水晶球软件使用crystalball.ppt

Project ManagementSession 9Crystal Ball;Session 9 Goals;Most real-world business situations today are probabilistic, but the decision models used to deal with them are deterministic. How to deal with randomness? Ignore it Simplify problem to make it analytically tractable, get solution, then ignore real-life complications Find a way to obtain an approximate solution to real-world problems;Monte Carlo simulation is a method by which approximate solutions are obtained to realistic (and therefore complicated) problems This is in contrast to analytical methods, which obtain exact solutions to highly stylized problems Tradeoff between rigor and relevance ;What is this? Y = f(X1, X2, …, Xk) Often, the values for one or more "input" cells are unknown or uncertain This creates uncertainty about the value of the "output" cell Simulation can be used to analyze these types of models;A random variable is any variable whose value cannot be predicted or set with certainty. Many “input cells” in spreadsheet models are actually random variables. For example: the future cost of raw materials future interest rates future number of employees in a firm expected product demand Decisions made using uncertain information often involve risk. What risks?;Using expected values for uncertain cells tells us nothing about the variability of the performance measure. Suppose an $1,000 investment is expected to return $2,000 in two years. Would you invest if... the outcomes could range from $1,060 to $4,000? the outcomes could range from $0 to $2,100? Alternatives with the same expected value may involve very different levels of risk. ;Best-Case/Worst-Case Analysis What-if Analysis Simulation;Best case - plug in the most optimistic values for each of the uncertain cells. Worst case - plug in the most pessimistic values for each of the uncertain cells. This is easy to do and bounds the outcomes, but tells us nothing about the distribution of possible outcomes within the best and worst-cas