Methods for Business Analysis and Forecasting: Text and Case
Peter Tryfos, York University
608 Pages, Cloth, ISBN: 0-471-12384-6, 1998

Among the many appealing features of this text is a large collection of real-life examples. problems and cases. The cases, in particular, provide a unique opportunity for students to reflect on and apply what they have learned using real situations and data. The text covers the principal methods for analysis and forecasting, traditionally included in separate courses such as Regression, Linear Models, Forecasting, and Econometrics.

The author concentrates on explaining the assumptions and uses of the methods and illustrating their applications, leaving the task of calculations to the computer. A flexible design allows instructors to follow a traditional approach under which students write assignments and exams; a case approach under which students possibly working in groups do cases, write reports and make presentations; or any desired mixture of the two.

This book is intended primarily as a main text for a one-semester or two-quarter elective course in methods for analysis and forecasting, for students of business or public administration at the upper undergraduate, M.B.A or Ph.D. level. It can also be used in second business statistics course and as a self-study guide for professionals.

• Emphasizes model formulation and interpretation rather than computation and takes full advantage of the computer as a tool for decision making.

• Appropriate as an outstanding resource for case based learning as the entire Part II of the text is devoted to cases.

• Each chapter has a collection of numerous interesting, real-life examples, problems, and cases based on the author's experience.

• Designed to accommodate both the traditional and case-based approaches to course design.

• Provides a brief review of essential statistical concepts in Appendix A for readers who do not remember concepts taught in introductory business statistics or general statistics course.

• Clear, concise, student-friendly writing style.

• Includes enough cases so that instructors, if they so desire, can assign one case ever week of a 12 or 13 week semester.

• Instructors Manual by Peter Tryfos, York University
  Contains solutions to all problems, suggestions for the use of cases, the author's treatment of each case and possible alternatives, and the source code of the computer programs used by the author. Download this product from the Wiley Web Site.

• Diskette by Peter Tryfos, York University
  Contains over 700KB of data in ASCII form used in examples, problems, and cases.

• Two additional chapters on factor and cluster analysis that were not included in the text are available for use by adopters of the text. See the Wiley Web Site for additional details.