Verified Document

Starting A Home-Based Business But Am Not Essay

¶ … starting a home-based business but am not sure whether I should proceed with these plans or persist with my original intention, I.e. To enter the teaching field. I have employed the traditional decision-making strategies, as well as reread books on the subject and approached careers advising. I will now try the probability technique. Firstly, I can approach the situation with ascertaining the subjective or objective probability of my predicted situation, likely this refers to how successful I will be in either scenario. The subjective probability is the impression that I accumulate from life experience and from biases such as my dreams and fears. Totaling them up, if I were an optimist I may conclude that I will be successful in either field. 'Objective probability' refers to my accumulating empirical evidence regarding the rigors of each field and my rating in each as well as steps needed to launch myself in each field. I will adopt the rout of 'objective probability'.

Probability ranges from 0 to 1. In other words,...

I am looking for absolute certainty at this moment in life in order to dedicate myself to one goal. The summation of all the units of probability in between 0 and 1 = 1. I want 1.00 (i.e. 100%) probability, not 0.5, in the decision that I take.
My decision may involve non-mutually exclusive events, such as, for instance, I may have to consider trade-offs being unable to accomplish all. As, for instance, work at home may bring me greater security (since self-owned) than becoming a lecturer. On the other hand, lecturing may bring me greater security since it may bring me a regular paycheck. Work at home may be cost-effective in various ways; lecturing may, however, bring me prestige. A way that I can determine the probabilities of x or y occurring is by adding the individual probabilities of situation X and situation Y, and subtracting the probability that the two occur simultaneously from the total (P (x or y)…

Sources used in this document:
references. The whole may be defined as binomial distribution since options are independent of each other.

Other techniques that I can use are tabulated layout of my options (Probability table) rating each option according to perceived value and summing each option in order to decide. The Poisson distribution is another strategy where I approximate the binomial distribution under certain conditions (e.g. recession) or location (e.g. probability of my finding a lecturing position in current geographical location).

Ultimately, I am aware that trade-offs will occur between selections of one decision in preference to the other. I am uncertain yet which decision I will adopt, but realize that to adopt any which one, I will have to (a) thoroughly research the topic in order to achieve the stance of objective probability (b) list and work through all options (c) rate the various options and (d) sum up the total of each alternative. Summation will help me decide.

Sources

Olson, ET Probability. Portland: Walch, 1998
Cite this Document:
Copy Bibliography Citation

Sign Up for Unlimited Study Help

Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.

Get Started Now