GEN 4055 - Decision Analysis

Credits: 4

GEN 4055 (Decision Analysis) introduces the fundamentals of decision analysis with emphasis on real-world engineering and business applications. Main topics covered will include descriptive vs normative decision models, economic analysis, decisions under uncertainty, sensitivity analysis, scenario analysis, Monte-Carlo simulation, expectation-variance criterion, decision tree analysis, statistical decision techniques, multiple attribute decision making, utility theory, and group decision making.

This course takes the perspective that engineering managers are primarily decision-makers. For instance, engineering managers routinely: (a) choose between various technologies, (b) allocate resources, (c) program capital investments, and (d) make repair or replace decisions, just to name a few. Over roughly the last quarter century, the fields of decision and management science have developed a variety of useful tools that promulgate rational decision processes. These approaches provide a means for structuring and resolving decision problems systematically. Thus, this course will spend the majority of its time covering these methods and techniques and discussing benefits that they might derive.
Prerequisite(s): The prerequisite for undergraduate students is a course in statistics or probability.