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Software Selection Books
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Software Selection Books

Source Selection Answer Book (2nd Edition)
by Vernon J. Edwards
Hardcover: 443 pages
ISBN: 1567261728

Book Description:
The newly expanded and updated second edition of this best selling and practical handbook is designed to give hands-on contracting professionals a solid working knowledge of this critical process.
This proven resource covers the entire source selection process, including acquisition and source selection planning, preparation of requests for proposals, proposal solicitation and preparation, proposal evaluation, award without discussions, discussions and final proposal revisions, final proposal evaluation, contractor selection, and debriefings and protests.

Source Selection Answer Book, Second Edition provides concise, straightforward answers to common questions about the Federal government’s rules and procedures in selecting contractors including:

Completely updated FAR Part 15 citations and quotations.
Revised answers to questions based on new regulations and case law.
Easily understandable explanations of concepts such as evaluation factors for award, relative importance, cost realism analysis, and tradeoff.
How agencies evaluate proposals and how to evaluate agencies.
Answers on the best methods in developing effective proposal strategies.

All in a unique question and answer format that allows the reader to go directly to the topic of interest for fast and comprehensive solutions!

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The Software Selection Questionnaire
by Preston D. Cameron
Hardcover: 60 pages
ISBN: 0929526856

Book Description:
Business experts all agree: if you're not asking the right questions of your potential technology vendors, you are putting your entire technology project at risk. The need for seamless technology selection and implementation projects is nothing new. What is new is the shorter time frames that now dominate the organization landscape. Every company wants and needs a productive and efficient process for identifying new technology needs. Technology selection projects that used to take years to complete must now be up and running in a matter of months or even weeks. More importantly, they must be done successfully - the first time. And part of doing it right is knowing the right questions to ask.

The Software Selection Questionnaire identifies a host of questions that busy executives and managers at all levels of an organization should be asking themselves, each other, and potential vendors to ensure that their software selection process is as efficient and effective as it should be.

In this comprehensive outline executives, managers, and vendors alike will discover:

Over 270 questions that should be asked and answered prior to beginning any technology project
Strategies that even established organizations can use to take control of the solution selection process
Techniques that master the software selection challenge
Lessons learned from the leaders of successful selection & implementation projects
Helpful hints that can help organizations avoid the often encountered problems that bring technology projects to a standstill

The potential returns from selecting and implementing the right technology solution continue to skyrocket. Let The Software Selection Questionnaire help you develop a competent starting point for your project and take the fullest possible advantage of today's evolving technology vendors.

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A Guide to Software Package Evaluation & Selection:
The R2Isc Method
by Nathan Hollander
Hardcover: 344 pages
ISBN: 0814405533

Book Description:
Performing the right software selection process for a company is downright scary! Whether it's for inventory, e-commerce, accounting, e-mail, or whatever else the company needs, a poor software selection process has negative ripple effects that can undermine business for years to come (and damage reputations as well).

This pragmatic book is for anyone charged with evaluating and choosing an application. It provides a systematic method for the best software selection. In careful detail, the book guides readers through each key step to obtaining a package that meets their needs, based on: critical requirements, budget, culture, and in-house technical expertise. The ideal software selection process allows readers to learn how to:

Create a request for proposal (RFP), and then understand how to thoroughly evaluate the vendors' responses
Accurately compare requirements against the package
Ensure that the vendor demonstrations really help them determine if the software can do the job they need
Investigate the software company to make sure it's reliable
Negotiate the contract to the organization's advantage.

More information about A Guide to Software Package Evaluation & Selection: The R2Isc Method

Maximizing Business Performance through Software Packages: Best Practices for Justification, Selection, and Implementation
by Robert W. Starinsky
Hardcover: 320 pages
ISBN: 1574443291

Book Description:
Performing an enterprise software selection process is very complex - and usually involves a large expenditure. As a result, decision-makers desperately seek a definitive source that will help them select the solutions that best fit their business needs. This is that source.

The book presents an overview of available software and discusses their pros and cons. It provides cost justification/ROI criteria, a scoring matrix for evaluating vendors, and guidelines for controlling the whole software selection process, including software purchase and implementation costs. It also demonstrates how to effectively implement a technology solution for enhanced performance after it has been selected and much more.

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Request for Proposal:
A Guide to Effective RFP Development
by Bud Porter-Roth
Hardcover: 288 pages
ISBN: 0201775751

Book Description:
Despite its importance as an initial step in the development of major technical projects, the Request for Proposal (RFP) process rarely receives the professional attention it deserves. Used by government agencies and by private corporations to solicit proposals from contractors and vendors, the RFP document is the foundation for a successful software selection process. A clearly written and properly organized RFP clarifies technical goals, communicates administrative and financial expectations, and sets the tone for good communication and a trusting and productive relationship between customer and contractor.

This experience-based handbook offers a systematic, comprehensive, and professional approach to writing RFPs for any king of selection project, including and particularly software selection. It guides you through the software selection process step-by-step—from initial planning to selecting the winning proposal—through the RFP process, demonstrating the most effective ways of structuring the document and expressing technical, administrative, and financial requirements. Request for Proposal: A Guide to Effective RFP Development focuses on the major goals of the RFP process—to elicit high-quality responses from potential contractors and promote effective communication between the client and the chosen vendor.

You will be able to plan and execute a state-of-the art software selection process:

Plan and organize the RFP effort
Outline each RFP section
Develop, write, and review all requirements, including those that are administrative, technical, and managerial
Set realistic pricing requirements
Pre-screen a vendor list to select appropriate vendors
Set up objective evaluation criteria for selecting the best solution
Prepare for post-RFP activities such as site visits, reference checks, and implementation activities

In addition, this book includes several templates you can adapt for your own organization’s RFP efforts. Request for Proposal gives numerous examples of both effective and poorly-written RFP requirements that illustrate the author’s points and provide solid advice to help you avoid common pitfalls and implement best practices.

For anyone with the responsibility of writing RFPs or responding to them, this book is are source you will want to keep close at hand.

More information about Request for Proposal: A Guide to Effective RFP Development

The New Science of Management Decision
by Herbert A. Simon
Hardcover: 175 pages
ISBN: 0136161367

Book Description:
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Administrative Behavior, 4th Edition
by Herbert A. Simon
Hardcover: 384 pages
ISBN: 0684835827

Book Description:
In this fourth edition of his ground-breaking work, Herbert A. Simon applies his pioneering theory of human choice and administrative decision-making to concrete organizational problems. To commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the book's original publication, Professor Simon enhances his timeless observations on the human decision-making process with commentaries examining new facets of organizational behavior. Investigating the impact of changing social values and modem technology on the operation of organizations, the new ideas featured in this revised edition update a book that has become a worldwide classic.

Named by Public Administration Review as "Book of the Half Century," Administrative Behavior is considered one of the most influential books on social science thinking, and was referred to by the Nobel Committee as "epoch-making."

Written for managers and other professionals who wish to understand the decision-making processes at the heart of organization and management, it is also essential reading for students in business and management, economics, sociology, psychology computer science, government, and law.

More information about Administrative Behavior, 4th Edition

Software Selection Magazines

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Software Selection Books
Software Selection Magazines
Software Selection Organizations

Decision Analysis

Decision Analysis is dedicated to advancing the theory, application, and teaching of all aspects of decision analysis. The primary focus of the journal is to develop and study operational decision-making methods, drawing on all aspects of decision theory and decision analysis, with the ultimate objective of providing practical guidance for decision makers. As such, the journal aims to bridge the theory and practice of decision analysis, facilitating communication and the exchange of knowledge among practitioners and researchers in academia, business, industry, and government. Articles will contribute to these goals in many ways, using a wide variety of methods and approaches. For example, articles might discuss new or existing algorithms, procedures, or processes for implementing decision analysis; develop new theory or empirical studies related to cognitive, organizational, or social issues that have implications for decision analysis; propose and test innovative uses of information technology to perform decision analysis; or raise issues related to the application of decision analysis in real-world situations. Articles should generally remain faithful to the intellectual foundations of decision theory and decision analysis. However, the Decision Analysis Journal welcomes original contributions that genuinely challenge the field, for example by showing how concepts, ideas, and methods from other fields can improve the theory or practice of decision analysis. The journal also publishes articles that review and summarize important topics or advances of interest to decision analysts or that provide original historical, scholarly, or practical perspectives on the field. In addition, the Decision Analysis Journal encourages articles that support the teaching of best practices, such as state-of-the-art applications, case studies, and tutorial articles on decision-analysis methods.

Decisions in Economics and Finance
Decisions in Economics and Finance: A Journal of Applied Mathematics is the official publication of the Association for Mathematics.
Decisions Sciences Journal
The Decision Sciences Journal is a quarterly, professional journal that uses the latest computer technology, mathematical and statistical techniques, and behavioral science. The Decision Sciences Journal is subscribed to by more than 1,000 libraries and read by over 4,000 faculty and students in all functional areas of business, as well as by corporate-related personnel and consultants.
Decision Support Systems Journal
The Decision Support Systems Journal research papers tend to fall into the following six topic departments:
1. DSS Foundations. e.g. DSS principles, concepts, and theories; frameworks, formal languages, and methods for DSS research; tutorials about the nature of DSS; assessments of the DSS field.
2. DSS Development-Functionality. e.g. methods, tools, and techniques for developing the underlying functional aspects of a DSS; solver/model management; data management in DSSs; rule management and AI in DSSs; coordinating a DSS's functionality within its user interface.
3. DSS Development-Interfaces. e.g. methods, tools, and techniques for developing the overt user interface of a DSS; managing linguistic, presentation, and user knowledge in a DSS; DSS help facilities; coordinating a DSS's interface events with its functionality events.
4. DSS Impacts and Evaluation. e.g. DSS economics; DSS measurement; DSS impacts on individual users, multiparticipant users, organizations, and societies; evaluating/justifying DSSs.
5. DSS Reference Studies. e.g. reference discipline tutorials for DSS researchers; emerging technologies relevant to DSS characteristics or DSS development; related studies on such topics as communication support systems, computer supported cooperative work, negotiation support systems, research support systems, task support systems.
6. DSS Experiences, Management, and Education. e.g. experiences in developing or operating DSSs; systems solutions to specific decision support needs; approaches to managing DSSs; DSS instruction/training approaches.
Discrete Applied Mathematics
The aim of Discrete Applied Mathematics is to bring together research papers in different areas of algorithmic and applicable discrete mathematics as well as applications of combinatorial mathematics to informatics and various areas of science and technology. Contributions presented to the Discrete Applied Mathematics journal can be research papers, short notes, surveys, and possibly research problems.
Journal of Behavioral Decision Making
The Journal of Behavioral Decision Making is a multidisciplinary journal with a broad base of content and style. It publishes original empirical reports, critical review papers, theoretical analyses and methodological contributions. The Journal of Behavioral Decision Making also features book, software and decision aiding technique reviews, abstracts of important articles published elsewhere and teaching suggestions. The objective of the Journal of Behavioral Decision Making is to present and stimulate behavioral research on decision making and to provide a forum for the evaluation of complementary, contrasting and conflicting perspectives. These perspectives include psychology, management science, sociology, political science and economics. Studies of behavioral decision making in naturalistic and applied settings are encouraged.
Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis
The Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis provides an international forum for the presentation and discussion of all aspects of research, application and evaluation of multi-criteria decision analysis. The Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis publishes material from a variety of disciplines and all schools of thought: mathematical, theoretical, and behavioral aspects of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis, case studies, applications and evaluation of techniques and methodologies. In addition to full-length papers, the Journal of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis offers fast publication for short letters raising points for discussion. It also publishes book and software reviews.
Journal of Risk and Uncertainty
The Journal of Risk and Uncertainty is the natural outlet for the best research in decision analysis, economics and psychology dealing with choice under uncertainty. It features original manuscripts, both theoretical and empirical, dealing with the analysis of risk-bearing behavior and decision making under uncertainty. The topics covered in the Journal of Risk and Uncertainty include, but are not limited to, decision theory and the economics of uncertainty, psychological models of choice under uncertainty, risk and public policy, experimental investigations of behavior under uncertainty, and empirical studies of real world risk-taking behavior.
Theory and Decision
The field of decision has been investigated from many sides. However, research programs relevant to decision making in psychology, management science, economics, the theory of games, statistics, operations research, artificial intelligence, cognitive science and analytical philosophy have remained separate. Theory and Decision is devoted to all aspects of decision making belonging to such programs, but addresses also possible cross-fertilizations between these disciplines which would represent effective advances in knowledge. The purpose of the journal is to let the engineering of choice gradually emerge both for individual and for collective decision making. Formalized treatments will be favored, to the extent that they provide new insights into the issues raised and an appropriate modeling of the situation considered. Due to its growing importance, experimentation in decision making as well as its links to the cognitive sciences will be granted special attention by Theory and Decision.
Of particular interest are:
Preference and belief modeling,
Experimental decision making under risk or under uncertainty,
Decision analysis, multicriteria decision modeling,
Game theory, negotiation theory, collective decision making, social choice,
Rationality, cognitive processes and interactive decision making,
Methodology of the decision sciences.
Applications to various problems in management and organization science, economics and finance, computer-supported decision schemes, will be welcome as long as they bear on sufficiently general cases. Analysis of actual decision making processes are also relevant topics for the journal, whether pertaining to individual, collective or negotiatory approaches; to private decisions or public policies; to operations or to strategic choices.

Software Selection Organizations

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Software Selection Books
Software Selection Magazines
Software Selection Organizations

Decision Analysis Society (DAS)

The Decision Analysis Society promotes the development and use of logical methods for the improvement of decision-making in public and private enterprise. Such methods include models for decision-making under conditions of uncertainty or multiple objectives; techniques of risk analysis and risk assessment; experimental and descriptive studies of decision-making behavior; economic analysis of competitive and strategic decisions; techniques for facilitating decision-making by groups; and computer modeling software and expert systems for decision support. Members of the Decision Analysis Society include practitioners, educators, and researchers with backgrounds in engineering, business, economics, statistics, psychology, and other social and applied sciences.

Decision Sciences Institute (DSI)
The Decision Sciences Institute is a multidisciplinary international association dedicated to advancing knowledge and improving instruction in all business and related disciplines. To pursue this mission, the Decision Sciences Institute will facilitate the development and dissemination of knowledge in the diverse disciplines of the decision sciences through publication, conferences, and other services.
European Association for Decision Making (EADM)
The European Association for Decision Making is an interdisciplinary organization dedicated to the study of normative, descriptive, and prescriptive theories of decision making.

The purpose of the European Association for Decision Making is the advancement and diffusion of knowledge about human judgement and decision making and the interchange of information relating to this subject between the members and other associations throughout the world as well as between members and other interested institutions and/or individuals. The Association is a non-profit organisation of interested researchers.
European Working Group on Multi-Criteria Decision Aiding (MCDA)
Multicriteria decision aid is an important branch of Operational Research (OR). Beyond the exchanges and meetings which already exist by means of the international conferences and the publications in the scientific journals, the objectives of the European Working Group on Multi-Criteria Decision Aiding (MCDA) are the following:
(1) to contribute to the development, at a European level, of an original way of thinking in the field of multicriteria decision aiding;
(2) to allow each member of the group to make to others methodological, theoretical or applied results, to submit its own work and thoughts to the critical discussion of the group and also facilitate some collaborations;
(3) to develop multicriteria aid for decisions by facilitating contacts with every people interested in the subject and by stimulating continuity and progress in exchanges and work;
(4) to keep the group alive and open by means of bi-annual meetings which must not be mini-conferences but real meetings favourable to exchanges and to emergence of news ideas.
International Society on Multiple Criteria Decision Making
MCDM can be defined as the study of methods and procedures by which concerns about multiple conficting criteria can be formally incorporated into the management planning process.

The purposes of the Society are to develop, test, evaluate and apply methodologies for solving multiple criteria decision making problems, to foster interaction and research in the scientific field of multiple criteria decision making, and to cooperate with other organizations in the study of management from a quantitative perspective. These purposes are to be carried out by:

(1) facilitating communications,
(2) providing academic assistance with ideas, methods and contacts whenever and wherever needed,
(3) sponsoring international conferences for the dissemination of results,
(4) encouraging special purpose workshops and student exchanges,
(5) publishing the newsletter MCDM WorldScan, and
(6) encouraging an environment of international colleagueship and friendship across the globe.
Society for Judgment and Decision Making (SJDM)
The Society for Judgment and Decision Making is an interdisciplinary academic organization dedicated to the study of normative, descriptive, and prescriptive theories of decision. Its members include psychologists, economists, organizational researchers, decision analysts, and other decision researchers. The Society's primary event is its Annual Meeting at which Society members present their research.