Director named for new Chicago graduate degree in business analytics

Don N. Kleinmuntz has been chosen by the Mendoza College of Business at the University of Notre Dame as the director of the Notre Dame Master of Science in Business Analytics, a graduate business degree set to launch in the University’s downtown Chicago campus in January 2015.

Kleinmuntz is a widely recognized industry expert in decision and risk analysis, business analytics, and leveraging information technology to improve organizational decision making. He previously served as founder and senior executive at Strata Decision Technology, a leading provider of financial analytics software to the health-care industry.

“Technology allows us to gather exponentially more data than we ever have in the past, and businesses have a critical need for professionals with the analytic knowledge and skills to leverage this resource toward better decision making,” said Roger D. Huang, Martin J. Gillen Dean of the Mendoza College of Business. “Because of his extensive experience as both an executive and educator, Don provides valuable insight and expertise in leading the Master of Science in Business Analytics.”

“The emerging field of Business Analytics is about the art and science of transforming data into insights for better decision making,” said Kleinmuntz. “Successful businesses are intent on unlocking the value embedded in their data and are looking for skilled professionals to lead the way. I am excited to be leading the Mendoza College team that is meeting this need through a unique Chicago-based degree program.”

Kleinmuntz, who earned his bachelor’s, MBA and doctoral degrees from the University of Chicago, previously held tenure-track or tenured faculty positions at the University of Texas at Austin, the MIT Sloan School of Management, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, as well as a part-time research appointment at the University of Southern California. His expertise is focused on a range of topics related to decision making, including fundamental and methodological research on cognitive processes in judgment and decision making, methods and approaches for improving decision making, and applied work on decision making models and processes for accounting, financial management, resource allocation and risk management.

He was a founding editor-in-chief of the journal Decision Analysis, an associate editor of the journal Management Science, and also served on several editorial boards and National Science Foundation grant review panels. He currently serves on the editorial board of Decision Analysis and the EURO Journal on Decision Processes.

Kleinmuntz has been active in professional organizations, notably the Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences (INFORMS), where he served as an officer for a total of seven years and as president in 2009. In 2011, the INFORMS Decision Analysis Society awarded him the Frank P. Ramsey Medal for Distinguished Contributions to Decision Analysis. In 2012, INFORMS awarded him the George E. Kimball Medal for distinguished service to the field of operations research and management science.

The MSBA is offered by the Mendoza College of Business at the University of Notre Dame, a premier Catholic business school that fosters academic excellence while promoting values-based education. The College’s degree programs include the top-rated Undergraduate Studies degree program, which has been ranked No. 1 in the nation by Bloomberg Businessweek for five consecutive years, as well as seven graduate degree programs: the Notre Dame MBA, Executive MBA, Master of Science in Management, Master of Science in Accountancy, Master of Nonprofit Administration, Master of Science in Business Analytics and Master of Science in Finance.

For more information about the Notre Dame Master of Science in Business Analytics, call (574) 631-5285 or visit msba.nd.edu. To contact Don Kleinmuntz, call (574) 631-4943 or email Kleinmuntz.1@ND.edu.

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