Do you have to evaluate completely different alternatives?
Do you have to accommodate distinct needs in one solution?
Do you have to find consensus on conflicting ideas?
For sure, you need to learn the weighted scoring method
My name is Americo Cunha.
Welcome, and let's start learning the weighted scoring method
The Weighted Scoring method is a tool:
- to rank completely different alternatives for a problem
- to choose the best suitable technology for an application
- to select the most critical problem, among several others
First, let’s see how the method works in a simple example
John needs to buy a new car.
But he is very confused with so many options.
he thinks about a cheaper and fuel efficient model,
but, his family is asking for a big and fancy car.
His decision involves contrary interests that are difficult to accommodate.
The question is how to find the most suitable alternative
that better accommodates all family needs and desires?
Who is involved in the decision?
John, his wife, a 10 years old boy, a 7 years old daughter, and a dog.
John drives every day to work, and monthly Davis relatives that
lives 100 kilometers away it is just a day trip
the first step is to create a table
with the requirements and possible alternatives
the requirements are listed in the first column as you can see
we summarized Jones needs into four major requirements
passengers comfort, fuel efficiency monthly payments and cargo capacity
secondly we need to indentify alternatives in this case the car models John can buy
to be more illustrative we decided to present alternatives
manufactured by Ford company
The four models are fiesta, focus, Edge, and Explorer
fiesta is the smallest cheapest and most fuel-efficient car
on the other side we include the Ford Explorer a large utility vehicle
in the middle range we have Ford Focus and Edge
Now, the weighting and scoring table
is ready for the analysis, requirements in the lines and alternatives
in the columns. The next step we need to define
which requirement is the most important
which one is the least important the challenge is to translate the
requirement importance into a numeric weight
the most important requirement
receives weight five, high importance
the least important receives weight one low importance.
Let's make some assumptions for John : John uses his car every day to work
the vehicle must be fuel efficient and therefore the requirement for fuel efficiency
receives weight five John considers that cargo capacity is not
that important and gave weight one for this requirement
the remaining requirements receive intermediate weights ranging from two to four
in this example: passengers comfort and monthly payments are graded as three
that means
that they have intermediate importance in the final decision
In the following step, we need to evaluate each alternative on each requirement.
Let’s start with the Ford Fiesta, John thinks that this car satisfies partly
the requirement comfort therefore fiesta receives score one i
n terms of fuel efficiency and payment fiesta receives the highest score five because it is the
cheapest and has the better fuel efficiency
For cargo capacity, Fiesta does not satisfy the needs
, and it received score zero on this requirement
after finishing the scoring for the Fiesta alternative John needs
to give scores for the remaining models once the scoring for all alternatives is finished
it is time to calculate the weighted score the weighted score is calculated
by multiplying the alternative score by the requirement weight, for instance in
terms of passengers comfort model fiesta received scored one and the weighted score
will be 3 x 1 that is 3 four full efficiency the weighted score
is 5 x 5 that comes to 25 after calculating or weighted scores for
the alternative it's possible to the determine its total weighted score
the total weighted score is obtained by adding up the weighted score for each requirement.
for the alternative fiesta the weighted score is 3 + 25 + 15 + 0
that comes to 43 now we can repeat the calculation for the remaining
alternatives. It's now possible to have an idea how suitable the alternatives
are for Jonh requirements in fact the weighting scoring method translated
needs and opinions into weights and score which helps to compare alternatives
using numerical values let's recap the needs and interests
were translated into requirements
the requirements received weights based on the importance level
then the total weighted score was calculated
This made possible to compare
and ranked alternatives in this case, we may assume that
the alternative focus is the most suitable for Jonh's needs the way to the scoring
The weighting and scoring method can be explained
in five easy steps: first define the objective and
requirements; second grade each requirement importance with weight;
three indentify alternatives to achieve the objective
Four, give scores to each
alternative and calculate the total weight score. Finally rank alternatives
and interpret the results
let's see the details of each step in the next slides
in the first step it is crucial to define clearly the goal and then choose
requirements or criteria that are important to achieve the objective
the requirement or criteria can be qualitative or quantitative. Here you can
see some examples for business scenarios.
In step 2, it's time to the determine
the requirements importance. Here you have
two examples of scale you can use
A scale of high to low importance in which y
ou give numerical values 5 to high importance
and 1 to low-importance another weight scale, you can evaluate
if the requirement is mandatory, desirable or optional
You may give scale 5 to mandatory requirements
3 to "desirables" and one for the optionals
during the step 3, you should focus on one alternative of the columns each time
and evaluate it on each requirement of the lines, for instance, you may ask
does the alternative satisfy the requirement?
in our example we could have said
Does Fiesta satisfy comfort requirements?
the answer will naturally conduct to a score
in the step 4, it's time to calculate the weighted score for each alternative
by multiplying the score and each respective weight after
determine all alternatives weighted scores
we will be able to calculate the
total weighted score for each alternative this can be done by adding
up the values in the weighted scores’ column
This is a simple math as you could see in the example
In the last step we can compare the total weight scores
for all alternatives and discuss the results within the team and stakeholders
in some situations it can be useful to repeat the method just considering
the 3 best ranked alternatives by doing this you will narrow down the focus and
increase consistency let's check now some practical business applications
this example shows how to select a technology you can see technological alternatives
in the columns and business requirements in the lines
you can evaluate each technology against each requirement and then indentify the
most suitable for a specific application this example shows how to approach
a supplier selection problem the suppliers are placed in the columns
and the company business requirements in the lines
by providing ratings scores for each supplier
you can find out the best supplier to provide the resources required
here you have another very common application
the buy or make decision in the column
we have the two alternatives buy or make in the lines the business requirements
by scoring the pros and cons of each alternative you can find what is better
for the company as you could see the weighted scoring method h
as several advantages: - it provides a quick, easy, and consistent method for
evaluating distinct alternatives
it quantifies requirements and alternatives
with numerical values, simplifying the assessment
it facilitates agreement on priorities
it establishes common ground for the decision-making process
thanks for watching I wish you the best as you lapply the weighted scoring
in your course assignments and professionally.