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d. 2001 United States
Herbert Alexander Simon (June 15, 1916 – February 9, 2001) was an American political scientist whose research ranged across the fields of cognitive psychology, computer science, public administration, economics, management, philosophy of science and sociology and was a professor, most notably, at Carnegie Mellon University. With almost a thousand often very highly cited publications he is one of the most influential social scientists of the 20th century.
United States Business theorists Computer scientists Economists Nobel laureates Also known as: H.A. Simon, Herbert Alexander Simon, Herbert Simon, Simon, Herbert, Simon, Herbert A.
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The function of knowledge in the decision-making process is to determine which consequences follow upon which of the alternative strategies.
The criterion of efficiency dictates that choice of alternatives which produces the largest result for the given application of resources.
The behaviour of individuals is the tool with which the organisation achieves its targets.
Decision making processes are aimed at finding courses of action that are feasible or satisfactory in the light of multiple goals and constraints.
We need to augment and amend the existing body of classical and neoclassical economic theory to achieve a more realistic picture of economic process.
Herbert A. Simon (1986)
The world you perceive is drastically simplified model of the real world.
The problem can be approached initially either by inquiring into the properties of the choosing organism, or by inquiring into the environment of choice.
Rationality is bounded when it falls short of omniscience. And the failures of omniscience are largely failures of knowing all the alternatives.
Human beings, viewed as behaving systems, are quite simple. The apparent complexity of our behavior over time is largely a reflection of the complexity of the environment in which we find ourselves.
The capacity of the human mind for formulating and solving complex problems is very small compared with the size of the problems whose solution is required for objectively rational behavior in the real world—or even for a reasonable approximation to such objective rationality.
p. 198; Cited in: P. Slovic (1972)
A major task in organizing is to determine, first, where the knowledge is located that can provide the various kinds of factual premises that decisions require.
Organizations and institutions permit stable expectations to be formed by each member of the group as to the behavior of the other members under specified conditions.
Before a science can develop principles, it must possess concepts. Before a law of gravitation could be formulated, it was necessary to have the notions of “acceleration” and “weight.”
The techniques of the practitioner are usually called 'synthetic'. He designs by organizing known principles and devices into larger systems.
Over Christmas, Allen Newell and I created a thinking machine.
Simon (1956)
Most of the propositions that make up the body of administrative theory today share, unfortunately, this defect of proverbs. For almost every principle one can find an equally plausible and acceptable contradictory principle.
Roughly speaking, rationality is concerned with the selection of preferred behavior alternatives in terms of some system of values, whereby the consequences of behavior can be evaluated.
Organizations and institutions provide the general stimuli and attention-directors that channelize the behaviors of the members of the group, and that provide those members with the intermediate objectives that stimulate action.
Whereas economic man maximizes - selects the best alternative from among all those available to him, his cousin, administrative man, satisfices - looks for a course of action that is satisfactory or "good enough."
If there were no limits to human rationality administrative theory would be barren. It would consist of the single precept: Always select that alternative, among those available, which will lead to the most complete achievement of your goals.
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