O.R./Analytics at Work Blog
Blog Entries for analytics
My subject here is the "analytics initiative" that has earned a high priority with INFORMS and CPMS. Actions resulting so far from the initiative include publishing the online Analytics magazine, renaming and reprogramming the spring practice conference, organizing the new analytics section, and, when it comes to fruition, offering professional certification in analytics. As the topic of analytics rose to prominence, we heard various anxiety provoking questions that still may trouble some of us...
Professionals in the fields of operations research – which uses advanced analytical methods to help make better decisions – and analytics are slowly becoming aware of one another, and after 70 years of crunching numbers for business and government, the synergy is becoming more manifest...
My mother worked for EPA for almost 20 years, instilling me with a respect for the world around me. The topic of O.R. and the Environment seemed like a natural (weak pun intended) fit. I was struck by the sentence in Patricia Randall’s blog entry, “While I am certain it is possible to include green objectives in a model, I haven’t had a client say ‘Minimize my emissions or my carbon footprint’. Or have I?”
I guess it's time I introduce myself. My name is Kevin Geraghty. I am the new Editor-in-Chief of INFORMS Online, and I'm very excited by the opportunities and direction that INFORMS leadership intends to take our site. One of the more notable recent changes we are adopting for the INFORMS brand is the incorporation of the term ‘Analytics’.
My work in the area of biomass-for-biofuels began as an accident. I had just started working as an assistant professor at Mississippi State University (MSU), and being eager to secure research funding I responded to a call for proposals from the university’s newly founded Sustainable Energy Research Center (SERC). I didn’t get the grant, but...
I’m excited to be seeing you soon at the INFORMS Healthcare conference. It’s amazing that this specialized conference, offered for the first time, features 13-14 parallel tracks. Congratulations to the organizing committee for putting together such a rich schedule. As part of my preparations for leaving, I was looking over the latest travel news and noticed that a computer glitch at United Airlines had led to the stranding of thousands of passengers.
There has been a lot of buzz about the analytics movement here at INFORMS beginning with the Capgemeini study that was completed last fall. The INFORMS Board of Directors have approved funding to build out the executive forum at the rebranded Analytics Conference, as well as developing certification and continuing education programs.
As my operations-research readers know, analytics has become the word en vogue in the community - the INFORMS Practice conference was recently renamed INFORMS Conference on Business Analytics and Operations Research to reflect this trend, as Mike Trick pointed out in this blog post of his. My non-operations-research readers will be left thinking: what exactly is operations research anyway? Research on operations?
The strategic planning subcommittee of the 2011 INFORMS Practice Conference Organizing Committee has decided to take steps to re-configure and re-brand the Practice Conference to better serve the emerging business analytics field...

