Definition

FOR-DEC is an aviation decision-making model that was developed in the 1990s by Lufthansa and the German Aerospace Center. It has been described as a method of applying structure and logic to a complex problem.

The acronym FOR-DEC stands for the six phases of the decision-making process. The exact wording used to describe each phase varies among different sources, but basically are as follows:

Facts: What’s the matter or what is going on here?

Options: Possible ways to solve the problem or what are our choices?

Risks and Benefits: What can be said for and against the different options?

Decision: What are we going to?

Execution: Who does what, when, and how?

Check: Is everything still ok or did everything work to plan?

In addition, the hyphen between the ‘R’ and ‘D’ is intended to make the pilot stop and reflect on whether anything essential was missing and whether all available information had been taken in to consideration.