The Minor in Management Analytics and Decision-Making (MAD) will immerse students in interdisciplinary courses that foster rigorous analytical and communication skills, as well as critically thinking, with regards to managing data and analytics in complex environments. Students who earn the MAD Minor will attain skills that will help them succeed in interdisciplinary environments, solve problems, and manage resources mindful of risk, uncertainty, human dimensions, and sustainability.
Data governance and ethical considerations underlie decision making and resource management. Courses rely on case studies and applied projects to exemplify the diverse challenges encountered when simultaneously seeking profitability, social justice, and environmental sustainability. Students are introduced to the fundamentals of entrepreneurial decision-making, as well as the ethics of data use, custodianship, and communication. Case studies and project materials are drawn from real management problems from the Central Valley, Sierra Nevada, and Bay Area, incorporating content from public and private stakeholders in a rapidly developing region with an economy dependent on agriculture, food processing, and services; a sparsely populated area with an economy shaped by tourism, ranching, and extensive public lands management; and a developed, highly urbanized region at the forefront of the global technology-enabled services economy, surrounded by an extensive wildland-urban interface that exemplifies sustainability challenges with global relevance.
In summary, the minor in Management Analytics and Decision-making (MAD) provides students the tools to collect, analyze, manage, visualize and communicate data in support of diverse management applications, particularly in the context of “triple bottom-line” thinking, that is, with a focus on People, Planet, and Profit.
