Summary

In summary, one can think of decision equity in a number of ways. At a conceptual level, it is a philosophy or a guiding principle, which suggests that the value of decisions lies in the value of the capitalized future cash flows resulting from them. Several entities or metrics may benefit from good decisions, but the true residence of equity or its source is the decision itself. At a more concrete level, decision equity is perhaps the ultimate management metric that can be used to judge good versus bad strategic choices on the basis of their financial outcomes. The system of linkages that accompanies decision equity–based thinking can also be used as a device to cut through organizational silos and connect them through common pathways. A secondary benefit of this approach is a suppression of the importance of silo-based models and ultimately silo-based thinking. Decision equity can also be used as an evaluation system in order to devise reward structures based on true contributions to the financial outcomes of firms and prevent rewarding beneficiaries of equity enhancing decisions. Moreover, it can be used as a measure of the learning occurring within the organization. Strategic learning within this context can be thought of as acquiring the knowledge about the strength of linkages relating different actions to their consequences. And finally, the adoption of a decision equity–based framework can be used as an indicator that the organization is breaking free from paradigm-driven and silo-based thinking toward a more paradigm-free and data-driven regime.