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Purpose: The purpose of the chapter is to determine the connection between organizational culture and specifics of the process of decision making in modern business systems and to determine the directions of managing the organizational culture depending on the set criteria of decision making.

Methodology: A proprietary classification of the types of organizational culture of modern business systems according to the criterion of employees' involvement into decision making is offered. This classification uses two dimensions of employees' involvement into decision making for classification of the types of organizational culture of modern business systems. First dimension: interest of business manager in involvement of employees into the process of decision making. Second dimension: employees' inclination for participation in the process of making of managerial decisions. The factors that influence these dimensions are determined.

Conclusions: Connection between organizational culture and specifics of decision making in modern business systems according to the criterion of employees' involvement in decision making is determined. The minimal level of involvement envisages independent decision making by business manager without participation of employees. In this case, a lot of problems of the business system remain unsolved and possibilities remain unused. Resource intensity of decision making is the highest, and their practical implementation is complicated by employees' dissatisfaction, but this process is conducted very quickly. The medium level of involvement envisages either collective discussion, but decision making by business manager, or collection of feedback by business manager with low interest in it from employees. In this case, resource intensity of decision making is lower, and decisions could be made and implemented faster. The highest level of involvement is connected to collective decision making by employees and business manager. This allows determining problems and using possibilities of the business system with minimal resources. Though the duration of the process of decision making is the highest, solutions are implemented quickly due to employees' support.

Originality/value: The determined specifics show the necessity for considering the influence of the organizational culture on specifics of the process of decision making in modern business systems. It is substantiated that no type of organizational culture of modern business systems according to the criterion of employees' involvement in decision making can provide a guarantee of decisions' optimality. The directions of managing the organizational culture depending on the set criteria (completeness, speed, resource intensity) of decision making are recommended.

Purpose: The purpose of the work is to study the characteristics of leadership and to determine its value in the process of decision making in modern business systems, as well as to determine the possibilities of increasing the effectiveness of this process through changing the characteristics of leadership.

Methodology: Target study of the influence of leadership on the process of decision making in modern business systems on the basis of the methodology of the systemic approach is performed, and two additional characteristics of leadership are determined, apart from management style, in the aspect of making of managerial decisions: contradiction of leaders in business system and authority of a formal leader (business manager) in business system and his competence as to involvement of employees into the process of making of managerial decisions, which includes capabilities. Depending on combination of these characteristics, classification of leadership in modern business systems as to criterion of decision making is offered.

Conclusions: It is substantiated that the most preferable type of leadership in a modern business system as to criterion of decision making is highly effective involvement of employees in the process of making of managerial decisions. Capabilities of increasing the effectiveness of the process of making of managerial decisions in a modern system through changing the characteristics of leadership are connected to transition to this type of leadership through overcoming the contradiction of leaders in a business system and increase of competence of the formal leader (business manager) in a business system as to involvement of employees in the process of making of managerial decisions through his training.

Originality/value: It is substantiated that leadership in business system determines only certain characteristics of the process of making of managerial decisions, and no type of leadership can guarantee optimal decisions. With highly effective involvement of employees in the process of making of managerial decisions, the probability of optimal decisions is the highest, so this type of leadership is the most perspective for modern business systems.

The emerging roles of management accountants as either hybrid accountants or business partners are a cause for much debate in the literature. Of the two characteristics related to these roles, namely information provider and interpreter, and decision-maker, the latter remains under-researched. The present study adds to the decision-maker debate by examining business decision-making involvement. Survey responses from a diverse sample of mostly Institute of Management Accountants (USA) and Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (UK) members were obtained and analysed to examine their current business decision-making involvement, including an investigation guided by role theory into possible contextual factors associated with different levels of decision-making involvement. The business decision-making involvement of management accountants varies significantly, and is less pervasive than widely believed. A significant proportion (53%) of management accountants in traditional management accounting positions report no, or limited, business decision-making involvement. Management accountants employed in smaller firms, and middle-aged professionals, are more likely to be involved in making business decisions. The inverted u-shaped association between age and decision-making involvement identified in this study, requires further investigation. The large cross-sectional analysis of the present study extends prior research which was mostly narrowly focussed due to its case study nature. The varying levels of decision-making involvement, and contextual variables associated with higher level involvement, shed some light on the intricacies of the role of management accountants. Professional associations and educators should note that the roles of today’s management accountants vary greatly between information provider and decision-maker.

This paper investigates how individuals' decision-making approach and perceptions of a game's cognitive realism affect the performance of virtual businesses in a web-based simulation game.

Survey data are collected from 274 business simulation game users and is analysed using the fsQCA technique.

The study identifies three alternative pathways to high and low performance in a business simulation game. Results indicate that a flexible decision-making approach exists in all high performance pathway solutions. Where a game is perceived to be realistic, a more focused decision-making approach is associated with high performance. However, where perceived cognitive realism is absent, a less focused experimental decision-making approach is employed, which increases the chances to achieve low performance. Finally, perceived cognitive realism and an experimental decision-making approach are found to be mutually exclusive for achieving high performance.

Whilst the learning benefits of web-based simulation games are widely acknowledged, the complex interplay amongst factors affecting performance in games is under-researched. Limited research exists on how perceptions of a game's cognitive realism interact with user decision-making approaches to affect performance.

This paper aims to add to the theorization of family dynamics and women’s entrepreneurship by examining women’s influence on decision-making in family businesses. Business decisions in family firms, in particular, are not free from family influence in terms of goals and strategies, and the role of women in decision-making processes is of particular interest. Consequently, the role of women entrepreneurs in family firms and their influence on business development requires a more fine-grained analysis of the family dynamic within the family and the business.

This study draws on a qualitative study and focuses on the life story narratives of nine women in rural family businesses in rural communities of Småland province in Sweden to empirically examine the decision-making processes. This region is known both for its entrepreneurial culture and traditional gender order. Based on the narrative accounts of women entrepreneurs in family businesses, the data analysis method is thematic, using a Gioia-inspired method.

The complexity of decision-making in rural family firms is further complicated in part due to a closeness with the rural community. Thus, a typology of three decision-making modes in family firms emerges an informal family-oriented mode, a semistructured family/employee consensus mode and a formal board mode with at least one nonfamily member. Moreover, the advantages, disadvantages and strategies that women use to influence decisions within the respective mode are outlined.

This work contributes to the study of women’s agency and its implications in family business and entrepreneurship in the rural context. The study implies that women’s agency shapes the (rural) entrepreneurship context and, likewise, the (rural) entrepreneurship context influences women’s agency. Hence, the author challenges the view of women as only caregivers and sheds light on the practices and processes behind the scenes of entrepreneurial family businesses.

The purpose of this paper is to offer an interdisciplinary review of the existing research on ethical behavior – informed by philosophical theories, social sciences, and applied business research – and identifies the merits and limitations of the extant theories, including the applicability of prescriptive frameworks and models to business practice.

Following the review, the paper advances a descriptive model of ethical decision‐making criteria that elucidates how individual, organizational, and environmental variables interact to influence attitude formation across critical components of an ethical issue.

The model advanced expands upon other existing frameworks and provides a comprehensive and simultaneous assessment of the interplay between individual‐level variables (e.g. demographic variables, position in the organisation), the structure and climate of the organisation in which the decisions are made, and the social and political features of the business environment.

The proposed model can be used as a training tool and it holds several advantages over the extant alternatives, namely versatility (it is adaptable to the specific organizational context in which respondents are required to conceptualize the dilemma and generate courses of action), and scope (the model allows for the simultaneous assessment of a myriad of cross‐level variables).

The paper offers a comprehensive decision‐making model that can be used to examine ethical decisions in business settings, to investigate potential differences in decision‐making accuracy and ethical reasoning between groups and individuals, and to examine the impact of changing ethical climates in organizational strategy.

The purpose of this paper is to explore differences in the decision-making styles between family and nonfamily firms, while assessing how family participation relates to the use of decision-making styles within family firms.

The empirical evidence is provided by a sample of 155 firms, located in the Azores, Portugal, 82 family controlled and 73 nonfamily controlled firms. All firms included in the sample are small-sized privately owned enterprises. Business owners and managers responded to a decision-making styles questionnaire, followed, in the case of family firms, by the report of the number of family members actively involved in the business.

Results show that there are no differences in the use of rational decision making between family and nonfamily firms. However, nonfamily firms show higher levels of experiential decision making than family firms. Results also show that family participation plays a key role in guiding the decisional process, by promoting the use experiential decisions and inhibiting the adoption of a rational decision-making styles in family firms.

From a theoretical perspective, this study opens the door to new research on an under investigated topic in the family business literature. It contributes with initial notions that may help profile the decisional style within small family firms, while revealing how family participation affects it. Thus, creating a fertile ground of discussion that can be an impulse for more research in this area.

From an applied perspective, assessing the influence of family participation in the adoption of a decisional style is potentially valuable for practitioners as well as for owners and managers. Providing them with clues that may help them better understand the basis of their decisions which can benefit their relations with other family members, as with customers, partners and suppliers that play a key role in the firm’s growth, profitability and adaptability.

From a social point of view, showing that family firms tend to be rational in their decisions may help create a more reputable and credible image surrounding these firms that are sometimes perceived as less professional than nonfamily firms. Thus, a more solid reputability can help improve their relationship with important partner institutions (e.g. financial, governmental), becoming more attractive to private and public investment, which can translate into win-win situations.

This study responds to a gap in the literature, by exploring the use of experiential vs rational decision-making styles in small family and nonfamily firms. This study also contributes to the understanding of the decision making within family firms, by assessing the role of family participation in the adoption of a decisional style.

Lawrence Kohlberg's (1969) concept of cognitive moral development (CMD) has been one of the most investigated constructs in the field of social psychology, with over one thousand studies reported investigating this construct in only two decades of research. However, what is the relationship of this theoretical construct to actual decision making and behavior? Blasi (1980, p. 4) opined for the criticality of moral judgement research to both ethical decision making and ethical inquiry, stating that “without judgement, an action, no matter how beneficial, would not be moral.” Relating Kohlberg's model to business decision making and behavior has been central to the building of theoretical frameworks of the ethical decision making process engaged in by individuals. The models of this process proposed by Trevino and Youngblood (1990), Trevino (1986), Bommer, Gratto, Gravender, and Tuttle (1987), Ferrell and Gresham (1985), Ferrell, Gresham, and Fraedrich (1989), Swinyard, DeLong, and Cheng (1989), and Jones (1991) all contained cognitive moral development as a factor in their respective models of ethical decision making.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the current industrial marketing and purchasing (IMP) research that has a vague positioning of the bounded rationality of an actor. By borrowing insights from other disciplines, this study aims to develop the IMP approach further by acknowledging the importance of individuals who act and make decisions on behalf of their companies.

This study is conceptual. By examining the IMP studies in combination with decision-making literature from behavioral economics and psychology, this paper provides a new understanding of the phenomenon in question.

This study demonstrates that individual decision-making is not as rational as has previously been thought, thus indicating the bounded rationality of the actor. After examining the most common negative emotions that influence the decision-making process, the paper presents a research agenda. It provides a series of research topics and methodological choices for future IMP research endeavors.

As this paper is conceptual, empirical research is needed to examine the role of negative emotions in dynamic decision-making processes.

Managerial implications of this paper are focused on providing instructions for managers on how to deal with negative emotions in dynamic decision-making processes.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is one of the first papers that attempts to connect the IMP studies with the dynamics of decision-making by examining negative emotions in the business world.

The purpose of this paper is to understand, which internal processes (mental, emotional, cultural, ethical and spiritual) Afghan business leaders use when making managerial decisions.

Primary data were collected through 1-h face-to-face interviews with Afghan business leaders. Interviews were conducted through open-ended questions in a semi-structured format. This method was considered most appropriate to acquire an understanding of senior executives’ interpretation and usage of decision-making processes. The method of analyzing data was thematic analysis where the researchers identified common themes, topics, ideas and patterns of meaning that come up repetitively. The objective of the analysis was to determine the most frequent decision-making processes by business leaders and the reasons for using these processes.

Although the usage of internal processes in decision-making are not homogeneous among Afghan business leaders, some of the processes are used more frequently than others such as mental, cultural and ethical processes. During the mental process of decision-making, the majority of leaders use intuitional decision-making, the minority using logic. Regarding the cultural dimension, the majority of leaders stated that they have an open, friendly, caring organization for each employee and horizontal culture in their organization. The minority indicated that they have a friendly culture but they also considered the processes and hierarchy in their organization. Considering the ethical process of decision-making, leaders stated that their priorities are more ethical than getting extra profit. They believe that profit will be generated while considering ethical values. As a leader noted: when you consider ethics and fulfill your obligations, the profit automatically generates. Most leaders use the internal process of emotion in their decision-making, but the usage has not been frequent. The emotional process of decision-making is more involved when the human factor is involved. For instance, one of the participants stated “I did not fire an employee that I had to because he was a needy and poor person.” About the spiritual process of decision-making, although all leaders agreed that they have used spirituality in decision-making, its usage varies. About one-third of the leaders mostly rely on spirituality or on religious teachings during the decision-making process, one-third somehow rely on spirituality or religion, about 50% of the time and one-third rely on spirituality between 25% to 30% of the time.

This study is pilot research as no previous research was carried out on this topic, therefore, it provides a basis of literature on the usage of internal processes on decision-making in Afghanistan. The findings may differ in other economic and national contexts.