Internal and Interdisciplinary Growth

In recognition of the fact that this is the annual international special issue of OR/MS Today, I send a note of appreciation to all international members of INFORMS for their contributions to and support of our profession. More than ever, the past couple of years have highlighted the fact that the impact of our profession is not limited to any one region but is global in nature. Likewise, the contributions to the research and practice of our field are certainly enriched by the expertise of our diverse and multinational membership. Nowhere is this more evident than in this year’s finalists for the Edelman Award. We have two international organizations, Alibaba and Gobierno de Chile, among this list. Another finalist, Janssen, has tackled one of the most pervasive global challenges: COVID-19. We have also seen over the years that many Edelman Award finalists are multinational organizations that have addressed comprehensive global issues involving members from all over the world. I thank all the members, including the many international ones, for being part of our organization and making it a richer place!

As I write this column, there are positive signs that the COVID-19 pandemic is receding, which gives me hope for a return to normalcy soon. Unfortunately, another global crisis is unfolding with the war in Europe, which will cause upheaval in many ways; in particular, it will stress our global supply chains that have just started recovering from the effects of the pandemic. Once again, the operations research and analytics expertise of our members will be invaluable to minimize the risk of disruption and increase the resilience of the supply chains. As we try to address these emerging new challenges, I express my sadness and sympathy for our colleagues across the world who have been personally affected by this situation.

In the remainder of this column, I will expand on two more of the top 10 opportunities I listed in my first column published in the February issue of OR/MS Today [1].

Practice Community Growth

It is undeniable that the real-world impact of the research and innovations in our field is amplified when put into practice or “where the rubber meets the road.” Last year, an article in OR/MS Today outlined several significant opportunities provided by the new strategic plan for practitioners within INFORMS [2]. As articulated in that article, we must explore what is needed from all of us, whether in academia or industry, so that “INFORMS will further continue to be an incubator, combining the best minds in academia, industry and government to put the latest advances into practice and develop the next generation of industry leaders equipped to tackle greater challenges.”

Fundamentally, the practice community is important for the growth of the OR/MS/analytics profession. There is an increasing trend of graduate students (even at the Ph.D. level) choosing a career in industry rather than academia, which behooves us to ensure that INFORMS serves as their professional organization of choice. However, we have not seen a corresponding increase in industry membership within INFORMS. What can INFORMS do about this?

There is a large population of potential INFORMS members within industry; their training and expertise vary from Ph.D.-level researchers to master’s or even undergraduate-level professionals with degrees in operations research, analytics or data science. I will use the term “analytics professionals” to describe all these individuals. Their role within the organization typically falls into one of the following categories, described in greater detail in the booklet, “How Organizations can get Started with Analytics” [3].

• Analytics Champions: typically the leaders of analytical organizations.
• Analytics Producers: those involved mostly in original research and development to solve specific problems and implement decision support systems for their organization.
• Analytics Enablers: the supporting members of an organization, such as IT and database experts needed to support analytics projects.
• Analytics Consumers: those responsible for deploying the results of the analytical work.

We can certainly expand our tent to include some of these analytics professionals who do not currently see INFORMS as a professional home: They range from students entering the job market, to early career practitioners, to students in the many data science and analytics programs, to newer communities in the AI/ML world and many more.

The question is: Which of these groups would benefit most from joining our association? We cannot be everything for everyone. So, which of the above categories of professionals are key to the growth of the practice community in INFORMS? Over the next few months, the Board will examine these questions as we explore opportunities to increase practice member engagement and membership.

INFORMS’ AI Initiative

My involvement with the INFORMS AI initiative began in 2019 under then-INFORMS president Ramayya Krishnan and continued last year when 2021 INFORMS president Steve Graves entrusted me with leading the ad hoc AI Strategy Workgroup in 2021. The workgroup’s activities have been described in the December issue of OR/MS Today [4]. It has been an enriching experience to work with the ad hoc committee, INFORMS staff, SIGNAL Group and many other enthusiastic INFORMS members on several activities. Here are some of the insights from those efforts:

• The AI/OR workshop (jointly organized by INFORMS, the CCC and ACM SIGAI) [5] reinforced our belief that the time is right for us to actively engage with the computer science communities on promoting interdisciplinary collaboration between the two groups. Both communities see tremendous value in such a collaboration. We plan to organize two more workshops in 2022 and perhaps a hackathon with participation from both the AI and OR communities.
• We must find opportunities for joint activities between the two communities, including summer schools, multidisciplinary workshops and tutorials, participation in each other’s conferences, etc.
• We must actively engage with the federal government’s AI initiative with assistance from the SIGNAL Group.
• We must ensure that our community is recognized as a key player in the AI world.

I believe that continuing such an interdisciplinary collaboration is important for the future of our profession. I welcome input from our many INFORMS community leaders and experts interested in AI-OR collaboration to help us determine the form and function that will serve our members well.

Shoutout to the INFORMS Roundtable 

I would like to end my column by recognizing an impressive milestone anniversary with a shoutout to the INFORMS Roundtable. It is my pleasure to congratulate the members of the INFORMS Roundtable, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. For many years, I was a SAS Institute representative on the Roundtable and enjoyed many valuable discussions with my peers in other organizations. So, I am especially glad to have an opportunity to applaud the Roundtable on this occasion. The INFORMS Roundtable is a premier group of organizations that have nurtured OR/MS excellence in practice and provided practitioner-inspired leadership to our profession. We are proud of the connection between the Roundtable and the INFORMS organization and look forward to many more years of working together to promote the practice of OR/MS and support the growth of successful OR/MS groups in industry. We wish continued success in the years to come and welcome any opportunities to serve the missions of both the Roundtable and INFORMS, especially in matters related to practice.

References

1. Radhika Kulkarni, 2022, “Top 10 Opportunities from the 2022 INFORMS President,” OR/MS Today, Feb. 3, https://doi.org/10.1287/orms.2022.01.03.
2. Allen Butler, David Hunt and Radhika Kulkarni, 2021, “Impact of INFORMS’ Strategic Plan: Where the Rubber Meets the Road,” OR/MS Today, June 3, https://doi.org/10.1287/orms.2021.03.15.
3. https://www.informs.org/Explore/Building-Successful-O.R.-and-Analytics-Teams
4. Radhika Kulkarni, 2021, “INFORMS AI Initiative and the AI-OR Workshop,” OR/MS Today, Dec. 8, https://doi.org/10.1287/orms.2021.06.17.

https://cra.org/ccc/events/artifical-intelligence-operations-research-workshop/