Customer Reviews

Statistics for Managers Using Microsoft Excel (2nd Edition)

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

While I used the first edition of this book (1997) with delight and great admiration, I was disappointed when I bought the second edition (1999). The main reason was that the authors had indicated in a small top right hand corner on the cover that the book uses PHSTAT as an an Excel Add In. (Not very useful for online purchases). Amazon mentioned PHSTAT in one review as an "Add In included on the CD", ie, it seemed optional. The examples solved in the 1st edition used native Excel methods. In edition 2, they were solved using PHSTAT. All screen captures, worksheets, etc, were in PHSTAT. If one does not wish to use PHSTAT, the second edition would not be useful at all. It would have been leading (Opposite of misleading) to entitle the book "Statistics for Managers Using PHSTAT, an Excel Add In". I am hence confused about the number of stars : first edition : 5 and second edition only 1.

I used this book in a first year MBA program and found it a great resource. Stat freaks complain that Excel is not SPSS - true! But many many more business people have access to Excel, along with a reasonable ability to do FAST basic statistics.

Don't let the title mislead you: Statistics for Managers Using Microsoft Excel (Student Solutions Manual) has almost nothing to do with Microsoft Excel. This book is useful IF and only if you are using it as a companion to the Statistics for Managers Using Microsoft Excel text book in a statistics class.

The book provides ANSWERS. It does not provide any how-to; it does not provide any Excel formulas/etc. But is does provide the answers to all of the even-numbers problems in the companion text book. That's the only reason it got as much as a "3 stars" rating from me -- it was helpful for feedback.

As a [MBA]graduate student taking my second statistics class the book is tremendously easy reading but has multiple "typos" where answers are posted incorrectly in the back or not at all. The PH Stats disk has flaws that prevent it from executing certain histograms, Pareto charts and other activities. Once the "bugs" are worked out of the PH Stats CD, it will be useful. The CD does work well but, if you are not computer literate and cannot troubleshoot the issues, you could be more frustrated than you want. As for the text errors, be certain to purchase the Solutions Manual with the book so you can check, and obtain right answers, for a wider variety of problems. "2" is a reasonable rate for the content. The rest of the problems detract from the books overall objective.

A worse textbook I have not seen. It's riddled with mistakes and misprints. The authors should be ashamed. The examples are virtually impossible to follow. Unfortunately, most students don't have a choice but if you do go with Statistical Techniques in Business and Economics (Mason, Lind & Marchal).

A worse textbook I have not seen. It's riddled with mistakes and misprints. The authors should be ashamed. The examples are virtually impossible to follow. Unfortunately, most students don't have a choice but if you do go with Statistical Techniques in Business and Economics (Mason, Lind & Marchal).

With Dr. Levine as an author, you have a right to expect that this would be an excellent statistics text. A few sections are, but most are anything but excellent. This edition is somewhat like the girl in "Nightmare Before Christmas" - stitched together and not very neatly. The text itself has many errors, and by trying to accomodate many versions of Excel and it's own dedicated add-in, it is the least user friendly of any statistics text I've encountered.
Just consider the premise of the work... Excel was never meant to do statistics! The authors admit this in one passage, and soon give up on the idea by including PHSTAT - an unsupported, buggy software that is not at all intuitive or user friendly. If you have the option, you might use StatGraphics or any of the other excellent statistics packages - and you may have to use them just to complete the course!
If your instructor plans to use PHGradeAssist with this text...give up, pull the plug - wait to take this class for another year!!! The grade assistant is much more buggy than the text, and nearly every homework assignment contained obvious errors...so you are left to "game the system" by completing the homework, discovering the grade assistant's errors and then redoing the homework to get a reasonable grade by entering statistically incorrect data to an idiotic number of significant (or rather insignificant) digits. I found this extremely irritating...instead of the book teaching me, I'm having to correct it and the grade assistant!
Are you considering purchasing the solutions manual - don't bother if you are using the PHGradeAssistant option...the grade assistant has buggy algorithms that select random levels for the parameters of the problems (sometimes outside the solution space of the built in answers) that make the solutions manual useless.
Caution, caution, CAUTION if this is your text I suggest that you drop the class and wait for a course in Business Statistics that isn't using this text...or maybe the next revision will be better. I use statistics every day, I taught Green Belt Six Sigma, have a Black Belt in Six Sigma and enjoy applying statistics to solve problems - if I didn't enjoy this text, what are your chances?

This book does not help with understanding statistics. The examples are confusing and often point out a problem but never solve or resolve the problem. Don't buy this book!

I'm only through chapter 3, but I've found

* inconsistancies - not using the same term in the same manner; all through the chapter, it refers to class boundaries, but in the excersizes, they are called bins - you have to check out the solutions manual and figure out what they are asking for.

* circular definitions - using the term in the definition of the term you are describing (ie, frumious = being frumious)

* poor examples - when describing how to use an excel wizard to process data, it tells you to select E5:E12 - without describing what this range is supposed to be (bins? midpoints? data?)

* incorrect answers in the solution manual (some are right, some are not)

* PHStat does not function as specified in the book in all cases (ie, percentage polygons)

Frankly, the book is a big waste of cash, and should not be selected as a book to be used for statistics classes - unfortunately, neither the students nor the profs at the school I'm attending had a choice. I'm having a hard time believing this is a THIRD edition, with all the errors. Either the authors or the publishers can screw up on a first edition, but it takes an effort for both to do it, much less three times.

Too bad you can't give negative star reviews.

The Statistics for Managers Using MS Excel 5th edition textbook had brief and to the point explanations, although there were some unrecalled directions that were slightly confusing.

It was nice to learn with the CD program in order to comprehend how the statistics were affected by changing certain numbers in the effective formulas. Aside from accounting applications, it also helped me comprehend statistical concepts that I use in my (math involved) hobby as well.

For the most part it's a very good book and CD program to learn by. I'd give it a 9 out of 10.

Statistics for Managers Using Microsoft Excel and Student CD Package (5th Edition)