Data Science for Business and Decision Making covers both statistics and operations research while most competing textbooks focus on one or the other. As a result, the book more clearly defines the principles of business analytics for those who want to apply quantitative methods in their work. Its emphasis reflects the importance of regression, optimization and simulation for practitioners of business analytics. Each chapter uses a didactic format that is followed by exercises and answers. Freely-accessible datasets enable students and professionals to work with Excel, Stata Statistical Software®, and IBM SPSS Statistics Software®. - Combines statistics and operations research modeling to teach the principles of business analytics - Written for students who want to apply statistics, optimization and multivariate modeling to gain competitive advantages in business - Shows how powerful software packages, such as SPSS and Stata, can create graphical and numerical outputs
Data science is expanding across industries at a rapid pace, and the companies first to adopt best practices will gain a significant advantage. To reap the benefits, decision makers need to have a confident understanding of data science and its application in their organization. It is easy for novices to the subject to feel paralyzed by intimidating buzzwords, but what many don’t realize is that data science is in fact quite multidisciplinary—useful in the hands of business analysts, communications strategists, designers, and more. With the second edition of The Decision Maker’s Handbook to Data Science, you will learn how to think like a veteran data scientist and approach solutions to business problems in an entirely new way. Author Stylianos Kampakis provides you with the expertise and tools required to develop a solid data strategy that is continuously effective. Ethics and legal issues surrounding data collection and algorithmic bias are some common pitfalls that Kampakis helps you avoid, while guiding you on the path to build a thriving data science culture at your organization. This updated and revised second edition, includes plenty of case studies, tools for project assessment, and expanded content for hiring and managing data scientists Data science is a language that everyone at a modern company should understand across departments. Friction in communication arises most often when management does not connect with what a data scientist is doing or how impactful data collection and storage can be for their organization. The Decision Maker’s Handbook to Data Science bridges this gap and readies you for both the present and future of your workplace in this engaging, comprehensive guide. What You Will Learn Understand how data science can be used within your business. Recognize the differences between AI, machine learning, and statistics.Become skilled at thinking like a data scientist, without being one.Discover how to hire and manage data scientists.Comprehend how to build the right environment in order to make your organization data-driven. Who This Book Is For Startup founders, product managers, higher level managers, and any other non-technical decision makers who are thinking to implement data science in their organization and hire data scientists. A secondary audience includes people looking for a soft introduction into the subject of data science.
This open access book covers the use of data science, including advanced machine learning, big data analytics, Semantic Web technologies, natural language processing, social media analysis, time series analysis, among others, for applications in economics and finance. In addition, it shows some successful applications of advanced data science solutions used to extract new knowledge from data in order to improve economic forecasting models. The book starts with an introduction on the use of data science technologies in economics and finance and is followed by thirteen chapters showing success stories of the application of specific data science methodologies, touching on particular topics related to novel big data sources and technologies for economic analysis (e.g. social media and news); big data models leveraging on supervised/unsupervised (deep) machine learning; natural language processing to build economic and financial indicators; and forecasting and nowcasting of economic variables through time series analysis. This book is relevant to all stakeholders involved in digital and data-intensive research in economics and finance, helping them to understand the main opportunities and challenges, become familiar with the latest methodological findings, and learn how to use and evaluate the performances of novel tools and frameworks. It primarily targets data scientists and business analysts exploiting data science technologies, and it will also be a useful resource to research students in disciplines and courses related to these topics. Overall, readers will learn modern and effective data science solutions to create tangible innovations for economic and financial applications.
This book considers and assesses essential financial issues by utilizing data science and fuzzy multiple criteria decision making (MCDM) methods. It introduces readers to a range of data science methods, and demonstrates their application in the fields of business, health, economics, finance and engineering. In addition, it provides suggestions based on the assessment results on each topic, which can help to enhance the efficiency of the financial system and the sustainability of economic development. Given its scope, the book will help readers broaden their perspective on the assessment and evaluation of financial issues using data science and MCDM approaches.
Deep Learning with R introduces deep learning and neural networks using the R programming language. The book builds on the understanding of the theoretical and mathematical constructs and enables the reader to create applications on computer vision, natural language processing and transfer learning. The book starts with an introduction to machine learning and moves on to describe the basic architecture, different activation functions, forward propagation, cross-entropy loss and backward propagation of a simple neural network. It goes on to create different code segments to construct deep neural networks. It discusses in detail the initialization of network parameters, optimization techniques, and some of the common issues surrounding neural networks such as dealing with NaNs and the vanishing/exploding gradient problem. Advanced variants of multilayered perceptrons namely, convolutional neural networks and sequence models are explained, followed by application to different use cases. The book makes extensive use of the Keras and TensorFlow frameworks.
Accessible and concise, this exciting new textbook examines data analytics from a managerial and organizational perspective and looks at how they can help managers become more effective decision-makers. The book successfully combines theory with practical application, featuring case studies, examples and a ‘critical incidents’ feature that make these topics engaging and relevant for students of business and management. The book features chapters on cutting-edge topics, including: • Big data • Analytics • Managing emerging technologies and decision-making • Managing the ethics, security, privacy and legal aspects of data-driven decision-making The book is accompanied by an Instructor’s Manual, PowerPoint slides and access to journal articles. Suitable for management students studying business analytics and decision-making at undergraduate, postgraduate and MBA levels.
Public Policy Analytics: Code & Context for Data Science in Government teaches readers how to address complex public policy problems with data and analytics using reproducible methods in R. Each of the eight chapters provides a detailed case study, showing readers: how to develop exploratory indicators; understand ‘spatial process’ and develop spatial analytics; how to develop ‘useful’ predictive analytics; how to convey these outputs to non-technical decision-makers through the medium of data visualization; and why, ultimately, data science and ‘Planning’ are one and the same. A graduate-level introduction to data science, this book will appeal to researchers and data scientists at the intersection of data analytics and public policy, as well as readers who wish to understand how algorithms will affect the future of government.
Bridge the gap between business and data science by learning how to interpret machine learning and AI models, manage data teams, and achieve impactful results Key Features Master the concepts of statistics and ML to interpret models and guide decisions Identify valuable AI use cases and manage data science projects from start to finish Empower top data science teams to solve complex problems and build AI products Purchase of the print Kindle book includes a free PDF eBook Book DescriptionAs data science and artificial intelligence (AI) become prevalent across industries, executives without formal education in statistics and machine learning, as well as data scientists moving into leadership roles, must learn how to make informed decisions about complex models and manage data teams. This book will elevate your leadership skills by guiding you through the core concepts of data science and AI. This comprehensive guide is designed to bridge the gap between business needs and technical solutions, empowering you to make informed decisions and drive measurable value within your organization. Through practical examples and clear explanations, you'll learn how to collect and analyze structured and unstructured data, build a strong foundation in statistics and machine learning, and evaluate models confidently. By recognizing common pitfalls and valuable use cases, you'll plan data science projects effectively, from the ground up to completion. Beyond technical aspects, this book provides tools to recruit top talent, manage high-performing teams, and stay up to date with industry advancements. By the end of this book, you’ll be able to characterize the data within your organization and frame business problems as data science problems.What you will learn Discover how to interpret common statistical quantities and make data-driven decisions Explore ML concepts as well as techniques in supervised, unsupervised, and reinforcement learning Find out how to evaluate statistical and machine learning models Understand the data science lifecycle, from development to monitoring of models in production Know when to use ML, statistical modeling, or traditional BI methods Manage data teams and data science projects effectively Who this book is for This book is designed for executives who want to understand and apply data science methods to enhance decision-making. It is also for individuals who work with or manage data scientists and machine learning engineers, such as chief data officers (CDOs), data science managers, and technical project managers.
This book examines how to develop the main traits that are necessary to become an “informed intuitant”. Case studies and examples of successful “informed intuitants” are a major component of the book. “Intuitant” is someone who has the intuitive awareness to be successful. “Informed intuitant” indicates that the individual/decision maker not only applies his/her intuition but also verifies it through using data-driven approaches (such as data analytics). Some of this work resulted from research examining how well do executives trust their intuition.
Evidence-Based Decision-Making: How to Leverage Available Data and Avoid Cognitive Biases examines how a wide range of factual evidence, primarily derived from a variety of data available to organizations, can be used to improve the quality of business decision-making, by helping decision makers circumvent the various cognitive biases that adversely impact how we all think. The book is built on the following premise: During the past decade, the new ‘data world’ emerged, in which the rush to develop competencies around business analytics and data science can be characterized as nothing less than the new commercial arms race. The ever-expanding volume and variety of data are well known, as are the great advances in data processing/analytics, data visualization, and related information production-focused capabilities. Yet, comparatively little effort has been devoted to how the informational products of business analytics and data science are ‘consumed’ or used in the organizational decision-making processes, as the available evidence shows that only some of that information is used to drive some business decisions some of the time. Evidence-Based Decision-Making details an explicit process describing how the universe of available and applicable evidence, which includes organizational and other data, industry benchmarks, scientific studies, and professional experience, can be assessed, amalgamated, and funneled into an objective driver of key business decisions. Introducing key concepts in relation to data and evidence, and the history of evidence-based management, this new and extremely topical book will be essential reading for researchers and students of data analytics as well as those working in the private and public sectors, and in the voluntary sector.
