4. Your company is using the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and you have been asked to undertake an AHP analysis. You have been given the following pairwise comparison matrix for three objectives your company is considering:

		Objective
		1	2	3
Objective	1	1	5	8
	2	-	1	2
	3	-	-	1

Here, for example, the judgement as to objective 1 as compared with objective 2 is rated 5.

a.  Would you conclude that these objective judgements are reasonably consistent or not? Assume the value of RI for n=3 is 0.58.

b. A colleague has argued that AHP depends upon the order in which you consider objectives. So if you were to swap the labels on objectives 1 and 2 (so objective 1 becomes objective 2 and objective 2 becomes objective 1) then the conclusion you reach if you apply the same numeric procedure as in part (a) above could be the same, or be different. In other words under this swap you may reach a different conclusion than that arrived at in part (a) above. Would you agree with this view or not? Give your reasons.

c.  The relative judgment of two possible courses of action (A and B) for the company with respect to the above three objectives is:

		A	B
Objective 1	A	1	3
	B	-	1

 

		A	B
Objective 2	A	1	-
	B	4	1

 

		A	B
Objective 3	A	1	6
	B	-	1

 

Ignoring part (b) of this question, and assuming that the judgements made with respect to the three objectives are reasonably consistent, which course of action (A or B) should the company take?