The Palgrave Handbook Of Operations Research

Operations Research (OR) is a fast-evolving field, which is having a significant impact on its neighbouring disciplines of Business Analytics and Data Science, and on contemporary business and management practices. This handbook provides a comprehensive and cutting edge collection of studies in the area. Views differ on what should be included within the scope of OR. The editors of this volume have taken the view that an inclusive stance is the most helpful, both for theory and practice. Real-world problems often require consideration from both ‘softer’ and ‘harder’ perspectives and need consideration of both predictive and prescriptive problems. In accordance with this inclusive approach to OR, the book is divided into six parts, covering Discrete Optimization, Continuous Optimization, Heuristic Search Optimization, Forecasting, Simulation and Prediction, Problem Structuring and Behavioural OR, and finally some recent OR Applications. This wide-ranging handbook includes a culturally diverse collection of authors, with different perspectives and backgrounds around Operations Research. It will be of tremendous value to researchers, students and practitioners in the field of OR

The Palgrave Handbook of Research Design in Business and Management uses a new state-of-the-art research design typology model to guide researchers in creating the blueprints for their experiments. By focusing on theory and cutting-edge empirical best-practices, this handbook utilizes visual techniques to appease all learning styles.

Here is the first systematic handbook treatment of quantitative modeling natural resource problems, their allocated efficient use, and societal and economic impact. Andrés Weintraub is the very top person in Natural Resource research. He has selected co-editors who are at the top of the sub-fields in natural resources: agriculture, fisheries, forestry, and mining. The book covers these areas with contributions from researchers on, among others, modeling natural research problems, quantifying data, and developing algorithms.

This handbook provides an innovative, thorough overview of service management. It draws together an impressive, international group of leading scholars who offer a truly global perspective, exploring current literature and laying out guidance for future research. Beginning with defining service as a perspective on value creation, and service management as “a set of organizational competencies for enabling and realizing value creation through service,” it then moves on to follow the evolution of service research. From there, the book is structured into six main themes: perspectives on service management; service strategy; service leadership and transition; service design and innovation; service interaction; quality and operations; and service management and technology. This book is valuable reading for academics, lecturers, and students studying service management, operations management, and service research.

This Handbook takes an econometric approach to the foundations of economic performance analysis. The focus is on the measurement of efficiency, productivity, growth and performance. These concepts are commonly measured residually and difficult to quantify in practice. In real-life applications, efficiency and productivity estimates are often quite sensitive to the models used in the performance assessment and the methodological approaches adopted by the analysis. The Palgrave Handbook of Performance Analysis discusses the two basic techniques of performance measurement – deterministic benchmarking and stochastic benchmarking – in detail, and addresses the statistical techniques that connect them. All chapters include applications and explore topics ranging from the output/input ratio to productivity indexes and national statistics.

Focusing on the specific challenges of research design and exploring the opportunities of conducting research in humanitarian logistics and supply chain management, this handbook is a significant contribution to future research. Chapters include extensive descriptions of methods used, highlighting their advantages and disadvantages, and the challenges in scoping, sampling, collecting and analysing data, as well as ensuring the quality of studies. Covering a wide variety of topics including risk and resilience and the impact of humanitarian logistics on capacity building, sustainability and the local economy, it also explores the need for scalability and co-ordination in the humanitarian network. Contributors provide important insight on future directions and offer crucial guidance for researchers conducting projects within the field.

The Palgrave Handbook of Research Design in Business and Management uses a new state-of-the-art research design typology model to guide researchers in creating the blueprints for their experiments. By focusing on theory and cutting-edge empirical best-practices, this handbook utilizes visual techniques to appease all learning styles.

In both rich and poor nations, public resources for health care are inadequate to meet demand. Policy makers and health care providers must determine how to provide the most effective health care to citizens using the limited resources that are available. This chapter describes current and future challenges in the delivery of health care, and outlines the role that operations research (OR) models can play in helping to solve those problems. The chapter concludes with an overview of this book – its intended audience, the areas covered, and a description of the subsequent chapters. KEY WORDS Health care delivery, Health care planning HEALTH CARE DELIVERY: PROBLEMS AND CHALLENGES 3 1.1 WORLDWIDE HEALTH: THE PAST 50 YEARS Human health has improved significantly in the last 50 years. In 1950, global life expectancy was 46 years [1]. That figure rose to 61 years by 1980 and to 67 years by 1998 [2]. Much of these gains occurred in low- and middle-income countries, and were due in large part to improved nutrition and sanitation, medical innovations, and improvements in public health infrastructure.