Dana Johnson

Dana Johnson graduated from Michigan Tech in 1980 with her Bachelor's Degree in Business Administration.

Johnson has over 37 years of experience including industrial, consulting, and academia starting at Michigan Tech in 1981 as an accounting instructor. Upon her departure in 1984, she worked for a variety of manufacturing and consulting firms, ultimately owning her own business supplying training and consulting primarily to the automotive industry in quality engineering and supply chain management, business assessment, and project management. In 1999, Johnson returned to the School of Business and Economics to teach supply chain, operations and engineering management related courses.

Dr. Johnson has two primary research focuses: outcomes-based and performance measurement research with emphasis in healthcare & assessment of integrated management systems.

Dr. Johnson is collaborating with researchers in the area of Patient Centered Outcomes Research (PCOR). This is an extension of earlier research in the area modeling to predict the outcome of process quality as measured by cost, delivery, and product quality in the automotive industry. The latest stream of research emphasizes the impact of service quality to predict behavioral assessment of patient experience. Dr. Johnson and her collaborators apply multivariate modeling such as robust regression, principal components analysis, and structural equation modeling. This recent stream of research is timely considering that the Affordable Care Act requires health care providers to measure patient outcomes. This extends the descriptive analysis currently used by healthcare providers. The results will inform decision makers on how to improve overall patient satisfaction and the process of quality patient care. Work has been published in International Journal of Operations and Production Management, International Journal of Quality and Reliability Management, and Quality Management Journal.

Since 2006, Dr. Johnson has supported the Advanced Power Systems Research Center (APSRC) and Sustainable Futures Institute (SFI) at Michigan Tech. These multidisciplinary teams have focused on research and development of liquid and solid biofuels from woody biomass. She provides expertise in the area of supply chain management through application of simulation and optimization models to identify the number of biorefineries or biomass fired power plants in the upper portion of the lower peninsula of the State of Michigan. This was developed for the Forestry Biofuels Statewide Collaboration Center for the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. Her work is widely published in Biomass and Bioenergy, Bioenergy, Renewable Energy, and a number of other journals and conference proceedings. Dr. Johnson has over 70 refereed publications including work related to liquid and solid biofuels for the transportation and power industries.

Updated August 2023