Conference rides the analytics wave into California

Last year, the spring practice conference of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) was re-branded to include business analytics while preserving the core competencies of O.R. The success of this initiative was evident by the highest attendance ever for the meeting, with a 42 percent increase in participants. This year’s INFORMS Conference on Business Analytics & Operations Research – set for April 15-17 in Huntington Beach, Calif., at the Hyatt Regency Resort & Spa – is expected to build on last year’s success.

Real-world applications of O.R., implemented by leading companies and non-business organizations, have always been the focus of the spring INFORMS conference. This year’s distinguished keynote speakers include Hal Varian, chief economist at Google, and Bob Page, vice president of Analytics Platform at eBay.

Varian has been involved in many aspects of Google, including auction design, econometric analysis, finance, corporate strategy and public policy. Page is responsible for Web analytics, business intelligence, experimentation, advanced metrics and services for the world’s largest online marketplace. Both of these speakers will provide insight on the role of large data sets and the Web in analytics. Their presentations will tie in well to a special high-level panel discussion on “Innovations and Big Data” led by Diego Klabjan, associate professor and director of the Master of Science in Analytics program at Northwestern University. The panel will bring together industry leaders and renowned scholars for a lively discussion on big data analytics.

To complement the “big data” theme, the conference will introduce a new 10-session Marketing Analytics track designed by P.K. Kannan (marketing professor and chair of the Department of Marketing at the University of Maryland), along with Manoj Chari (director of Operations Research R&D at SAS), Elea McDonnell Feit (research director of Wharton Customer Analytics Initiative at The Wharton School) and Maher Lahmar (business development consultant for Target Corporation). Many of the analytics applications presented in the Marketing Analytics track rely on advances in managing big data and Web analytics.

Based on the success of the Analytics Process track last year, conference organizers have kept this as a10-session track. Stefan Karisch (director of O.R. and Optimization at Jeppesen), Douglas Meiser (manager of Operations Research & Simulation at Kroger), Michael Rappa (director of the Institute for Advanced Analytics and Professor at North Carolina State University) and Manoj Chari of SAS developed the popular track that offers executive insight into how to incorporate and get the best value out of analytics teams within organizations.

For those wanting to complement their technical skills with enhanced soft skills, conference organizers are continuing both the Soft Skills Workshop on Sunday and a Soft Skills for Analysts track. The latter track includes cutting-edge topics, such as visualizing data and information, managing technical personnel, storytelling for complex technical subjects, and teamwork and leadership skills. Freeman Marvin of Innovative Decisions and Don Buckshaw of SAIC, who helped design the original Soft Skills Workshop, will lead the track together with Bill Klimack, Decision Analysis Consultant, Chevron.

Based on a recent INFORMS survey to gauge the leading analytics topics of interest, decision analysis (DA) came out on top. Eva Lee, director of the Center for O.R. in Medicine & HealthCare and professor at Georgia Tech, and Patrick Leach, chief executive officer of Decision Strategies, have developed a track with an impressive mix of university, industry and public sector speakers that will look at DA and culture, text mining, finance, retail, and soldier performance issues.

The last three focused tracks are: 1) Supply Chain Management (SCM), co-chaired by Mike Gilliland (product marketing manager at SAS) and Clive Thomas (manager of Supply Chain Decision Support at Nestlé); 2) Public Sector, co-chaired by Scott Nestler (assistant professor, Naval Postgraduate School) and Arnie Greenland (Office of the Public Sector CTO, IBM); and 3) Energy and the Environment, co-chaired by Jeremy Bloom (senior product marketing manager at IBM) and Genetha Gray (principal member of technical staff at Sandia National Labs). These tracks underscore the longstanding importance of analytics/O.R. for SCM and public sector problems and the emerging use and benefits of applying analytics techniques to problems associated with energy and environment.

While many speakers are invited by the committee, the conference will also feature selected speakers for talks on a variety of topics with focus areas in healthcare, SCM & logistics, and forecasting & risk management. In addition, selected speakers will make poster presentations on both Monday and Tuesday.

The Franz Edelman Award Competition – which recognizes outstanding examples of implemented, innovative applications of operations research and is considered the “Super Bowl of O.R.” – will once again serve as a conference highlight. The finalists will make their presentations in a series of sessions on Monday. The Edelman winner will be announced that evening at the Edelman Gala, along with the winners of the INFORMS Prize and the Wagner Prize, which spotlight the role of analytics and O.R. in practice, and the new UPS George Smith Prize, which is awarded to a university academic department or program to recognize the practical importance of operations research. In addition, the new Innovation in Analytics Award that recognizes creative and unique developments, applications or combinations of analytical techniques and the new Spreadsheet Guru Prize, sponsored by the INFORMS Spreadsheet Productivity Research Interest Group, will be presented during the conference.

Conference attendees can also take advantage of Analytics Connect, an outlet for connecting those looking for jobs with companies that are looking for qualified analytics and O.R. professionals, both seasoned and new to the job market. Twenty-seven companies participated last year.

An Executive Forum will provide executives who would not normally be exposed to the utility of analytics in making key business decisions with an introduction to bottom-line successes that the expert use of analytics brings.  The Executive Forum features a networking reception hosted by the INFORMS Board of Directors on Sunday evening and a full program of intimate, small group discussions and executive level talks and panels on Monday. Be sure to register for this outstanding event.

For complete conference information, go to: http://meetings2.informs.org/Analytics2012.