Week 1

Question 1

what is analytics?

Answer 1

the use of data, information technology, statistical analysis, quantitative methods etc to help managers gain improved insight about their business operations and make better, fact based decisions

Question 2

what is business analytics?

Answer 2

a process of transforming data into actions through analysis and insights in the context of organizational decision making and problem solving.

Question 3

what is data mining?

Answer 3

focused on better understanding characteristics and patterns among variables in large databases using a variety of statistical tools

Question 4

what is visualisation?

Answer 4

visualising data and results of analyses provide an easy way of communicating data at all levels of business

Question 5

what are the positive impacts of applying business analytics?

Answer 5

companies report reduced costs, better risk management, faster decisions, better productivity and enhanced bottom line performance eg profitability and customer satisfaction

Question 6

what are the challenges of applying business analytics?

Answer 6

a lack of understanding of how to use analytics, competing business priorities, insufficient analytical skills, difficulty in getting good data and sharing information and not understanding the benefits versus perceived costs of analytics studies.

Question 7

what is descriptive analytics?

Answer 7

the use of data to understand past and current business performance and make informed decisions, its the most commonly used type.
- These techniques categorize, characterize, consolidate, and classify data to convert it into useful information for the purposes ­ of understanding and analyzing business performance.

Question 8

what is predictive analysis?

Answer 8

seeks to predict the future by examining historical data, detecting patterns or relationships in these data, and then extrapolating these relationships forward in time.
- what will happen if the future if we do nothing

Question 9

what is prescriptive analysis?

Answer 9

uses optimization to identify the best alternatives to minimize or maximize some objective. Prescriptive analytics is used in many areas of busi­ness, including ­operations, marketing, and finance.

Question 10

give examples of some tools used to support business analytics?

Answer 10

database queries and analysis, data visualisation, statistical methods, spreadsheets, simulation, forecasting etc

Question 11

what is data?

Answer 11

they are numerical facts and figures that are collected through some type of measurement process

Question 12

what is information?

Answer 12

comes from analysing data that is extracting meaning from data to support evaluation and decisions making

Question 13

what is a data set?

Answer 13

a collection of data

Question 14

what is a database?

Answer 14

a collection of related filed containing records on people, place or things
- they are important in business analytics for accessing data, making queries, and other data

Question 15

what is big data?

Answer 15

refers to massive amounts of business data from a wide variety of sources
- Big data can help organizations better understand and predict customer behavior and improve customer service.

Question 16

what is a metric?

Answer 16

a unit of measurement that provides a way to objectively quantify performance

Question 17

what is a discrete metric?

Answer 17

one that is derived from counting something

Question 18

what is continuous metric?

Answer 18

based on continuous scale of measurement eg dollars, length, time, volume

Question 19

what is categorical data?

Answer 19

Categorical (nominal) data , which are sorted into categories according to specified characteristics. For example, a firm’s customers might be classified by their geographical region (North America, South America, Europe, and ­Pacific);

Question 20

what is ordinal data?

Answer 20

Ordinal data can be ordered or ranked according to some relationship to one another. College football or basketball rankings are ordinal; a higher ranking signifies a stronger team but does not specify any numerical measure of strength. Ordinal data are more meaningful than categorical data because data can be compared to one another.

Question 21

what is interval data?

Answer 21

Interval data , which are ordinal but have constant differences between observations and have arbitrary zero points. Common examples are time and temperature. Time is relative to global location, and calendars have arbitrary starting dates

Question 22

what is ratio data?

Answer 22

Ratio data , which are continuous and have a natural zero. Most business and economic data, such as dollars and time, fall into this category. For example, the measure dollars has an absolute zero.

Question 23

what does reliability mean?

Answer 23

that data is accurate and consistent

Question 24

what does validity mean?

Answer 24

that data correctly measures what its supposed to measure

Question 25

what is a model?

Answer 25

an abstraction or representation of a real system, idea or object, they capture the most important features of a problem and present them in a form that is easy to interpret.

Question 26

what is an influence diagram?

Answer 26

a simple descriptive model that is a visual representation, that describes how various elements of the model influence, or relate to others

Question 27

how is data described?

Answer 27

• volume ie size
• variety ie is it audio, text, video
• velocity ie is data real time or static
• veracity = the level of reliability

Question 28

what is a decision model?

Answer 28

a logical representation of a problem or business situation that can be used to understand or facilitate decision making

Question 29

what are the three types of input in decision models?

Answer 29

1. Data , which are assumed to be constant for purposes of the model. eg costs, machine capacities, and intercity distances.
2. Uncontrollable variables , which are quantities that can change but cannot be directly controlled by the decision maker. eg customer demand and inflation rates. Often, these variables are uncertain.
3. Decision variables , which are controllable and can be selected at the discretion of the decision maker. Eg production quantities and staffing levels.

Question 30

what are all models based on?

Answer 30

All models are based on assumptions that reflect the modeler’s view of the “real world.” Some assumptions are made to simplify the model and make it more tractable; that is, able to be easily analyzed or solved. Other assumptions might be made to better characterize historical data or past observations. The task of the modeler is to select or build an appropriate model that best represents the behavior of the real situation.

Question 31

what is uncertainty?

Answer 31

the imperfect knowledge of what will happen

Question 32

what is risk?

Answer 32

its associated with all the consequences and likelihood of what might happen

Question 33

what is a prescriptive decision model?

Answer 33

helps decision makers to identify the best solution to a decision problem

Question 34

what is optimisation?

Answer 34

is the process of finding a set of values for decision variables that minimize or maximize some quantity of interest— profit, revenue, cost, time, and so on— called the objective function

Question 35

what is the optimal solution?

Answer 35

any set of decision variables that optimises the objective function

Question 36

what is an algorithm?

Answer 36

• a systematic procedure that finds a solution to a problem
• search algorithms are solution procedures that generally find good solutions without guarantees of finding the best one

Question 37

what two things can prescriptive models be?

Answer 37

1. A deterministic model is one in which all model input information is either known or assumed to be known with certainty.
2. A stochastic model is one in which some of the model input information is uncertain. For instance, suppose that customer demand is an important element of some model.

Question 38

what is problem solving?

Answer 38

the activity associated with defining, analyzing, and solving a problem and selecting an appropriate solution that solves a problem