User:Oalexy/Predictive knowledge

Predictive knowledge is a concept in organization theory, a branch of management literature. It is defined as knowledge of Actor A about the most likely action of another party B in a situation in which the optimal decision of A is dependent on the decision of B. It is particularly important in situations of epistemic interdependence: A and B are dependent on each others’ actions, yet to choose their own action optimally, they need to be able to predict accurately which decision the other party will make.

The need to predict will arise primarily for two reasons. First, because the other party has not acted yet or is acting simultaneously with one's own actions, as happens frequently in real time situations where coordination is pivotal (for example surgical teams, fire fighters). Second, certain constraints may exist which make it (too) diffucult or outright impossible to find out how the other has acted, a situation common in new product development (in particular regarding competitors’ actions).

Predictive knowledge can be formed in several ways, most easily through information processing methods, such as communication between the agents, mutual observation (for example, through co-location in the case of individuals), learning, or (joint) decision making by the agents.