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The purpose of this paper is to assess the issues faced by managers of inland waterways in the Southeastern USA as a guide for improvements to spill management information systems.

A survey was administered to a group of over 300 professionals representing multiple organizations involved in water quality management and/or spill response in the Southeast region of the USA to query their perceptions on leading demands and issues faced in management of inland waterways both on a daily basis and during spill response efforts.

Survey results indicated that communication is often the “weak link” in both water management and spill response activities, and that enhanced spill management information tools could serve as a valuable resource in addressing this problem. Display of spatial/visual information was deemed to be especially important to spill response personnel and should be included in the next generation of spill response systems.

The scope is limited to the Southeastern USA, but similar results would be expected in other regions where management of surface water is of concern.

In these trying economic times, the survey results serve to rank order decision‐support priorities to which available resources should be allocated and indicate areas of interest for improved support in both water resource management and spill response.

The paper provides the first documentation of the demands and decision‐support priorities of inland waterway resource managers and spill response personnel.

This chapter presents a new model for developing and assessing the decision competencies of executive decision-makers. Prior models consider individual and group decision-making but neglect to consider the impact of group-interactive decision-making on real-world problem-solving and sense-making activities. In the present study experimental protocols represent an approximation of a realistic business decision-making process, where decision-makers consult with groups of stakeholders and then make decisions on their own. The model juxtaposes decision competence with the level of decision confidence with which decisions are made. The study furnishes an objective test for this phenomenon, resulting in quantitative empirical evidence of either follow-the-herd (FTH) behavior, or group-forged individual decisions (GFID), or follow-my-own-mind (FMOM) individual decision behavior. The study investigates the impact of group-interactive decision processes on hubristic behavior – decision-makers who make poor/wrong decisions, but remain confident in their choices, judgments, and decisions. The resulting management decision competency model provides an inter-disciplinary matrix, of benefit to human resource development specialists, and provides scholars in organizational behavior and leadership development with guidance for current and future research into group dynamics and decision competencies.