Quite appropriately, I think, leading Japanese thinkers have turned away
from the Group Decision Support Systems idea in favor of the Management
Support System Idea. The latter concept recognizes, among other things,
what H. A. Simon pointed out 35 years ago in one of his more insightful
books: decision-making is only the last step after problem-finding and
design. My spin on this is that no decision can every be any better than
the designed alternatives from which the choice is made.
The software program based on the theory of Interpretive Structural
Modeling developed in Societal Systems (Wiley, 1976) has been in use to
support management for 21 years, long before the current crop of groupware
came forth. This program supports four steps in the Work Program of
Complexity: Description, Diagnosis, Design, and Implementation. It is
part of the larger sphere called "Interactive Management".
It's very hazardous to go with the popular flow in this arena, unless all
you're working on are programmable, single-loop problems, in the Argyris
sense.
If still reading, take a look at the following book, which will answer 99%
of your questions:
J. N. WARFIELD AND A. ROXANA CARDENAS: A HANDBOOK OF INTERACTIVE
MANAGEMENT, Iowa State University Press, Ames, IA 1994.
The remaining 1% are very worthy areas for research.
-- JOHN N. WARFIELD Johnwfield@aol.com