Papers
Management decision making by the analytic hierarchy process: A proposed modification for large-scale problems
Author(s)Rafikul Islam
International Islamic University Malaysia
Malaysia
Nur Anisah Abdullah
International Islamic University Malaysia
Malaysia
Publication date: Jan, 2007
Journal: J. for International Business and Entrepreneurship Development Vol.: 31- Issue: 1/2- Pages: 18-40
Publisher: Inderscience
Abstract: The use of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) for decision making is sometimes marred by the laborious effort of conducting a large number of pairwise comparisons, especially in the presence of a large number of criteria. The present empirical study attempts to investigate the possibility of eliminating insignificant criteria in order to reduce AHP computational time. Using Expert Choice software, findings confirmed that criteria assigned with comparatively lesser weights can be excluded from the hierarchy and thereby the total time required for making pairwise comparisons is reduced. To solve large-scale enterprise multi-criteria decision-making problems (that involve large number of criteria) by AHP, it is proposed that, at the very outset, decision-makers can apply nominal group technique to identify the more significant criteria and drop lesser important criteria from the list. This proposed methodology is expected to enhance the applicability of AHP in solving various kinds of larger sized multi-criteria decision-making problems in any enterprise.
Keywords: AHP, Decisions making, Large scale problem