Optimization Decision Types

Optimization is unique among information technologies in that it provides explicit recommendations for business decisions.

At Princeton Consultants, we divide business decisions into 6 primary “decision classes”, which helps us organize and apply different types of optimization algorithms and techniques to different aspects of each business situation.

In our experience, almost every real-world business situation is not a single decision or even decision class, but a combination of multiple simultaneous decisions and decision classes.

In this section of the website we briefly explain and examine each decision class. Note that by selecting from our case studies, you’ll see that in every case the business required multiple simultaneous decisions and decision types. You may also find it interesting to examine that multiple [asset classes] are optimized, and multiple [optimization challenges].

Optimization has great potential, but this potential is only realized in the real world if the Optimizers can accurately model the complete problem domain.

Assignment

Who gets what?                  

Production/Acquisition

How much to make/get/have?

Scheduling

When? In what order?

Network Routing

Where? Which path?

Pricing

At what price?

Policy Creation

What should the rules be?