Introduction: The differences in mental models of decision-making among managers with different educational backgrounds have not been systematically extracted, compared, or analyzed. Mental models serve as cognitive frameworks for managers' decision-making as an intellectual resource. The mental model has three components: image, imagination, and assumption. This study aimed to compare the decision-making mental models among clinical (medical) managers and professional managers (non-clinical specialists: engineers and humanities graduates), focusing on clinical managers’ mental model.
Methods: This qualitative study employs phenomenological theory. The study participants comprised 39 managers from three fields: humanities and social sciences, medical sciences, and engineering sciences, selected through criterion-based purposive sampling. Data were collected through structured interviews containing 19 open-ended questions. Collected data were analyzed by thematic analysis and continuous comparison techniques.
Results: Analysis of 1300 data propositions yielded 19 findings and revealed 14 mental models. We systematically compared and reported images, imagination and mental assumptions between clinical and non-clinical managers.
Conclusion: Our findings demonstrate that the decision-making mental model across all three groups of managers exhibit simplicity, imprecision, incorrect (unscientific) foundations, as well as unstructured and static characteristics. Clinical managers demonstrated simpler and more limited mental models than those of non-clinical managers. These findings underscore the necessity of transformative restructuring of managers' decision-making mental models, particularly regarding the dynamics of their mental models.
