Introduction: 2021 Franz Edelman Award for Achievement in Advanced Analytics, Operations Research, and Management Science

Selection committee members, verifiers, coaches, judges, and those supporting the award ceremony all deserve thanks for the effort they put into making the Franz Edelman Award competition a success—in spite of the disruptive pandemic.

We thank this year’s members of the selection committee: Carrie Beam (chair), Layek Abdel-Malek, Jeffrey Alden, Sudharshana Apte, Sharon Arroyo, Sudip Bhattacharjee, Ann Bixby, Paul Brooks, Aaron Burciaga, Pooja Dewan, Carol DeZwarte, Goutam Dutta, Gul Ege, Michael F. Gorman, Genetha Gray, Shailendra Jain, Burcu B. Keskin, Margarit Khachatryan, Don Kleinmuntz, Russell Labe, Tim Lowe, Polly Mitchell-Guthrie, Sven Müller, Chanel Murray, Ranganath Nuggehalli, Kamran Paynabar, Catherine Petersen, Patti Phillips, Sanjay Prasad, Michael Prokle, Mikael Rönnqvist, Cynthia Rudin, Harrison Schramm, Onur Seref, Zohar Strinka, Kendra Taylor, Rajesh Tyagi, Andrés Weintraub, and Xiaodi Zhu.

We thank the verifiers: Jeffrey Alden, Sudharshana Apte, Sudip Bhattacharjee, Ann Bixby, Aaron Burciaga, Carol DeZwarte, Goutam Dutta, Gul Ege, Shailendra Jain, Burcu B. Keskin, Margarit Khachatryan, Russell Labe, Chanel Murray, Catherine Petersen, Patti Phillips, Michael Prokle, Mikael Rönnqvist, Cynthia Rudin, Harrison Schramm, Zohar Strinka, Kendra Taylor, Rajesh Tyagi, and Xiaodi Zhu.

We thank the coaches: Jeffrey Alden, Aaron Burciaga, Goutam Dutta, Gul Ege, Chanel Murray, Sanjay Prasad, Michael Prokle, Mikael Rönnqvist, Kendra Taylor, Rajesh Tyagi, Andrés Weintraub, and Xiaodi Zhu.

We thank the judging panel: Carrie Beam (chair), Ann Bixby, Michael F. Gorman, Terry Harrison, Shailendra Jain, Tim Lowe, Aly Megahed, Harrison Schramm, and Kermit Threatte.

We thank the Edelman Award Ceremony Organizing Committee: Peter Bell (chair), Jeffrey Alden, Carrie Beam, Robert Dell, Pooja Dewan, Mary Helander, Erica Klampfl, and Russell Labe.

We thank the INFORMS staff members who helped with this year’s Edelman Award Ceremony: Christy Blevins, Ashley Kilgore, Mary Leszczynski, Max Liberatore-Resnick, Mary Magrogan, Olivia Schmitz, and Kara Tucker. We thank Dionne Aleman and Zahir Balaporia, who served as the award’s masters of ceremonies.

We thank the INFORMS staff who helped with many aspects of the process.

A final thanks from one of the authors (Milne), who is completing his 10th and final year as special issue editor of these Edelman finalist papers. I am grateful to the former editor-in-chief (EiC) of the journal, Srinivas Bollapragada, and the current EiC, Michael F. Gorman, for their guidance and allowing me to insist that the world’s best work in applied analytics be explained clearly enough that even I could understand as much of it as would fit within the page limits. Finally, my appreciation for the journal’s manuscript editor, Alice Mack, cannot be overstated. Having edited for the journal since 2006, Alice blends her knowledge of how an analytics success story should be conveyed with her judgment, brilliant editing, and meticulous attention to detail. Her talent and conscientious efforts have greatly improved the quality of these issues.