Product Description

In the Second Edition of their popular text, Wayne Winston and Chris Albright continue to build on their highly successful approach of teaching by example while using spreadsheets to model a wide variety of business problems. The authors show the relevance of topics through numerous examples of real-world implementation of management science. The ideal solution for people who want to teach by example and who want to solve real problems with spreadsheets and professional spreadsheet add-ins, this text is always interesting, in part due to the useful cases added to this edition.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #999557 in Books
• Published on: 2002-12-24
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 976 pages

Review
"Prose is casual and understandable; not stuffy or full of jargon. Problems are realistic and motivating for students, but solvable. Working through problems within a spreadsheet provided by the authors along side text discussion is invaluable for the learning experience."

"More simplistic and to the point. Not to much extra material above and beyond the stuent’s level. I also enjoyed the more focused approach toward simulations!! Good business examples are used with nice introductory paragraphs for each chapter. The CD that accompanies the book contains wonderful solution sets and useful supplemental programs."

About the Author
Wayne L. Winston is Professor of Operations and Decision Technologies in the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University, where he has taught since 1975. Wayne received his B.S. degree in mathematics from MIT and his Ph.D. degree in operations research from Yale. He has written the successful textbooks OPERATIONS RESEARCH: APPLICATIONS AND ALGORITHMS, MATHEMATICAL PROGRAMMING: APPLICATIONS AND ALGORITHMS, INTRODUCTION TO PROBABILITY MODELS, SIMULATION MODELING WITH @RISK, DATA ANALYSIS AND DECISION MAKING, DATA ANALYSIS FOR MANAGERS, PRACTICAL MANAGEMENT SCIENCE, AND FINANCIAL MODELS USING SIMULATION AND OPTIMIZATION. Wayne has published more than 20 articles in leading journals and has won many teaching awards, including the school-wide MBA award four times. His current interest is in showing how spreadsheet models can be used to solve business problems in all disciplines, particularly in finance and marketing.

Customer Reviews

This text is without peer in MS but has wider applicability.
Unlike most textbooks on OR/MS, Winston and Albright's Practical Management Science's has, at least, three clear possible roles -- each performed superbly. 1. As a self-study text for someone learning / relearning management science in a spreadsheet environment. 2. As a management science student's self-help resource to decipher whatever cryptic text happens to have been required for a course. 3. As a conventional textbook to be chosen by an academic for classroom use.

1. As a self-study text for someone learning / relearning management science in a spreadsheet environment, you'll find PMSc written with obvious and utter mastery of the subject matter, that's commendable but hardly unique. What is unique are the clarity of the presentation and the lucidity of the abundant examples running throughout. In addition, there is thoroughness in the treatment which effectively anticipates virtually any and all sources of confusion which a student of any stripe might suffer. It is, in my view, wholly autodidactic. There is a subset of this type of user: the individual with a job-specific task which defies current familiarity / skill-level. No sweat! Use the inside-the-front cover material as a functional area task locator to identify "look-alike" situations and then proceed to master all which is required by back-tracing the example to similar situations encapsulated within the many interspersed problems -- for each of which there is a complete Excel solution format.

2. As a management science student's self-help resource with which to cope and to decipher whatever cryptic text was assigned for the course. If you find yourself in this far too common dilemma, take heart, help is well and truly at hand. Skim the TOC, find the relevant chapter and enjoy basking in your fast-welling, new-found competence. PMSc will provide ample basis for warranting a celebration at the local "pub" -- or whatever passes for same in your locale.

3. "As a conventional textbook to be chosen by an academic for classroom use" was the category into which I "fell." To my dismay, I recently found myself assigned, on extremely short notice, to teach a comprehensive course on MS/OR. I found our standard two-volume text decidedly off-putting and could only conclude that my students would likely as well. As my background includes accounting, finance, and computer systems, I knew that I wanted a spreadsheet-based textbook for the course. As at most schools, MS is under fire for "relevance" and "accessibility," compounded here through the "mix" of students for my various sections: MBA, EMBA, and MS/MOT (latter all engineering degreed).

Suffice it to say that the classes proved complete successes: the students petitioned the Dean to have an advanced management science course added to the curriculum which I'm teaching this (fall '98) semester. In addition to covering the chapters / chapter sections omitted from the "introductory" course, we're using PMSc as the primary text with Bodily, Carraway, et al's excellent QBA case book for facilitating the integration of MS with finance, marketing, operations, and strategy.

As a sidebar: Most of my MBA students were from one of our "dedicated" MBA programs. These manager / students have apparently provided many of their subordinates with copies of PMSc. Their experience had regularly been that they were using on Monday the material I had "taught" them on Saturday.

As if this weren't enough praise, I'm using PMSc as a supplemental text in my finance courses because of its lucid and extensive coverage of @RISK and for the extensive finance material provided. This is proving extremely popular with my students.

As you might infer, I think that PMSc is without peer as the best and most effective text for learning how to actually perform REAL management science without tears or undue ancillary learning. I've yet to have a student who was not wildly enthusiastic about PMSc (that's not hyperbole) -- when's the last time you've had THAT experience?

I'd be happy to hear from anyone buying this text -- I really WANT to hear from anyone buying this text who is less than completely satisfied.

Not as good as the first edition
I own both editions where I belive the 1st edition is better than their second. I don't particular like their new approach in teaching network modeling; it's non-intuitive. The first edition was a bit more 'logical' and easier to set up than the approach use in their 2nd edition. Secondly, their use of the Palisade @Risk is definitely a good choice, but the time lock (1 year if registered online) somewhat deflates the enthusiasm knowing that at some future date your software will cease to work. I bought the @129 upgrade but jumped through hoops with palisades (their authorization code did not undo the time lock and tech support argued that it was a publisher issue--in the long run they discovered a problem with the software where it was not taking the time lock off the application as designed.) I do like the 2nd edition's choice of larger fonts and the broader examples. I am still yet disappointed that unlike many other quality text books, the text does not include answers to 'odd' or even selected problems. I don't think the authors realize that their text is used by professionals looking to develop workplace skills and are not necessarily enrolled in a formal academic setting. Nevertheless, I bought the second edition because I think management science is a terribly valuable skill to have and that the authors have published the best book in the area of MS.

This book is the best of the bunch
I began using this book when I was a part time lecturer while working on my Ph.D. Now that I'm an Assistant Professor I get a chance to review most of the new books that deal with OR/MS. It is surprising that none of those can even come close to the quality of this book. What I enjoy most about it is the amazing clarity with which it explains concepts that would usually force students to run to the hills. In addition, its extensive use of spreadsheets helps the teacher to present the material in a more practical way. Without reservation I recommend it to anyone teaching an OR/MS course at an undergraduate (or even MBA) level.