[joeclark77]

I cannot recommend enough a paper called "A Garbage Can Model of Organizational Choice" (1972) by Cohen, March, and Olsen. Maybe the best thing I was assigned to read during my whole PhD. The authors propose that decisions are made by random co-occurrences of problems looking for solutions, solutions looking for problems, and people looking for opportunities to make decisions (not exactly in those terms). The authors even did a little computer simulation, which might prove enlightening (or distressing) given your objective. Link: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2392088

Thanks for reminding me of this.