Real-World Decision Support Systems: Case Studies

This book presents real-world decision support systems, i.e., systems that have been running for some time and as such have been tested in real environments and complex situations; the cases are from various application domains and highlight the best practices in each stage of the system’s life cycle, from the initial requirements analysis and design phases to the final stages of the project. Each chapter provides decision-makers with recommendations and insights into lessons learned so that failures can be avoided and successes repeated. For this reason unsuccessful cases, which at some point of their life cycle were deemed as failures for one reason or another, are also included. All decision support systems are presented in a constructive, coherent and deductive manner to enhance the learning effect.

It complements the many works that focus on theoretical aspects or individual module design and development by offering ’good’ and ’bad’ practices when developing and using decision support systems. Combining high-quality research with real-world implementations, it is of interest to researchers and professionals in industry alike.

Jason Papathanasiou is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Business Administration, University of Macedonia, Greece. His PhD was in Operational Research and Informatics and he has worked for a number of years at various institutes. He has organized and participated in many international scientific conferences and workshops. He has published more than 100 papers in international peer referred journals, conferences and edited volumes and has participated in various research projects in FP6, FP7, Interreg and COST; he served also as a member of the TDP Panel of COST and currently serves at the coordination board of the EURO Working Group of Decision Support Systems. His research interests include Decision Support Systems, Operational Research and Multicriteria Decision Making.
Nikolaos Ploskas is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Chemical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, USA. His primary research interests are in operations research, decision support systems, mathematical programming, linear programming, and parallel programming. He has participated in several international and national research projects. He is author of more than 40 publications in high-impact journals, book chapters and conferences. He has also served as reviewer in many scientific journals. He was awarded with an honorary award from HELORS (HELlenic Operations Research Society) for the best doctoral dissertation in operations research (2014).
Isabelle Linden is a Professor of Information Management at the University of Namur in Belgium, Department of Business Administration. She obtained her PhD in Computer Sciences from the University of Namur. She also holds Masters degrees in Philosophy and in Mathematics from the University of Liege, Belgium. She is member of the CoordiNam Laboratory and the FoCuS Research Group. Combining theoretical computer science and business administration, her main research domain regards information, knowledge and artificial intelligence. She explores their integration within systems as EIS, DSS and BI systems. Her works can be found in several international edited books, journals, books chapters and conferences. She serves as reviewer and program committee member in several international journals, conferences and workshops.