Decision Modeling Expert Wayne Winston to Deliver Keynote
Palisade is pleased to welcome Dr. Wayne Winston to the 2007 User Conference North America. Dr. Winston is a professor in the Operations and Decision Technologies department at the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University in Bloomington. He has been teaching at the Kelley School of Business for thirty years, and specializes in operations research, which is mathematics applied to business problems. His courses include Advanced Decision Models for MBA students, and he incorporates @RISK and DecisionTools software into much of his curricula.
He also works for the Dallas Mavericks basketball team, simulating tournament outcomes and optimizing rosters. The Mavericks are currently the winningest team in the NBA.
Dr. Winston has consistently been recognized for excellence in business education, winning awards such as the Trustee Teaching Award twice, and the Lilly Award for Teaching Excellence four times. He consults and teaches extensively for companies and organizations like Eli Lilly, Cisco, and the US Army. Dr. Winston has written many books on Excel modeling and decision making, and regularly teaches Excel to Microsoft staff. His books include Operations Research, Financial Models Using Simulation and Optimization I & II, and Spreadsheet Modeling Using @RISK. He has degrees from MIT and Yale.
Alphabetical by Last Name
Ed Biernat
President
Consulting with Impact, Ltd.
Edward Biernat is the president of Consulting With Impact, Ltd., a training, coaching, and consultancy located in Canandaigua, NY that he founded in 1998. CWI’s client list includes companies ranging from the Fortune 100 to post-startups in the medical device, food and food packaging, steel, automotive, healthcare, and service sectors. He is a graduate of Clarkson University with bachelor degrees in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, and has held positions in engineering, quality, and management at several New York companies. He is the author of numerous training programs and articles, and has presented at national and international events including the Institute of Industrial Engineers’ Annual Conference and the European Organization for Quality in Brussels, Belgium. Ed also developed part of the curriculum for and presents at the Lean Six Sigma Black Belt certification course at a local college.
Lina S. Cheung, FSA, MAAA, FCA
Partner
CP Risk Solutions, LLC
Lina Cheung is a partner and co-founder of CP Risk Solutions, LLC. Lina has 20 years of underwriting, actuarial, and risk management experience in the life and health insurance industry. At CP Risk Solutions, she consults with clients in the areas of product and portfolio strategies, acquisitions, company and product risk management, pricing, underwriting, valuation, and other risk management services.
Immediately before founding CP Risk Solutions, LLC, Ms. Cheung was a senior vice president at Platinum Underwriters Reinsurance, Inc. in charge of the accident and health reinsurance underwriting operations. Her other experience includes Milliman USA, Transamerica Reinsurance, Management Facility Corporation, Actuarial Sciences Associates and Prudential Insurance Company of America where she played a leadership role in various actuarial and risk management capacities.
Ms. Cheung is actively involved in the health care industry. She has served on the American Academy of Actuaries Committees, the Society of Actuaries Education and Examination Committees, and the Self-Insurance Institute of America National Conference Committee. She has also presented at numerous industry events.
Ms. Cheung is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries (1994), a Member of the American Academy of Actuaries (1991), and a Fellow of the Conference of Consulting Actuaries (2006). She graduated Bachelor Magna Cum Laude from the City University of New York (1987).
Kimbal Curtis
Senior Research Officer
Department of Agriculture Western Australia
Mr. Kimbal Curtis is a Senior Research Officer with the Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia (DAFWA) where his research focuses on sheep and wool production, and processing of Merino wool. He was part of a research team working with Indian wool processors studying the impact of changing raw wool specifications on downstream processing and modeling the effects. Kimbal has extensive experience in establishing the Australian wool auction data archive, and using it to analyze the supply and price of Australian wool.
Kimbal has recently developed a National sheep demographic model to assist with forecasts of sheep numbers and wool production. He has developed and implemented a national survey instrument to collect statistics in order to calibrate and validate the flock model, and to inform the Australian wool industry.
Professor
Georgia Gwinnett State University
Michael Furick has been employed in the data processing and information technology industries for over 20 years. He has been a Vice President in the Equifax Division focused on providing information and decision solutions to the Auto and Property Insurance industries. He has also led a 100-person department for Brambles-Recall in their Information Solutions and Storage division. He currently is a faculty member at Georgia Gwinnett College and State University where he specializes in Information Management Systems and decision and risk solutions.
Clayton Graham
Chief Analytical Architect
Analytical Advantages, LLC
Clay Graham is a management consultant with Analytical Advantages, LLC specializing in non-linear stochastic optimization applied to professional sports. He teaches courses in statistics and entrepreneurship at DePaul University’s Business School.
Prior to his current undertakings, he was CEO of several companies in the aerospace and metal finishing industries. He has introduced innovative statistical process control technology to many firms including: Motorola, Siemens and Ford. He has served as president of local trade associations, director of several national alliances and sat on industry standardization and quality committees. Prior to his entrepreneurial ventures, Graham was a management consultant with A.T.Kearney, lnc. where he introduced cutting edge computer and mathematical modeling to the transportation and service distribution industries.
His award winning publications have been in the areas of artificial intelligence and metal finishing. Articles in Forbes, Business Week, Modern Metals, Industrial Finishing and Arthur Andersen's Small Business Forum have featured Graham.
He has served as an Advisor to the White House and Members of Congress in the areas of economics, environmental control and management strategy.
Dr. Ching Ning Guey
Manager, Reliability & Risk Assessment Group Nuclear Engineering
Florida Power & Light
Ching Ning Guey specializes in nuclear power plant safety using probabilistic risk assessment tools and techniques. He has worked at FPL since 1988, first as a Certified Reliability Engineer, and currently manages the Reliability & Risk Assessment Group. Prior to his tenure at FPL, Dr. Guey worked at BNL, Gulf States Utilities, and the Institute of Nuclear Energy Research in Taiwan. Dr. Guey earned his Ph.D in Nuclear Engineering from M.I.T. in 1984, an M.S. in Nuclear Engineering from University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1977, and a B.S. in Physics from the National Central University, Taiwan, R.O.C. in 1975. He is a member of the American Nuclear Society (Since 1984), the American Society for Quality.
Timothy J. Havranek, MBA, PMP
Senior Business Analyst
Triangle Economic Research, an ARCADIS Company
Mr. Havranek is a Senior Business Analyst with Triangle Economic Research. He holds a masters degree in Business Administration from Carnegie Mellon University and a bachelors degree in Petroleum Engineering from Marietta College. He is certified as a Project Management Professional by the Project Management Institute and has over 24 years of professional experience. Mr. Havranek has more than 12 years of professional experience in quantitative decision analysis, risk analysis, and project management consulting. He also has over 12 years experience directly managing environmental remediation and petroleum engineering projects. He is also the author of the book, Modern Project Management Techniques for the Environmental Remediation Industry.
Douglas W. Hubbard
President
Hubbard Decision Research
Doug Hubbard has more than 20 years experience in IT management consulting, including 12 years experience teaching organizations to use his Applied Information Economics (AIE) method. He invented AIE to quantify the value and risk of IT in a mathematically and scientifically sound manner, and this methodology has been used in a variety of Fortune 500 companies and major government agencies (civilian and military). He is an internationally recognized expert in the field of IT value and is a popular speaker at numerous conferences. Doug is the author of “How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of ‘Intangibles’ in Business,” and numerous articles in InformationWeek and CIO Magazine. He was formerly with Coopers & Lybrand, and has an MBA in Management Information Systems from his home state at the University of South Dakota.
Dr. Domingo Castelo Joaquin
Associate Professor
Illinois State University
Domingo Castelo Joaquin is Associate Professor of Finance. He teaches undergraduate and MBA courses in Value-based Management and Spreadsheet Modeling in Corporate Finance. He earned his Ph.D. from Michigan State University.
He has published articles on Strategic Entry and Exit Decisions, Cost of Capital, Decision Theory, Portfolio Selection and Capital Budgeting. His work of portfolio diversification has been cited in The New York Times, Money Magazine, and CNNfn.
Joaquin provides risk assessment training using @RISK, has given training courses on behalf of Palisade Corporation, and consults in the areas of Risk Assessment, Real Options, and Portfolio Risk. His work has appeared in Theory and Decision, the Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Journal of International Business Studies, Economic Letters, and the Journal of International Money and Finance.
John W. Lynch, P.E.
President
JWL Environmental
John Lynch is an environmental engineer with thirty five years of experience managing environmental issues. Over the past twenty five years his practice has concentrated on environmental remediation and property cleanup. He has managed over 200 environmental remediation projects nationwide. He is one of the founders of RETEC, a highly successful environmental consulting company specializing in the engineering and application of environmental remediation solutions. He has prepared over 25 probabilistic environmental costs estimates for individual sites and large portfolios of dozens to hundreds of properties. His clients include insurance companies and brokers, lenders and financial institutions, property developers and real estate managers, utilities, transportation companies (railroads), petroleum, and chemical companies. Mr. Lynch is a registered professional engineer in New York, Pennsylvania, and Illinois.
Frank S. McGowan
Senior Economist
British Columbia Hydro and Power Authority (BC Hydro)
Frank S. McGowan is a Senior Economist with BC Hydro. He has a MS in Mathematics form New York University (Courant Institute) and a MA in Economics from the University of Alberta. He has taught mathematics at NYU, SUNY, and Hofstra University. At present he is working on stochastic forecasting models for load forecasting and for price forecasting. His experience includes work in applied mathematics and econometrics in a variety of industries including aerospace, medical research, telecommunications, and electric power.
Sam McLafferty
President and CEO
Palisade Corporation
Sam McLafferty is Palisade's founder, president, and CEO. He started the company in 1984 with the release of PRISM, a stand-alone Monte Carlo simulation package for DOS on the PC. PRISM later evolved into @RISK for Lotus 1-2-3, and then for Excel. Sam is Palisade's lead developer, with over thirty years of programming experience. He works closely with the technical and sales staff, ensuring that customer feedback is heard. He personally oversees the development and evolution of every one of the fifteen software products Palisade sells. Prior to Palisade, he was a risk analysis consultant.
Roy Nersesian
Professor, School of Business
Monmouth University
B.S. Physics from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute followed by 8 years in the U.S. Navy with last position as Chief Engineer on a Polaris submarine. Graduated from Harvard Business School with a MBA and worked for a shipping company, a bank in shipping finance, and a consultant for a ship brokerage firm, and finally a professor at the School of Business, Monmouth University. He has written several books, one of which is “Corporate Financial Risk Management” published by Praeger Press, 2004 from which the presentation is drawn. His most recent book is “Energy in the 21st Century” published by M. E. Sharpe. He is also associated with the Center of Energy and Marine Transportation at Columbia University where @RISK simulation is an integral part of his course in quantitative analysis.
Dr. Javier Ordóñez
Training Consultant
Palisade Corporation
Javier Ordóñez holds a BS in Civil Engineering from the Universidad de Cuenca, Ecuador and a M.S. in Project Management from the University of Maryland. Javier earned his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland performing research on project risk analysis; his current research deals with cost and schedule integration and correlation issues through the use of Bayesian belief networks.
His experience is in the area of construction and project management, optimal project and capital investments selection, earned value management, engineering and project risk analysis and operations research applications to engineering and management problems.
He has taught as an adjunct professor in the Project Management Program at University of Maryland, and provides training in risk and decision analysis. He is also registered as a Project Management Professional (PMP).
Dr. Gregor K. Reid
Post–Doctoral Fellow
University of New Brunswick and Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Dr. Reid is a jointly appointed Post-Doctoral Fellow with the University of New Brunswick and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. He has pursued numerous works in aquaculture sustainability over the last decade, ranging from public extension to nutrient assimilative capacity; and routinely liaises with academia, industry, government, and non-government organizations on related topics. His Ph.D. research involved the investigation of novel methods to quantify water quality change from freshwater cage-based aquaculture (Great Lakes), exploring combinations of mass-balance nutrient modelling and automated monitoring. Presently, his Post Doctoral work involves the development of an overall flexible model for integrated multi-trophic aquaculture (IMTA) systems; incorporating aspects of nutritional ecology, Monte Carlo simulation, bioenergetics and mass-balance modelling.
Dr. William Strauss
President
FutureMetrics, LLC
William Strauss is the President and founder of FutureMetrics. He brings more than thirty years of strategic planning, project management, data analysis, and modeling experience into the company’s stock of knowledge capital. Bill’s professional history includes executive positions as director, president, and senior vice president, as well as positions as senior analyst and field coordinator. He has an MBA (specializing in Finance) and a PhD (Economics).
Bill is a member of the New England Complex Systems Institute, a member of the Eastern Economics Association, a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and acts as Executive Consultant for Aviation Management Systems, Inc., and President of Lightval Mines, Limited. He is also engaged in an ongoing study of Monhegan Island, ME, economics through FutureMetrics, in association with the Maine Land Use Regulation Commission.
Bill currently takes some time in the fall and spring to teach a few business and economics classes at a small college near his home in western Maine. He has logged over 1,000,000 vertical feet of heli-skiing.
Thompson Terry
Training Consultant
Palisade Corporation
Thompson Terry is a dedicated member of Palisade’s training and consulting staff. With ten years of experience at Palisade, including eight in technical support, he is recognized as an expert in all Palisade software products and their applications.
Thompson has led numerous regional training seminars on risk and decision analysis and provided customized onsite training in a variety of industries including insurance, manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, defense, and food safety. Clients Thompson has trained include: The Hartford, Unilever, Duratek, Eastman Chemical, Canadian Food Inspection Agency, National Rail (UK), RWE Thames Water (UK), National Gas Company of Trinidad & Tobago, Stone & Webster, and Northrop-Grumman.
Thompson is also on the board of directors of a local credit union’s not-for-profit, community development investment fund. He holds a BS in Agricultural Economics from Cornell University with specializations in economics, marketing, and finance.
Yu-jiun Tsai
Manufacturing Strategy Analyst
Corning Display Technologies
Yu-jiun (June) Tsai, is a graduate student at Lehigh University. She is currently working on her master’s thesis in Industrial Engineering for eventual acceptance into the doctoral program in Fall 2007. June has 7 years of experience in the strategic operations and planning department at Chinatrust Commercial Bank in Taiwan, and is now working on her summer internship as a Manufacturing Strategy Analyst in Manufacturing Strategy Group of Corning Display Technologies.
Dr. Michael Tucker
Professor of Finance
Fairfield University, Dolan School of Business
Michael Tucker holds MBA and DBA degrees in Finance from Boston University, and is a Professor of Finance at Fairfield University's Dolan School of Business where he has taught Finance for 20 years. He has published scholarly papers in many journals including Journal of Business, Finance and Accounting; Financial Review; Journal of Multinational Finance; Ecological Economics; Journal of Management Education. He is also the author or co-author of several business cases and simulations and Director of the Business Education, Simulation and Trading Classroom at Fairfield's Dolan School of Business.
Eric Westwig
Software Engineer
Palisade Corporation
Erik Westwig received his B.Sc. in 1991 and M.Sc. in 1994 from the applied and engineering physics department at Cornell University. In 1998 he published the book, Mathematical Physics with co-author Bruce Kusse, which was just re-released in its second edition.
Since 1995 Eric has worked as a software engineer at Palisade Corporation as part of The DecisionTools Suite development team.
Poh-Boon Ung
Senior Economist
Triangle Economic Research, an ARCADIS Company
Mr. Ung is a Senior Economist with Triangle Economic Research. In addition to developing quantitative decision models and statistical models, Mr. Ung manages projects related to water and air regulatory programs. He has prepared cost-benefit assessments for different environmental regulations involving power generating stations, off-road engines, and other environmental impacts from air emissions. He is also experienced in conducting natural resource damage assessments (NRDAs) and has been involved in various assessments throughout the United States. Mr. Ung holds an M.A. in Economics from the University of Michigan and a B.A. in Economics and Mathematics from Brandeis University, summa cum laude, where he is a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
John G. Zhao, MSc.
Manager, Project Risk Management Programme
Suncor Energy Services, Inc.
John Zhao is currently the Project Risk Manager for Suncor. He has authored many papers and made numerous presentations on the subject of risk and contingency management. In the past 10 years, John has developed his expertise in cost engineering and risk analysis for large energy and petrochemical projects across Canada. Besides the formal qualitative risk process that he pioneered and matured in Suncor Major Projects group, he also built and developed the Monte Carlo based RISCOR™ (Suncor Risk Modeling) technique for Suncor major projects to quantify capital project cost and schedule risk profiles.
