What is framing and how doe it relate to decision making?

Answer 1

Everyone has his or her own views of the world. These views fram how they think about other things. If you can change how an issue is framed, you can chance how people think about it.

A good example from recent political debate is the inheritance tax. Over U.S. history, voters have generally favored a tax on inherited assets. After all, most people don't inherit much money when someone dies, so an inheritance tax was no big deal.

When they wanted to eliminate the inheritance tax, the Republicans in Congress and the White House couldn't get much political traction. So they reframed it as the "death tax." Suddenly, public opinion shifted. While most people don't inherit money, everyone dies. Once the inheritance tax became the death tax, opposition to the levy increased and eliminating it became easy politically.

The reason war in Iraq has been reframed several times in attempts to gain or increase public support. Initially, it was to eliminate a source of weapons of mass destruction. When no such weapons could be found, the reason changed to overthrowing a cruel and dangerous dictator. As support for that rationale declined, the reason changed to fighting terrorism "over there" before we have to fight it "over here." Those reframings were intended to influence the public's decision making -- to support, rather than to oppose, the war.

Reframing also is used in marketing programs. Before gasoline prices started to rise sharply this year, SUVs were among the most popular vehicles sold in America. As the cost per gallon topped $3, SUV sales crashed. Automakers began a new round of commercials that positioned their SUVs as the most fuel-efficient "in their class." Vehicles there were once considered "gas-guzzlers" at 20 mpg were being touted as "gas-savers" because others in their class only got 17 mpg.

Answer 2

Framing - as in "we need to frame this problem people" is biz speak for defining what information you are going to use to make a decision before you attempt to make it. If your company is having problems with a supplier shipping components late and that is the issue everyone is focused on, then framing the problem would be defining exactly how late things are arriving from the said supplier, when they need to arrive, when they arrive from other suppliers. That way, your company would know what a successful outcome would be to the problem and can properly assess whether their planned action (dump the supplier, have a meeting with the supplier) will have the desired effect.

It's more simply a way of keeping people on track so they don't loose focus. If the problem is the supplier delivers componets late, than during that discussion trying to bring up the fact that their components have bad quality or are too expensive would likely be outside of the frame and inappropriate for that particular discussion/decision (although important none the less) Hope this helps.