Don G Wardell
  • Francis A. Madsen Scholar & Professor, Ois Operations & Info Systems, David Eccles School of Business
  • Professor, Ois Operations & Info Systems
801-581-8774

Research Statement

The majority of the research that I have completed and continue to pursue falls under the broad umbrella of quality management, with particular emphasis on statistical process control (SPC).    I became interested in this work as a doctoral candidate, where I sought to fine methods to improve processes by modeling them mathematically.  SPC is an ideal tool for process improvement.  As I learned more, I realized that many actual processes, especially in the process industries, generate data that do not meet the assumptions of traditional SPC.  Hence much of my work has questioned some of the traditional assumptions of SPC and what should be done if those assumptions are not met.  Questioning assumptions has required that I investigate the underlying probability distributions of statistics plotted on SPC charts, especially Shewhart charts.  Much of my work, then, also involves the derivation of new probability distributions and/or their first and second moments.

 

More recently I have worked on projects related to quality function deployment, quality management in non-profit environments, employee scheduling, experience management and scripting.  In addition, because of my teaching successes and at the encouragement of the former chair of the department, I have begun to write more about teaching methods and innovations.

 

I believe that my published research, especially the papers related to control charts applied to autocorrelated data, have had a strong impact on the academic community.   My dissertation was honored twice, first as the winner of the best dissertation competition of the Production and Operations Management Society in 1991; and second as a runner up (one of the top three) in the Decision Sciences Institute dissertation competition, also in 1991. 

 

I was honored again when “Run Length Distributions of Special-Cause Control Charts for Correlated Processes,” was the invited Technometrics presented paper at the Fall Technical Conference of the American Statistical Association and the American Society for Quality Control in 1993.  In 2004, this same paper was recognized as the most cited Technometrics paper appearing in the 1994 volume (ASQ Statistics Division Newsletter, Vol. 23, No. 2).  Moreover, I have been invited to contribute an article on monitoring correlated data in SPC for the Encyclopedia of Quality and Reliability (2007, pp 145-150) published by J. Wiley & Sons.

 

Presentations

  • DON G WARDELL (2022) Doctoral Consortium Invited Presenter. Panel, Presented, 01/12/2022.
  • Liana Victorino, & Mike Dixon, Don Wardell, Rohit Verma. (2019) 'A Customer’s Perspective to Scripting Alignment. Conference Paper, Presented, 11/23/2019.
  • Liana Victorino, & Michael Dixon, Don Wardell and Rohit Verma. (2018) A Customer’s Perspective to Script Usage across a Sequence of Encounters . Presentation, Presented, 11/18/2018.
  • DON G WARDELL, & Shane Schvaneveldt. (2018) What Faculty Should (But Don’t) Know About Statistical Process Control. Presentation, Presented, 11/17/2018.
  • Liana Victorino, & Michael Dixon, Don Wardell, Rohit Verma. (2017) The Sequence of Scripting. Presentation, Presented, 11/18/2017.
  • Liana Victorino, & Michael Dixon, Don Wardell, Rohit Verma. (2017) The Sequence of Scripted Service Encounters. Presentation, Presented, 05/08/2017.

Geographical Regions of Interest

  • Central America

Publications

  • Don Wardell (2022). Algebraic Expressions for Range Control Chart Constants. (pp. Online). Western Decision Sciences Institute. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 04/05/2022.
    http://wdsinet.org/Annual_Meetings/2022_Proceeding...
  • Liana Victorino & RohitVerma (2013). Script Usage in Standardized and Customized Service Encounters: Implications for Perceived Service Quality. Production and Operations Management. Vol. 26, 518–534. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 06/2013.
    http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1937-...
  • Liana Victorino, Rohit Verma & Bryan Bonner (2012). Can customers detect script usage in service operations? An experimental video analysis. Journal of Service Research. Vol. 15, 390-400. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 10/25/2012.
    http://jsr.sagepub.com/content/15/4/390
  • Wardell, D., & David Ding, Paul Hu and Rohit Verma. (2010). The Impact of Service System Design and Flow Experience on Customer Satisfaction in Online Financial Services. Journal of Service Research. 13, 96-110. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 02/2010.
    http://jsr.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/13/1/96
  • Wardell, D., & Liana Victorino, Rohit Verma. (2008). Service Scripting: A Customer’s Perspective of Quality and Performance. Cornell Center for Hospitality Research. 8 No. 20, 4-13. Practice - refereed, Published, 11/2008.
    http://www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/research/chr/pu...
  • Wardell, D.(2007). Autocorrelated Data. (pp. 145-150). Encyclopedia of Statistics in Quality and Reliability. Discipline based - other, Published, 2007.
  • Wardell, D., & Weiyu Tsai. (2006). An Interactive Excel VBA Example for Teaching Statistics Concepts. INFORMS Transactions on Education. 7. Teaching - refereed, Published, 07/2006.
    http://ite.pubs.informs.org/Vol7No1/TsaiWardell/
  • Ding, Xin, Wardell, Don & Verma, Rohit (2006). An Assessment of Statistical Process Control-Based Approaches for Charting Student Evaluation Scores. Decision Sciences Journal of Innovative Education. Vol. 4, 259-272. Teaching - refereed, Published, 07/2006.
    http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1540-...
  • Wardell, D., & Weiyu Tsai. (2006). Creating Individualized Data Sets for Student Exercises Using Microsoft Excel and Visual Basic. INFORMS Transactions on Education. 7. Teaching - refereed, Published, 2006.
    http://ite.pubs.informs.org/Vol7No1/TsaiWardell2/
  • Wardell, D., & Chesteen, S., Helgheim, B., and Randall, T. (2005). Comparing quality of care in non-profit and for-profit nursing homes: A process perspective. Journal of Operations Management. 23, 229-242. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 02/2005.
  • Wardell, D., & Pullman, M. and Moore, W. (2002). A Comparison of Quality Function Deployment and Conjoint Analysis In New Product Design. Journal of Product Innovation Management. 19, 354-364. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 2002.
  • Wardell, D.(2001). 'Reply' to Comment by R. L. Berger and B. W. Coutant. (pp. 85). The American Statistician. Discipline based - other, Published, 2001.
  • Wardell, D.(1997). Small Sample Interval Estimation of Bernoulli and Poisson Parameters. The American Statistician. 51, 321-325. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 1997.
  • Wardell, D., & M. R. Candia. (1996). Statistical Process Monitoring of Customer Satisfaction Survey Data. Quality Management Journal. 3, 36-50. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 1996.
  • Wardell, D., & H. Moskowitz and R. D. Plante. (1995). 'Response' to Yashchin Letter to the Editor. (pp. 243-245). Technometrics. Discipline based - other, Published, 1995.
  • Wardell, D., & H. Moskowitz and R. D. Plante. (1994). Rejoinder to Discussions by Adams, Woodall and Superville, Fellner, and Lucas of 'Run Length Distributions of Special-Cause Control Charts for Correlated Processes'. (pp. 23-27). Technometrics. Discipline based - other, Published, 1994.
  • Wardell, D., & H. Moskowitz and R. D. Plante. (1994). The Use of Run Length Distributions of Statistical Process Control Charts to Detect False Alarms. Production and Operations Management. 3, 217-239. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 1994.
  • Wardell, D., & H. Moskowitz and R. D. Plante. (1994). Run Length Distributions of Special-Cause Control Charts for Correlated Processes. Technometrics. 36, 3-17. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 1994.
  • Wardell, D., & H. Moskowitz and R.D. Plante. (1994). Run Length Distributions of Residual Control Charts for Autocorrelated Processes. Journal of Quality Technology. 26, 308-317. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 1994.
  • Wardell, D., & H. Moskowitz and R.D. Plante. (1992). Control Charts in the Presence of Data Correlation. Management Science. 38, 1084-1105. Discipline based - refereed, Published, 1992.