The Optimization Edge: Reinventing Decision Making to Maximize All Your Company's Assets

Steve Sashihara's book offers a groundbreaking approach to decision making. Using the newest advances in mathematics and computer software, companies can fully maximize their assets at every decision point. The Optimization Edge quickly introduces readers to this strategy in clear, nontechnical terms, with examples from the trenches.

Based on Steve's extensive experience working with major corporations across the industrial landscape, the book analyzes a variety of companies that are working on the frontier of Optimization. These multi-national organizations employ Optimization--which is also known as Business Analytics, Advanced Analytics and Operations Research--to make time-sensitive, complex decisions that drive up market share and profitability.

"For executives who don't have an optimization strategy, this book is a must read," says Jim Goodnight, CEO of SAS. "There's a good chance that the competition already has an active optimization battle plan--and the bottom-line savings to prove it."

The Optimization Edge provides real-life examples of Optimization, drawn from some of the most successful corporations--and optimizers--in the world. Top executives share their insights into the tremendous production and profit benefits of Optimization, while telling readers how to avoid pitfalls along the way. 

The book is written for a nontechnical business audience interested in moving from cut-back management to value creation and from decision making "by ear" to data-driven strategies that combine high-end algorithms with human judgment.

Steve Sashihara (Princeton, NJ), is the president and CEO of Princeton Consultants Incorporated (princeton.com), which helps clients optimize their assets through a unique blend of information technology and management consulting. Steve is a member of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) Roundtable and a director of the Association of Management Consulting Firms (AMCF), where he has served in various leadership roles, including cochairman. He is a graduate of Princeton University, where he serves on the Advisory Council for the Department of Operations Research and Financial Engineering.