The General Algebraic Modeling System (GAMS) is a high-level modeling system for mathematical programming and optimization. It consists of a language compiler and a stable of integrated high-performance solvers. GAMS is tailored for complex, large scale modeling applications, and allows you to build large maintainable models that can be adapted quickly to new situations.

Risk Taking Is Acceptable to Management
Management must recognize the risk/reward relationship and find organizational mechanisms for handling it. And it must communicate a clear understanding that reasonable risks are acceptable, since they are the handmaidens of progress. On the innovative front, two methods are available for dealing with risk: diversification and cheap failures. They can and should be used in concert.

This is the second part (response) of the eBay viral named Dear Manu.

Another great viral advertisement by eBay.

Are you losing customers because you don't know how the brain works?

Do you really understand how the marketing brain works? Are you harnessing its immense potential to make your business generate greater revenues? Wouldn't your strategy and tactics be vastly different, if you understood these psychological marketing ideas?

If you don't understand the simplicity and predictability of the brain, a lot of your business could be walking out the door. And you may not even realise it! Here's your opportunity to learn the psychology behind what makes your customer's brain tick. Then you can use this information, to keep them stuck to you like glue!

John P. Kotter, in a 2001 Harvard Business Review article, claims that most organizations are Overmanaged and Underled.  He explains the differences between Leadership and Management, which I summarize below:

Leadership	Management
Cope with Change	Cope with Complexity
Set a Direction	Planning and Budgeting
Aligning People	Organizing and Staffing
Motivating and Inspiring	Controlling and Problem Solving

As I mature and become more aware of the subtleties of business, I am slowly learning the meaning of Leadership.  For most of my career and, in part, my education, I have aimed to be become the best — technically — in the field of Operations, Logistics, Supply Chain, Lean Manufacturing, and Six Sigma.  I haven’t achieved my aim — and, indeed, view that pursuit as a lifetime goal — but I am now at a place where I feel some sense of achievement in those areas that I mentioned and have become painfully aware of those areas where I need to grow.

What is The Gemba? What is The Dojo?

Gemba is the Japanese word for “the actual place” or “the place where virtue or truth is found.” In a business setting, Gemba is often referred to “the place where value is added.” For example, in a factory, the production floor is where value is added.

The Dojo is a place of training. The Dojo is formally a place where martial arts is taught, but generically refers to any place where teaching and learning happens. Historically, the learning and teaching had to do with more holy or spiritual teaching.