ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the topic of decision making. In recent communication and discourse analytical research the topic of decision making has received some attention, and research is conducted on authentic interactional data rather than with interviews and other kinds of self-reports. The chapter explores several examples of authentic decision making episodes recorded in different workplaces in Hong Kong. It shows how different ways of negotiating, reaching and ratifying a decision can be linked to second-order notions of culture. Decision making plays a central role in many workplace contexts, and has received considerable attention from research in social sciences, as well as management and organisational studies. Many of these studies have been relatively large-scale and have employed quantitative research methods in which participants reported their perceptions of the processes and the outcomes of decision making. The chapter identifies two strategies that were frequently used in relation to more problematic decisions, namely unilateral decision making and collaborative decision making.
