The Role of Intuition in Managerial Crisis Decision-Making

Abstract

The boundaries of rational decision-making in managerial conditions of uncertainty and time pressure lead to several studies investigating the importance of the complementary role of intuition in such events. While for example Coget and Keller (2010) or Okoli and Watt (2018) show that in crises intuition is applied to validate decisions and is strongly related to emotions and rational thinking, it is still uncertain how that applies to managers and fundamental crises conditions such as the Covid-19 pandemic. Therefore, we investigated through in-depth qualitative interviews with 17 long-term experienced high-level managers at the beginning of the pandemic how managers decide during the Covid-19 pandemic and what role intuition plays thereby. We found that intuition is applied specifically by providing direction, assessing the situation and information, reviewing and verifying decisions, as well as handling interpersonal topics, and creating possible solutions to problems. Moreover, we propose that managers profit from their gut feeling in crises, however, dependent on their preference and level of responsibility. We provide a specific analysis of the application of intuition in managerial crisis decision-making and thereby a more comprehensive view than the few existing works. Furthermore, we recommend how managers might apply this knowledge to their decision-making practice.