Day 2 Week 7 of the CORTEX MBAnalytics

[Steve Bennett]

Continuing week 7 - part of the 60 day information management refresher course from the CORTEX. The CORTEX Master of Business Analytics Week 7, Day 2 Theme: The S Word Week 7, Tuesday This week's theme is statistics - yes, the dreaded S word. This is what is at the heart of the mechanics of analysis. So assuming that you have a reasonable grounding in basic stats, this week we will look at some of the current issues raised when stats is applied in the real world. READ Today's task: Why statistics rule 15 minutes "Why Statistics Rule", article by Stathi Paxinos, The Age newspaper, June 29th, 2004. Key takeout: Stats matter and you cannot be an effective analyst without a solid grounding in the subject. Most will be familiar with the book Moneyball by Michael Lewis - now an apparently very good film starring Brad Pitt "the man who made statistics sexy". Moneyball is the story of US baseball team Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane's successful attempt to put together a baseball club on a budget by employing computer-generated analysis to draft his players. This article shows how fundamental stats have become to sports - in this case in Australian AFL. Remember - this article is from 7 years ago, so it's more historical record than news now. Why should we care? Because the AFL is just one example among many industries where stats is an essential tool of management. In a way this is the justification for the whole of the CORTEX and this refresher course. As always, comments, questions and ideas are all welcome. The MBAnalytics is just one part of the Business Intelligence CORTEX - a community of Business Intelligence, Data Warehousing, Analytics and Project Management professionals in Australia, New Zealand and Asia. Membership is free and the forums are very active with over 25,000 posts offering a uniquely Australasian viewpoint.



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