Fisher's Decision Emergence and Tubbs' Systems Model

1Who made the decision?

Read this summary of a school committee's meeting about where to hold the S6 farewell party.

First twenty minutes. "Maybe the hall? Or outside? What do others think?" Members agree with almost everything; nobody commits.

Next thirty minutes. Two camps form. One wants the school hall ("it's free and safe"); the other wants a hired venue ("the hall is too small"). People bring numbers and argue.

Next fifteen minutes. Statements soften: "The hall could work if we use the courtyard too..." Fewer people object. A plan appears that nobody proposed at the start.

Last ten minutes. "Yes, hall plus courtyard is a great idea." "This will be the best farewell yet." Everyone supports it.

No single member "made" the decision; it emerged from the talk. The communication scholar B. Aubrey Fisher (1970) recorded and coded the comments made in decision-making groups and found this four-phase pattern.

21. Fisher's four phases of decision emergence

Fisher's most interesting observation concerns ambiguity. It appears twice: in orientation, because members do not yet know where others stand, and again in emergence, where it plays a social role, letting those who argued against the final choice move towards it gracefully.

Evaluating Fisher

• It was based on careful coding of real talk, not only on members' impressions.
• It drew on a small number of groups, mostly American student and laboratory groups that met for short periods, and that were asked to reach a consensus.
• Marshall Scott Poole (1983) studied more groups and found multiple sequences: some groups follow Fisher's phases, but many cycle back, skip phases or reach decisions by other paths, especially on complex tasks.
• It explains why apparent indecision and conflict are normal, and why leaders should leave room for face-saving rather than forcing a vote in the middle of the conflict phase.

32. Tubbs' systems model

Stewart Tubbs (A Systems Approach to Small Group Interaction, first published in 1978) argued that you cannot understand a group by looking at one variable at a time. A group is a system: what members bring in, what happens inside, and what comes out all affect one another, and the outcomes feed back into the next meeting (Figure 1).

Tubbs also described four phases of group development: orientation (members get to know one another and the task), conflict (different views and competing ideas are debated, which he saw as necessary to avoid lazy conformity), consensus (members compromise and agree on solutions) and closure (the decision is confirmed and supported, and the group may dissolve). Notice how close these are to Fisher's phases.

Applying Tubbs: a cooperative's loan committee

A savings group's committee must decide how much each member may borrow. Inputs: some members are older farmers wary of debt, others young traders keen to expand. Throughputs: the chairperson has high status, the meeting is held in a cramped office, and the norm is that young members speak last. Outputs: a cautious loan rule, but also frustrated young members. Through feedback, that frustration becomes an input to the next meeting, perhaps as conflict, perhaps as members leaving. Changing one throughput, such as letting everyone speak in turn, could change every output.

Evaluating Tubbs

• It is comprehensive and reminds us that variables interact, so there is rarely a single cause of a group's success or failure.
• Because it includes almost everything, it is hard to test or to use for precise predictions; critics say real groups are more complicated than any diagram.
• It treats conflict as useful, which fits research on the dangers of groupthink (Unit 4).