Essentials of Business Analytics

This book provides coverage over the full range of analytics--descriptive, predictive, prescriptive--not covered by any other single book. It includes step-by-step instructions to help students learn how to use Excel and powerful but easy to use Excel add-ons such as XL Miner for data mining and Analytic Solver Platform for optimization and simulation.

Dr. Jeffrey D. Camm is the Inmar Presidential Chair and Associate Dean of Business Analytics in the School of Business at Wake Forest University. Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, he holds a B.S. from Xavier University (Ohio) and a Ph.D. from Clemson University. Prior to joining the faculty at Wake Forest, he served on the faculty of the University of Cincinnati. He has also served as a visiting scholar at Stanford University and as a visiting Professor of Business Administration at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. Dr. Camm has published more than 40 papers in the general area of optimization applied to problems in operations management and marketing. He has published his research in numerous professional journals, including Science, Management Science, Operations Research and Interfaces. Dr. Camm was named the Dornoff Fellow of Teaching Excellence at the University of Cincinnati and he was the 2006 recipient of the INFORMS Prize for the Teaching of Operations Research Practice. A firm believer in practicing what he preaches, he has served as an operations research consultant to numerous companies and government agencies. From 2005 to 2010 he served as editor-in-chief of Interfaces. In 2016, Dr. Camm received the George E. Kimball Medal for service to the operations research profession and in 2017 he was named an INFORMS Fellow.

James J. Cochran is Associate Dean for Research, Professor of Applied Statistics and the Rogers-Spivey Faculty Fellow at The University of Alabama. Born in Dayton, Ohio, he earned his B.S., M.S., and M.B.A. from Wright State University and his Ph.D. from the University of Cincinnati. He has been at The University of Alabama since 2014 and has been a visiting scholar at Stanford University, Universidad de Talca, the University of South Africa and Pole Universitaire Leonard de Vinci. Dr. Cochran has published more than 40 papers in the development and application of operations research and statistical methods. He has published in several journals, including Management Science, The American Statistician, Communications in Statistics�Theory and Methods, Annals of Operations Research, European Journal of Operational Research, Journal of Combinatorial Optimization, Interfaces and Statistics and Probability Letters. He received the 2008 INFORMS Prize for the Teaching of Operations Research Practice, 2010 Mu Sigma Rho Statistical Education Award and 2016 Waller Distinguished Teaching Career Award from the American Statistical Association. Dr. Cochran was elected to the International Statistics Institute in 2005, was named a Fellow of the American Statistical Association in 2011 and was named a Fellow of INFORMS in 2017. He received the Founders Award in 2014, the Karl E. Peace Award in 2015 from the American Statistical Association and the INFORMS President�s Award in 2019. A strong advocate for effective operations research and statistics education as a means of improving the quality of applications to real problems, Dr. Cochran has chaired teaching effectiveness workshops around the globe. He has served as operations research consultant to numerous companies and not-for-profit organizations.

Michael J. Fry is Professor of Operations, Business Analytics, and Information Systems (OBAIS) and Academic Director of the Center for Business Analytics in the Carl H. Lindner College of Business at the University of Cincinnati. Born in Killeen, Texas, he earned a B.S. from Texas A&M University, and M.S.E. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Michigan. He has been at the University of Cincinnati since 2002, where he was previously department chair and has been named a Lindner Research Fellow. He has also been a visiting professor at the Samuel Curtis Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University and the Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Fry has published more than 25 research papers in journals such as Operations Research, M&SOM, Transportation Science, Naval Research Logistics, IIE Transactions, Critical Care Medicine and Interfaces. His research interests focus on applying analytics to the areas of supply chain management, sports and public-policy operations. He has worked with many different organizations for his research, including Dell, Inc., Starbucks Coffee Company, Great American Insurance Group, the Cincinnati Fire Department, the State of Ohio Election Commission, the Cincinnati Bengals and the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden. He was named a finalist for the Daniel H. Wagner Prize for Excellence in Operations Research Practice, and he has been recognized for both his research and teaching excellence at the University of Cincinnati. In 2019 he led the team that was awarded the INFORMS UPS George D. Smith Prize on behalf of the OBAIS Department at the University of Cincinnati.

Jeffrey W. Ohlmann is Associate Professor of Business Analytics and Huneke Research Fellow in the Tippie College of Business at the University of Iowa. Born in Valentine, Nebraska, he earned a B.S. from the University of Nebraska, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Michigan. He has taught at the University of Iowa since 2003. Dr. Ohlmann�s research on the modeling and solution of decision-making problems has produced more than two dozen research papers in journals, such as Operations Research, Mathematics of Operations Research, INFORMS Journal on Computing, Transportation Science and European Journal of Operational Research. He has collaborated with companies such as Transfreight, LeanCor, Cargill and the Hamilton County Board of Elections as well as three National Football League franchises. Because of the relevance of his work to the industry, he was bestowed the George B. Dantzig Dissertation Award and was recognized as a finalist for the Daniel H. Wagner Prize for Excellence in Operations Research Practice.

Dr. David R. Anderson is a leading author and Professor Emeritus of Quantitative Analysis in the College of Business Administration at the University of Cincinnati. He has served as head of the Department of Quantitative Analysis and Operations Management and as Associate Dean of the College of Business Administration. He was also coordinator of the college�s first Executive Program. In addition to introductory statistics for business students, Dr. Anderson has taught graduate-level courses in regression analysis, multivariate analysis, and management science. He also has taught statistical courses at the Department of Labor in Washington, D.C. Dr. Anderson has received numerous honors for excellence in teaching and service to student organizations. He is the co-author of ten well-respected textbooks related to decision sciences and actively consults with businesses in the areas of sampling and statistical methods. Born in Grand Forks, North Dakota, he earned his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from Purdue University.