INFORMS announces the next cohort of Senior Members. INFORMS members can earn the Senior Member distinction by being the most committed members of our community – the ones who get involved, contribute and engage. The base requirement for becoming a Senior Member is simply being a Regular INFORMS member for five (or more) continuous years.
FEATURED ARTICLE
How Difficult Should the U.S. Open Be?
Every June, like clockwork, golf pros complain that the just-played U.S. Open course was too difficult. All sorts of unkind statements are made about how the USGA, as the pros say, takes a perfectly good course and makes it impossible to play. The reasoning behind the USGA’s perhaps overly difficult course setup is that it is assumed that the more difficult the course, the more likely the event will identify the best golfer – the golfer who can excel at all facets of the game. Is that assumption correct? Can that assumption be tested statistically or otherwise? This paper is an initial, far from perfect, attempt to examine if difficulty equates to better identification.
LATEST NEWS 
FEATURED ARTICLE
From Misinformation to Trust: Safeguarding the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election
Several reoccurring election security themes in mainstream and social media have reemerged since 2020 (albeit in 2024 incarnations) as perceived public concerns threatening the integrity of the election process and results. In particular, election misinformation/disinformation pervading social media, security of election and voting equipment and processes, and the integrity of the election workers to administer a fair election in which any eligible voter’s valid votes are cast and counted as the voter intended. Thus, riding into the November 2024 U.S. presidential election, it is critical to understand the context and veracity of these echoing public concerns to separate polarized hearsay from legitimate concerns.
SPONSORED CONTENT from Gurobi
Big Tasks for Small Computers
Most current ideas about computing seem to revolve around the notion of putting together an optimal computer for a specific – generally cutting-edge, “big data” – task. For the past couple of years, I have focused on the following question: What is the “best thing” I can get the “worst computer” to do? This piece is a sampler of technical advice, philosophy and the story of running generative text-to-image artificial intelligence (AI) on an $80 single-board computer (SBC).
What's Your StORy?
Lamar Pierce
“For me, it's always been about integrating with the community in multiple fields. I'm a little bit of a strange character in that I'm at the intersection of strategy and organizational behavior, and marketing and operations. For me, INFORMS is the perfect place for that overlap of ideas.”
—Lamar Pierce, Beverly and James Hance Professor of Strategy at Washington University in St. Louis, and editor-in-chief of Organization Science
Click here to watch the full video interview.FEATURED ARTICLE
Processes, probabilities, performance: How O.R. enables success for university administrators
The field of operations research (O.R.) provides a platform of opportunities to contribute to our communities. Scientists extend the theoretical underpinnings of our discipline. Educators convey concepts in the classroom. Practitioners build analytical models to investigate situations encountered by actual organizations. Indeed, O.R. has an inspired past, promising present and flourishing future. Like many of you, I can trace my O.R. passion to the university classroom. Permit me to offer four instances in which O.R. has offered conceptual understanding and analytical awareness, thereby enabling my ability to serve in university senior leadership positions.
SPONSORED CONTENT from INFORMS
Behind the scenes with the #INFORMS2024 Plenaries: Featuring Koen Peters, World Food Programme
We signed up for the Franz Edelman Award basically during the peak of Covid. So we’d been going through this transformation journey at WFP of bringing more and more analytics into the way that we manage and design our operations, which was really brought to an explosion during the COVID peak because we had to go from an organization that was 8-9 billion dollars per year to 13-14 billion dollars per year in terms of assistance. So everything was supercharged, the complexity skyrocketed. We really required these analytics to help us really master this complexity.
We’re in the countdown to the 2024 INFORMS Annual Meeting, in Seattle, Washington, October 20-23, when more than 6,000 INFORMS members, students, prospective employers and employees, and academic and industry experts will share the ways O.R. and analytics are fueling Smarter Decisions for a Better World.
Joining me to give a sneak peek of this year’s meeting is Koen Peters, head of optimization for the World Food Programme’s Supply Chain Planning & Optimization branch. For the last decade he has been leading initiatives in the area of optimization and analytics, including tools that are now used to inform the design of food baskets, sourcing strategies, and delivery networks. These user-friendly solutions ensure that WFP can reach as many people in need as possible with available resources, and were awarded with the 2021 Franz Edelman Award for Achievement in Advanced Analytics, Operations Research and Management Science.
Koen holds a Master of science degree in operations research and management science from Tilburg University, and is pursuing a PhD in humanitarian analytics at Tilburg University’s Zero Hunger Lab.
FEATURED ARTICLE
Embracing the Impact: Understanding the Decline of Impact Factors in INFORMS Journals and the Future of OR/MS Publishing
On June 20, 2024, Clarivate released the 2023 edition of its impact factors, confirming our predictions, particularly for several flagship INFORMS journals. Of the 12 INFORMS journals tracked by Clarivate, eight have experienced declines in their impact factors. INFORMS journals are not alone in this battle and have arguably fared better than many of their peers. What lies ahead for INFORMS journals and OR/MS publishing in general?
What's Your StORy?
Javad Mohammadi
“My advice for young professionals would be - don't be afraid to take steps. The cost of indecision is too much. If you're stuck at a point where you just need to take the next step, you will eventually get out of that local minimum point. Look around, take iterations. The starting point is important, but if you adjust the course of your career along the way, you'll eventually get to where you want to be.”
—Javad Mohammadi, Assistant Professor at the University of Texas at Dallas
Watch the full interview on the INFORMS YouTube channel.FEATURED ARTICLE
Using Six Sigma to Measure and Improve Data Quality
Data drives decisions, informs strategies and supports operations across all sectors. Poor data quality can lead to significant business losses and risks. Although strategic decisions succeed or fail based on many criteria besides bad data, the quality of data plays an important role. This article, based on successful programs at large companies, explores how Six Sigma, a well-established methodology for process improvement, can be used in an innovative way to enhance data quality.
DEPARTMENTS 
Inside Story
A Humble PSA
I’d like to start this column by expressing gratitude to all the members who responded to my request for feedback about the magazines, which was a call to action from last issue’s Inside Story.
President's Desk
Innovation for Impact: Let’s Invent the Future
Lately, I have been thinking about innovation, projecting the future and planning organizations that are prepared for the challenges of tomorrow. With this column, I will open that “can of worms” and share my thoughts with you. It would be great to hear what you are thinking as well (feel free to email me at [email protected]).
HQ Highlights
The Vital Role of In-Person Conferences in Advancing Technology and Scientific Discovery: An INFORMS Perspective
I love the power of conferences. In-person conferences provide a unique platform for professionals and students to present their latest findings and receive immediate feedback. These events bring people together in ways that build connections that might not otherwise happen. These connections can lead to conversations that range from small and short-term impacts, like a smile or a new friend, to lifelong collaborative partnerships that drive advancements in one’s field and ultimately change the world.
Innovative Education
Teaching Data Science is Difficult! How to Make Data Science Learning Fun and Rewarding
The fields of business analytics, data science and machine learning (ML) are experiencing rapid growth in both industry and academia, necessitating effective educational approaches. Universities globally are launching programs at various levels, but it is crucial to develop methods that provide comprehensive knowledge while remaining accessible. This article addresses the primary challenges and proposes strategies for effectively teaching data science.
Viewpoint
Do They Age Like Wine or Cheese? How Different Generations Embrace Health Tech
When it comes to healthcare and technology, it is important to keep in mind generational differences – much like storing wine and cheese.
Subject to ...
10 Moments in the History of O.R.
The s.t. podcast offers a series of informal yet in-depth conversations with relevant figures in the fields of O.R., optimization and logistics in the form of oral history. The goal of s.t. is to inspire different generations of scholars and practitioners of such fields by providing technical insights and portraying the human side of these prominent names. I decided to select and present some interesting moments in the history of O.R. featured across different s.t. episodes. This was certainly not an easy task, but I was finally able to compile the following 10 anecdotes (in no particular order of relevance or importance).
Member Insights
How Mathematical Optimization Helps to Improve Customer Experience and Fraud Defense for Consumer Banking
Although mathematical optimization has been used in portfolio optimization for decades, we have not seen a great deal of new use cases in finance that leverage the power of optimization. Most practitioners today focus on the use of machine learning in banking and thus might overlook the power of the optimization modeling technique. In 2022, my team and I were tasked by one of the largest and leading technology-driven consumer banks in the U.S. to improve some of its critical business policies, which impact the banking experience of its millions of customers. By leveraging an integer programming-based solution, we were able to not only significantly improve its customer experience but also automate the previously manual and labor-consuming business procedures.
Tech Tips
Implementing Email Attachment Security
Businesses typically send documents to their customers via email as part of their operations. These documents could include renters or vehicle insurance, medical receipts, online transaction receipts and more. Documents are sent as attachments and contain customers’ personal data, which make them easy targets for hackers and prone to fraud. I propose two layers of security to be implemented to avoid fraud and secure email communications, using Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Python libraries.
Conference Preview
Seattle awaits! Register today for the 2024 INFORMS Annual Meeting
INFORMS is preparing to host more than 6,000 members of the INFORMS community in Seattle, October 20-23, including students, industry experts and academic scholars. The 2024 INFORMS Annual Meeting promises a broad exploration of how operations research (O.R.) and analytics are driving smarter decisions for a better world.
Student Perspectives
Enhancing Fairness and Reducing Bias in Emergency Response: Integrating Operations Research and AI
This article examines how operations research and artificial intelligence can be effectively combined to improve fairness and minimize bias in emergency response operations.
Last Word
On Surnames, Symbols and Goals
This year, the EURO Gold Medal 2024 – the highest European recognition in the field of operations research – was awarded to Maria Grazia Speranza, full professor at the University of Brescia (Italy) and author of the recent book “Women’s Surname.” She is the third woman in almost 50 years of the European Association of Operations Research (EURO) to receive this designation.
