For the past week or so, I have been going through Schaum's Outline of Business Statistics as recommended by the prof that teaches the stats course. There's a one liner review on amazon, stating that "This is a poorly presented text in terms of language." I didn't quite get it when I ordered the book, but after reading a few chapters, I totally understand what it means. The language is very counter-intuitive, and it is unlike any textbook I have ever read. I did learn all of these statistics materials back during my undergrad years, and what I learned was way more advanced than what is required/presented here. I still have my old stats textbooks, but I got this (cheap) book anyway, to see the level of understanding that's required in the MBA program. I have to say that even with familiarity of the topics presented, I have a hard time understanding what the book is going on about sometimes. It does a poor job explaining anything that's slightly complicated. I'm mostly using the examples as a refresher, so I can't imagine someone who never studied stats learning and understanding much from this book. The problems are a good resource though. Solutions are provided, so if you only need to reinforce your understanding in something you've already learned, doing these exercises is not a bad idea.
On a different note, the emphasis of business statistics lies in the applications of problems, which is different from my undergraduate courses. As part of my math-intensive program, my undergrad stats courses centred around theories, complicated formulas, and proofs.
10 years ago