range of case studies.