In this data-driven world, companies are often interested in knowing what is the "best" course of action, given the data. For example, manufacturers need to decide how many units of a product to produce given the estimated demand and raw material availability? Should they make all the products in-house or buy some from a third-party to meet the demand? Prescriptive Analytics is the branch of analytics that can provide answers to these questions. It is used for prescribing data-based decisions. The most important method in the prescriptive analytics toolbox is optimization. This course will introduce students to the basic principles of linear optimization for decision-making. Using practical examples, this course teaches how to convert a problem scenario into a mathematical model that can be solved to get the best business outcome. We will learn to identify decision variables, objective function, and constraints of a problem, and use them to formulate and solve an optimization problem using Excel solver and spreadsheet.
This course is part of the Analytics for Decision Making Specialization
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About this Course
Familiarity with Excel
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Try Coursera for BusinessSkills you will gain
- Analytics
- Linear Programming (LP)
- Mathematical Optimization
Familiarity with Excel
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Syllabus - What you will learn from this course
Module 1: Introduction to Linear Programming
Module 2: Solving Linear Programs
Module 3: Alternative Specifications & Special Cases in Linear Optimization
Module 4: Modeling & Solving Linear Problems in Excel
Reviews
- 5 stars82.35%
- 4 stars14.70%
- 1 star2.94%
TOP REVIEWS FROM OPTIMIZATION FOR DECISION MAKING
There are a lot of examples to work through and learn from which I find helps make the material easier to learn.
Good teaching style with step by step guidance. Thanks for the connecting high school math (that I learned many years ago) to real life context. I look forward to the next course.
Very insightful course. Love the detail explaination for solving simple LP problems.
About the Analytics for Decision Making Specialization

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