Paired comparison is a method of gaining team consensus on the priority of items which appear to be of equal merit.
The technique may be used when a team is unable to agree the priority of a number of items. The number of items to be compared is usually limited to no more that about six. It may be necessary to use another tool, such as list reduction, to condense a longer list before applying paired comparison. Paired comparison can then be used to reach consensus both quickly and democratically.
There are four steps to follow when using paired comparison:
1.List the competing items down the left hand side of a paired comparison table and give each team member a copy (see Figure 1).
2.Working on their own, team members compare every pair of options and circle their preference in each case on their copy of the table. The example given in Figure 2 shows that John preferred option 2 to option 1, option 1 to option 3, option 4 to option 1, and so on.
3.Team members then add up the number of times they have circled each option (see Figure 3).
4.The final step is to combine the team members' totals to give an overall total for each option. The option with the highest overall score represents the democratic choice of the team. In the example in Figure 4, option 2 was the team's consensus decision.
Figure 1:?a paired comparison table with six options for 'ways to improve the office'
1. Connect electronic mail system?1?1?1?1?1
?????2?3?4?5?6
2. Install a coffee machine???2?2?2?2
??????3?4?5?6
3. Put in extra telephone line????3?3?3
???????4?5?6
4. Buy fax machine??????4?4
????????5?6
5. New wallpaper???????5
?????????6
6. Buy a new printer
[the * indicate the numbers that should be circled ]
Figure 2:?a paired comparison table completed by John
1. Connect electronic mail system?1?1*?1?1*?1*
?????2*?3?4*?5?6
2. Install a coffee machine???2*?2*?2*?2*
??????3?4?5?6
3. Put in extra telephone line????3?3*?3
???????4*?5?6*
4. Buy fax machine??????4*?4
????????5?6*
5. New wallpaper???????5
?????????6*
6. Buy a new printer
Figure 3:?the total number of times John circled each option
Option 1?3??
Option 2?5??
Option 3?1??
Option 4?3
Option 5?0
Option 6?3
[* circle 12]
Figure 4:?the combined totals for the team showing that Option 2 "Install a coffee machine" was the consensus decision.
| Options | ||||||
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| John | 3 | 5 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 3 |
| Sarah | 5 | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 4 |
| Pauline | 3 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 3 |
| Totals | 11 | 12* | 3 | 4 | 5 | 10 |