Julia Hodgson

When a venture seems to be faltering, do you persist and hope that things will get better or do you cut your losses? This may be one of the most important decisions business or project owners may ever have to make. Persistence involves the risk of throwing good money (or resources) after bad, but owners may feel they have too much invested to quit now. Escalation in Decision-Making reveals why social scientists believe that owners may not respond rationally to such predicaments. Instead of exiting when the odds are clearly stacked against them, they re-invest and end up compounding their losses - a phenomenon known as escalation of commitment. The authors, Helga Drummond and Julia Hodgson, also introduce the concept of entrapment, a variation whereby decision-makers passively drift towards insolvency as the cost of changing direction becomes too high. So: · what drives escalation? · why do some owners quit whilst others persist until the bailiffs arrive? · what can we learn from owners' mistakes? · what makes newcomers believe they can succeed where others are conspicuously failing? These questions of behavioural economics are answered using a narrative that analyses decisions made by market traders facing economic extinction. Many highly successful entrepreneurs started their careers in markets - it was once an almost guaranteed route to prosperity - now market traders are struggling to survive. Although the market traders featured are small entrepreneurs, the ubiquitous phenomenon of escalation at the heart of these stories is widely relevant to practitioners such as project managers in large organizations and to those responsible for managing risk in many situations. Rich in case studies involving real business decisions and dilemmas, Escalation in Decision-Making provides an accessible introduction to the application of theory against a background of growing interest in behavioural economics, now being researched and taught in univ

This first-of-its-kind title addresses the failures of an often fragmented healthcare system in managing vulnerable patients with multiple, chronic, co-morbid conditions -- patients who are frequently unresponsive to the methods and approaches used to treat other patients with conditions that are less complicated. The book emphasizes a holistic evaluation to patient care that looks at the whole patient, providing comprehensive formulations that describe the interacting problems that afflict the patient, including elements that are barriers to effective treatment of active medical problems and barriers to recovery. The book begins by defining integrated care, discussing the types of patients who benefit from this approach and some of the models of care, including financing, barriers to acceptance, and advocacy for patients. The second section discusses the structural elements of integrated care, including the building of a team approach, issues of leadership, and role definition, as well as the authors’ experiences in overcoming some of the problems. In the remaining sections, the book discusses major complicating features of the patients seen in integrative care settings, including a description of the kinds of problems, a model for formulation of patient cases, and successful approaches to treatment of these problems. Finally, some of the real-world applications where integrative care provides better outcomes is covered, including in terms of addictions, medically complex patients, and chronic pain patients. Integrative Medicine for Vulnerable Populations - A Clinical Guide to Working with Chronic and Comorbid Medical Disease, Mental Illness, and Addiction is a major contribution to the clinical literature and will be of great interest to health care professionals, administrators, policy stakeholders, and even interested patients and patient advocates.

When a venture seems to be faltering, do you persist and hope that things will get better or do you cut your losses? This may be one of the most important decisions business or project owners may ever have to make. Persistence involves the risk of throwing good money (or resources) after bad, but owners may feel they have too much invested to quit now. Escalation in Decision-Making reveals why social scientists believe that owners may not respond rationally to such predicaments. Instead of exiting when the odds are clearly stacked against them, they re-invest and end up compounding their losses - a phenomenon known as escalation of commitment. The authors, Helga Drummond and Julia Hodgson, also introduce the concept of entrapment, a variation whereby decision-makers passively drift towards insolvency as the cost of changing direction becomes too high. So: · what drives escalation? · why do some owners quit whilst others persist until the bailiffs arrive? · what can we learn from owners' mistakes? · what makes newcomers believe they can succeed where others are conspicuously failing? These questions of behavioural economics are answered using a narrative that analyses decisions made by market traders facing economic extinction. Many highly successful entrepreneurs started their careers in markets - it was once an almost guaranteed route to prosperity - now market traders are struggling to survive. Although the market traders featured are small entrepreneurs, the ubiquitous phenomenon of escalation at the heart of these stories is widely relevant to practitioners such as project managers in large organizations and to those responsible for managing risk in many situations. Rich in case studies involving real business decisions and dilemmas, Escalation in Decision-Making provides an accessible introduction to the application of theory against a background of growing interest in behavioural economics, now being researched and taught in univ