Product Description
This update of the successful first edition offers tools and methods for effectively thinking through the consequences of a given action before making major decisions. Managers will not only gain an understanding of effective tools and methodologies for modelling in decision making, but also come to understand how modelling functions alongside intuition,vision, and leadership. This is an invaluable guide to using modelling to explore potential scenarios and make the right business decision.
From the Back Cover
Thinking things through is easier said than done, but there are tools that can help decision–making.
Writing from over twenty–five years′ experience as a management teacher and consultant, Mike Pidd provides the tools for thinking that will help us to think through the consequences of decisions before we act.
Tools for Thinking builds a bridge between the soft and hard OR schools of thought and provides an empirically based framework in which to place them, thus helping overcome the inherent suspicions of both camps. Focusing on modelling as an activity, rather than on models and techniques, the book argues for its relevance alongside intuition, vision and leadership. Above all it stresses that systematic thinking and analysis has a role to play in organisational life. By introducing the model as a tool for thought, Mike Pidd shows how models can be employed to explore possible future scenarios and to make sense of managerial vision.
Extensively revised and updated this new edition of Tools for Thinking builds on the success of the original book and shows how both soft and hard approaches can be used in practice.
Writing from over twenty–five years′ experience as a management teacher and consultant, Mike Pidd provides the tools for thinking that will help us to think through the consequences of decisions before we act.
Tools for Thinking builds a bridge between the soft and hard OR schools of thought and provides an empirically based framework in which to place them, thus helping overcome the inherent suspicions of both camps. Focusing on modelling as an activity, rather than on models and techniques, the book argues for its relevance alongside intuition, vision and leadership. Above all it stresses that systematic thinking and analysis has a role to play in organisational life. By introducing the model as a tool for thought, Mike Pidd shows how models can be employed to explore possible future scenarios and to make sense of managerial vision.
Extensively revised and updated this new edition of Tools for Thinking builds on the success of the original book and shows how both soft and hard approaches can be used in practice.
About the Author
Mike Pidd is Professor of Management Science at Lancaster University and a Past President of the Operational Research Society. His research interests focus on the development of usable models in management science and computer simulation and he has published widely in many academic journals and books. His authored books include the highly regarded Computer Simulation in Management Science (John Wiley & Sons), now in its fourth edition.
