Agile Business Analysis discusses trends in the business analysis and agile environments, how these two areas align and promote each other, and identifies areas of responsibility and ownership for the business analyst (BA). Readers will learn ways BAs can provide support to agile projects through modeling techniques; documentation; communication, meetings and reporting; governance; building user stories, elaborating requirements, and facilitating the estimating process; ensuring effective application of lessons, improvements, and efficiencies; and much more. The book is designed for BAs of all levels, from all types of environments.

Introductory courses in combinatorial optimization are popular at the upper undergraduate/graduate levels in computer science, industrial engineering, and business management/OR, owed to its wide applications in these fields. There are several published textbooks that treat this course and the authors have used many of them in their own teaching experiences. This present text fills a gap and is organized with a stress on methodology and relevant content, providing a step-by-step approach for the student to become proficient in solving combinatorial optimization problems. Applications and problems are considered via recent technology developments including wireless communication, cloud computing, social networks, and machine learning, to name several, and the reader is led to the frontiers of combinatorial optimization. Each chapter presents common problems, such as minimum spanning tree, shortest path, maximum matching, network flow, set-cover, as well as key algorithms, such as greedy algorithm, dynamic programming, augmenting path, and divide-and-conquer. Historical notes, ample exercises in every chapter, strategically placed graphics, and an extensive bibliography are amongst the gems of this textbook.

Foresight is an area within Futures Studies that focuses on critical thinking concerning long term developments, whether within the public sector or in industry and management, and is something of a sub-section of complexity and network science. This book examines developments in foresight methodologies and relates in its greater part to the work done in the context of the COSTA22 network of the EU on Foresight Methodologies. Foresight is a professional practice that supports significant decisions, and as such it needs to be more assured of its claims to knowledge (methodology). Foresight is practiced across many domains and is not the preserve of specialized futurists, or indeed of foresight specialists. However, the disciplines of foresight are not well articulated or disseminated across domains, leading to re-inventions and practice that does not make best use of experience in other domains.

The methodological development of foresight is an important task that aims at strengthening the pool of the tools available for application, thereby empowering the actors involved in foresight practice. Elaborating further on methodological issues, such as those presented in the present book, enables the actors involved in foresight to begin to critique current practice from this perspective and, thirdly, to begin to design foresight practice. The present trends towards methodological concerns indicates a move from given expert-predicted futures to one in which futures are nurtured through a dialogue among stakeholders. The book has four parts, each elaborating on a set of aspects of foresight methodologies. After an introductory section, Part II considers theorizing about foresight methodologies. Part III covers system content issues, and Part IV presents foresight tools and approaches."

The proliferation of new products has become a common phenomenon in today's business world. Most companies now offer hundreds, if not thousands, of stock keeping units (SKUs) in order to compete in the market place. Companies that expand their product and service varieties now face a new set of problems: accurate demand forecasts, controlling production and inventory costs, and providing high quality delivery performance. In addition, marketing managers will often advocate widening product lines for increasing revenue and market share, but increasing product lines can also decrease the efficiency of manufacturing processes and distribution systems. Hence, firms must weigh the benefits of increasing product variety against its cost and determine the optimal level of product variety to offer to their customers. Product Variety Management examines the interrelated problems between the marketing and production functions in industry, and through a series of research survey papers by leading scholars in economics, engineering, marketing, and operations research, the book addresses the following questions: Why do companies extend their product lines? Do consumers care about product variety? Will a brand with more variety enjoy higher market share? How should product variety be measured? How can a company exploit its product and process design to deliver a higher level of product variety quickly and cheaply? What should the level of product variety be and what should the price of each of the product variants be? What kind of challenges would a company face in offering a high level of product variety and how can these obstacles be overcome? The solutions to these questions are drawn frommultiple functions and a variety of disciplines. Product Variety Management is a state-of-the-art treatment of a multi-disciplinary approach to product variety.

This book focuses on research methodologies that apply to business research, particularly for researchers and managers embarking thereon to support managerial decision-making in the industry. In doing so, the book's objective is to guide business researchers in identifying, defining, and applying rigorous academic methodologies that will enable them to formulate, design, and execute effective research that answers their specific management problems. Such guidance can empower organizational managers to understand that business research can contribute to practical solutions to actual problems experienced in the industry. In addition, by emphasizing the integrative nature between (1) academic research and (2) experienced industry problems, it becomes possible to foster an awareness of such research's potential impact on organizational performance management, sustainability, and resilience. With that, attention is given to narrowing the gap between theory and practice, which requires that fundamentals of scientific research be adhered to while maintaining the delicate balance between a practice-friendly guide to pragmatically sound and academically rigorous business research.

This book provides insights from research and practice in how organizations were able to sustain resilience in their global supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic and to advance the understanding of supply chain risk management. The chapters highlight the lessons learned, insist on new models for resilience, suggest improved supply chain risk methodologies and bridge the gap between research and practice. It helps readers acquire greater knowledge, strategic approaches, new methods, and practical tools for ensuring global supply chain resilience.

1 Nabil R. Adam and Ali Dogramaci Measuring, analyzing, and improving productivity in a given organization is a complex process that involves the contributions of economists, industrial engineers, operations researchers, management scientists, and lawyers. The objective of this book is to provide the reader with a sample of original papers that relate to these productivity topics at the organizational level. In the book, the word organization refers to business firms and municipal organizations. The hook is divided into three parts: perspectives on productivity mea surement, a range of studies at the micro level, and some productivity issues in public organizations. Part I, which consists of three chapters, deals with productivity measurement. The first two chapters of this part cover a broad framework of measurement concepts and techniques; the last chapter, on the other hand, provides the reader with an example of productivity measurement for a specific industry (in this case, food retail ing). Thus, a spectrum of productivity measurement issues is covered in this part of the book."

This book introduces readers to a new approach to identifying stock market bubbles by using the illiquidity premium, a parameter derived by employing conic finance theory. Further, it shows how to develop the closed form formulas of the bid and ask prices of European options by using Black-Scholes and Kou models. By using the derived formulas and sliding windows technique, the book explains how to numerically calculate illiquidity premiums. The methods introduced here will enable readers interested in risk management, portfolio optimization and hedging in real-time to identify when asset prices are in a bubble state and when that bubble bursts. Moreover, the techniques discussed will allow them to accurately recognize periods of exuberance and panic, and to measure how different strategies work during these phases with respect to calmer periods of market behavior. A brief history of financial bubbles and an outlook on future developments serve to round out the coverage.

This book applies Multicriteria Decision Making (MCDM) tools and techniques to problems in location analysis. It begins with a generic model for MCDM and subsequently develops specific versions of the technique for particular location problems. Throughout the book, MCDM is understood to encompass all tools and techniques that choose or rank existing or feasible solutions, including discrete multi-attribute decision making (MADM) problems, which typically include an attribute table that specifies the consequences of each decision with regard to the given criteria, as well as multi-objective linear problems (MOLPs), which incorporate all objectives in a single optimization problem.  The book is organized as follows: the first four chapters introduce readers to the basic tools and techniques used in single-objective optimization, multicriteria decision making, location analysis, and other tools, such as statistical regression and geographical information systems. This is followed by ten chapters on model applications, each of which introduces readers to a specific location problem and applies one technique to solve it. The book is then wrapped up in a closing chapter that looks at the location process from a practitioner’s point of view.  This book is intended as a textbook for upper-undergraduate and master-level courses on location analysis. It will also benefit decision-makers who actually need to locate facilities. 

The past decade has shown an increasing level of interest, research and application of quantitative models and computer based tools in the process industry. These models and tools constitute the basis of so-called Advanced Planning Systems which have gained considerable attention in practice. In particular, OR methodology has been applied to analyze and support the design of supply networks, the planning and scheduling of operations, and control issues arising in the production of food and beverages, chemicals, pharmaceutical, for instance. This book provides both new insights and successful solutions to problems of production planning and scheduling, logistics and supply chain management. It comprises reports on the state of the art, applications of quantitative methods, as well as case studies and success stories from industry. Its contributions are written by leading experts from academia and business. The book addresses practitioners working in industry as well as academic researchers in production, logistics, and supply chain management.   

1 Ali Dogramaci and Nabil R. Adam 1.1. OVERVIEW With the decline of U.S. productivity growth, interest has surged to under stand the behavior of productivity measures through time, the conceptual foundations of productivity analysis, and the linkage between productivity performance and other major forces in the economy. The purpose of this volume is to present a brief overview of some of the concepts used in aggre gate and industry-level productivity analyses and the results of some of the recent research in this field. The book is divided into three parts. Part I covers some of the methodo logical approaches used in aggregate and industry-level productivity studies. Part II deals with the movement of labor productivity measures through time. The papers in this part of the book study productivity changes as uni variate time series and analyze some of the characteristics of the patterns displayed. The papers in Part III address the issues of measurement of capi tal, the relation of capital formation to productivity growth, and the rela tion of imported intermediate inputs to U.S. productivity performance."

In a world with highly competitive markets and economic instability due to capitalization, industrial competition has increasingly intensified. In order for many industries to survive and succeed, they need to develop highly effective coordination between supply chain partners, dynamic collaborative and strategic alliance relationships, and efficient logistics and supply chain network designs. Consequently, in the past decade, there has been an explosion of interest among academic researchers and industrial practitioners in innovative supply chain and logistics models, algorithms, and coordination policies. Mathematically distinct from classical supply chain management, this emerging research area has been proven to be useful and applicable to a wide variety of industries. This book brings together recent advances in supply chain and logistics research and computational optimization that apply to a collaborative environment in the enterprise.

Hardbound. This book is a result of recent developments in several fields. Mathematicians, statisticians, finance theorists, and economists found several interconnections in their research. The emphasis was on common methods, although the applications were also interrelated.The main topic is dynamic stochastic models, in which information arrives and decisions are made sequentially. This gives rise to what finance theorists call option value, what some economists label quasi-option value. Some papers extend the mathematical theory, some deal with new methods of economic analysis, while some present important applications, to natural resources in particular.

Because it deals with sustainably supplying cities and reducing congestion and pollution related to goods transport in urban areas, city logistics is an important field in transportation sciences. These logistics systems need to be sustainable and reliable to ensure the continued flow of goods. Logistics and Transport Modeling in Urban Goods Movement is a pivotal reference source that provides vital research on the main approaches and techniques used in urban goods transport modelling while addressing planning and management issues. Highlighting topics such as urban logistics, vehicle routing, and greenhouse emissions, this book is ideally designed for civil/transport engineers, planners, transport economists, geographers, computer scientists, practitioners, professionals, researchers, and students seeking current research on urban goods modelling.

The emergence of internet technologies have provided organisations and customers with access to vast amounts of data, information, and services which have revolutionized the process of exchanging products and services online. Trends in E-Business, E-Services, and E-Commerce: Impact of Technology on Goods, Services, and Business Transactions provides insights into issues, challenges, and solutions related to the successful application and management aspects of electronic business. This book will bring together a comprehensive framework for researchers and practitioners in understanding the growing demand of e-business research.

This book covers central issues in mitigating supply chain risks from various perspectives. Today's supply chains are vulnerable to disruptions that can have a significant impact on firms, business and performance. The aim of supply chain risk management is to identify the potential sources of risks and implement appropriate actions in order to mitigate supply chain disruptions. In this regard, the book presents a wealth of methods, strategies and analyses that are essential for mitigating supply chain risks. As a comprehensive collection of the latest research and cutting-edge developments in supply chain risk and its mitigation, the book is structured into four main parts, addressing supply chain risk strategies and developments; supply chain risk management review; supply chain sustainability and resilience; and supply chain analysis and risk management applications. The contributing authors are leading academic researchers and practitioners, who combine findings and research results with a practical and contemporary view on how companies can best manage supply chain risks and disruptions, as well as how to create resilient and sustainable supply chains. This book can be used as an essential resource for students and scholars who are interested in pursuing research or teaching courses on the rapidly growing field of supply chain management. It also offers an interesting and informative read for managers and practitioners who need to deepen their understanding of effective supply chain risk management.

This Festschrift honors George Samuel Fishman, one of the founders of the eld of computer simulation and a leader of the disciplines of operations research and the management sciences for the past ve decades, on the occasion of his seventieth birthday. The papers in this volume span the theory, methodology, and application of computer simulation. The lead article is appropriately titled "George Fishman's Professional Career." In this article we discuss George's contributions to operations research and the m- agement sciences, with special emphasis on his role in the advancement of the eld of simulation since the 1960s. We also include a brief personal biography together with comments by several individuals about the extraordinary effect that George has had on all his students, colleagues, and friends. Thesecondarticle, titled"AConversationwithGeorgeFishman,"isthetranscript of an extended interview with George that we conducted in October 2007. In the article titled "Computer Intensive Statistical Model Building," Russell Cheng studies resampling methods for building parsimonious multiple linear regr- sion models so as to represent accurately the behavior of the dependent variable in terms of the smallest possible subset of explanatory (independent) variables. The author shows how bootstrap resampling can be used not only for rapid identi cation of good models but also for ef cient comparison of competing models.

This book presents a selection of current research results in the field of intelligent systems and draws attention to their practical applications and issues connected with the areas of decision-making, economics, business and finance. The nature of the contributions is interdisciplinary - combining psychological and behavioural aspects with the theory and practice of decision-support, design of intelligent systems and development of machine learning tools. The authors, among other topics, discuss the multi-expert evaluation with intangible criteria, suggest a redefinition of the standard multiple-criteria decision-making framework, propose novel methods for causal map analysis and new feature selection methods. The topics are selected to stress the potential of the up-to-date intelligent methods to deal with practical problems relevant in these areas and to provide inspiration for advanced students, researchers and practitioners in the respective fields.

Sustainable Self-Governance in Businesses and Society offers a sound introduction to Stafford Beer's Viable System Model (VSM) and clarifies its relevance to support organisational sustainability and self-governance. While the VSM has been known since the early 1980s, it hasn't been always easy to understand and to apply. It explains the self-transformation methodology to analyse the way organisations manage (or not) their complexity and govern themselves. The work is supported by multiple examples of application in organisations of all scales - from small to multi-national corporations and from organised social networks to communities and national organisations. It clarifies the relevance of Beer's theory to support systemic learning and change in organisations, and to coach them to self-organise and self-govern. Readers interested in further understanding insights from complex systems and cybernetics theories for designing and transforming organisations will benefit from this book, as it works to offer very detailed insights on how to put the VSM theory into practice. It clarifies how it improves adaptive capabilities, agile and self-regulated structures, more capable of fully implementing corporate sustainability strategies and self-governing themselves. The chapters provide key reading for managers, consultants, practitioners, and post-graduate students working in organisational transformation, governance, and sustainability.

This book covers sustainable development in smart society's 5.0 using data analytics. The data analytics is the approach of integrating diversified heterogeneous data for predictive analysis to accredit innovation, decision making, business analysis, and strategic decision making. The data science brings together the research in the field of data analytics, online information analytics, and big data analytics to synthesize issues, challenges, and opportunities across smart society 5.0. Accordingly, the book offers an interesting and insightful read for researchers in the areas of decision analytics, cognitive analytics, big data analytics, visual analytics, text analytics, spatial analytics, risk analytics, graph analytics, predictive analytics, and analytics-enabled applications.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of recent developments in network dynamics and control with applications to supply chains, manufacturing and logistics systems. It systemizes these developments in the form of new taxonomies and methodological principles to shape the research domain of supply network dynamics control. Uniquely, the book links the fundamentals of control and system theories and artificial intelligence with supply chain and operations management. It addresses the needs of researchers and practitioners alike, revealing the challenges and opportunities of supply chain and operations management by means of dynamic system analysis.

This book gathers selected peer-reviewed papers from the 15th World Congress on Engineering Asset Management (WCEAM), which was hosted by The Federal University of Mato Grosso do Sul Campo Grande, Brazil, from 15--18 August 2021 This book covers a wide range of topics in engineering asset management, including: strategy and standards; sustainability and resiliency; servitisation and Industry 4.0 business models; asset information systems; and asset management decision-making. The breadth and depth of these state-of-the-art, comprehensive proceedings make them an excellent resource for asset management practitioners, researchers, and academics, as well as undergraduate and postgraduate students.

This book aims at providing cases with inspiring findings for global researchers in capacity allocation and reservation. Capacity allocation mechanisms are introduced in the book, as well as the measures to build models and the ways to achieve supply chain coordination. In addition, it illustrates the capacity reservation contract and quantity flexible contract with comparisons and some numerical studies. The book is divided into 7 chapters. Chapter 1 introduces the background and the latest development of the research. Chapter 2 introduces how to manage downstream competition through capacity allocation in symmetric market, including proportional mechanism and lexicographic mechanism. Demand competition is introduced in Chapter 3 as well as the uniform allocation mechanism and the comparisons among three different mechanisms. In Chapter 4, we give information about demand competition with fixed factor allocation, and the comparison with other allocations. Chapter 5 provides the optimal strategies under fixed allocation with multiple retailers and the impacts of fixed proportions. Chapter 6 illustrates how to achieve supply chain coordination through capacity reservation contract and its comparison with the quantity flexibility contract, and in Chapter 7 we describe outsourcing decisions and order policies in different systems with some numerical studies. We sincerely hope that this book can provide some useful suggestions and inspirations for scholars around the world who have the same interests in this field.

In the 21st century, advancements in the digital world are bringing about rapid waves of change in organizational management. As such, it is increasingly imperative to discover ways for businesses to adapt to changes in the markets and seize various digital marketing opportunities. Improving Business Performance Through Innovation in the Digital Economy is an essential reference source for the latest research on the impact of digital computing. It investigates new economic and entrepreneurial approaches to enhancing community development. Featuring research on topics such as business ethics, mobile technology, and cyber security, this book is ideally designed for knowledge workers, business managers, executives, entrepreneurs, small and medium enterprise managers, academicians, researchers, students, and global leaders seeking coverage on the management of sustainable enterprises.

This is an open access book discusses readers to various methods of modeling plans and policies that address public sector issues and problems. Written for public policy and social sciences students at the upper undergraduate and graduate level, as well as public sector decision-makers, it demonstrates and compares the development and use of various deterministic and probabilistic optimization and simulation modeling methods for analyzing planning and management issues. These modeling tools offer a means of identifying and evaluating alternative plans and policies based on their physical, economic, environmental, and social impacts. Learning how to develop and use the mathematical modeling tools introduced in this book will give students useful skills when in positions of having to make informed public policy recommendations or decisions.