Augmenting management ability by electronics

Today´s manager is confronted with a paradox: within his organization there are “giant brains”, but still he is forced to make daily decisions without adequate knowledge of the “facts” of his enterprise. However, techniques are emerging which will permit a more efficient distribution of the tasks of decision making between man and machine and thus, soon executive capability will be significantly extended. In this paper, the management decision process is conceived as a double-looped, real-time, man-machine feedback system. The manager establishes status by a question and answer game. He also evaluates alternatives by making trial decisions and by instructing the computer to carry on suboptimization processes. Such a management system can be realized with the aid of the Man-Machine Communication Device introduced in this paper. The manager is enabled to use a digital computer as a problem solving tool. With the aid of a special keyboard he can direct a computer to execute computer routines whereupon the machine can immediately respond by visually displaying answers. As an illustration, the Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) used in the U. S. Defense Department is discussed. It is shown that with the on-line man-machine system discussed in this paper, the manager will be able to examine a wide panorama of suboptimum alternatives and will arrive at a better decision than is possible today.