Decision-making style structure of Slovenian sports managers

Abstract

Purpose: Decisions that we make are always burdened with consequences, which are the inevitable result of our decision-making. The decision-making style (DMS) is the way in which managers acquire, process and use information in decision-making processes. The goals of the present research are to define the factor structure of DMS for a sample of Slovenian sports managers and to determine the characteristics of their DMS structure. Methods: 80 managers of Slovenian sports organizations filled in an anonymous internet survey. The DMS was measured with the use of the General Decision-Making Style Inventory (GDMS), which was translated into the Slovenian language. The GDMS questionnaire measures five different decision-making styles: rational, intuitive, dependent, avoidant and spontaneous. The factor analysis (FA) method was used to test the assumption about the structure of the DMS. The internal consistency was measured using Cronbach's alpha coefficient. The Pearson correlation coefficient was used to study the relationship between the DMS. Results: After three successive implementations of FA, we developed an optimized DMS model with 20 items confirming that when making decisions, sports managers use a combination of all five DMS. Slovenian sports managers mostly use the rational and dependent DMS, indicating that they are mostly rational decision-makers. We also recognized the correlation between the rational and the dependent style, but since the structure of the DMS in our sample is dominated by the rational DMS, we could conclude that this is a dependent-rational DMS, where mangers seek advice, opinions and knowledge from colleagues when making decisions to increasing their rationality. Conclusions: We can conclude that the recognized average structure of the DMS is functional and healthy; furthermore, Slovenian sports managers are on average rational decision-makers who, due to the specific organizational characteristics of sports organizations, look for confirmation and opinions on future decisions in the broader environment of the organizations' stakeholders.