INFORMS Open Forum

  • 1.  If you had one month and a $1,000,000 budget to tackle any work project, what would it be?

    Posted 02-02-2023 16:50

    If you had one month and a $1,000,000 budget to tackle any work project, what would it be?



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    Horia Tipi
    Global Optimization Practice Leader
    FICO
    NEW YORK NY
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  • 2.  RE: If you had one month and a $1,000,000 budget to tackle any work project, what would it be?

    Posted 02-08-2023 10:02
    So this isn't necessarily a work project per se, but here goes:

    One of my responsibilities is serving on my local school board. Our community is a very diverse, high poverty community and our school district is underfunded. In an attempt to "spread the gospel of analytics", I would implement some type of analytics education initiative in our district. Two significant obstacles in successfully implementing the initiative would be:

    1. I'm unsure what could be accomplished in 30 days
    2. The other eight school board members would have to agree to spend the funds in the manner I suggest

    I hope this post helps gets the conversation started.


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    Neil Desnoyers
    ndesnoye@sju.edu
    Adjunct Professor
    Saint Joseph's University
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    Original Message


  • 3.  RE: If you had one month and a $1,000,000 budget to tackle any work project, what would it be?

    Posted 02-08-2023 11:59
    I'd like to convince my local grocery store (Wegmans) to adopt a single line for its cashiers (like Trader Joe's). The game of trying to pick the line with the fewest people and hoping no issues arise is not fun.

    As Neil points out, I'm not sure 30 days would be long enough to accomplish this goal.

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    Kathryn Walter
    Senior Operations Research Analyst
    Avista Corp
    Houston TX
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    Original Message


  • 4.  RE: If you had one month and a $1,000,000 budget to tackle any work project, what would it be?

    Posted 02-09-2023 05:19

    In South Africa, people are spending more than 3 hours in clinics, with it not being uncommon to spend the entire day in the clinic and not receive services.  I would spend money assessing clinic systems in HIV focused clinics.  There would be lots of visits, interviews, and data collection throughout South Africa.  Although most blame lack of staff for these long wait times, I think resolving system issue would have a bigger impact, and cheaper, than hiring more people, which is impossible at this point.  I would model clinics that were more complicated.  The $1M over 30 days would be a proof of concept, and hope for additional funds to continue in South Africa and throughout Africa.



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    Michael Washington
    Health Scientist
    Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
    Dulles VA
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    Original Message


  • 5.  RE: If you had one month and a $1,000,000 budget to tackle any work project, what would it be?

    Posted 02-10-2023 11:05

    I would use the money to give 10,000 microloans of $100 each. Repayment rates on microloans have been shown to be extraordinarily high, so I could give new microloans as the previous microloans were repaid. This could likely be sustained beyond my life. 



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    James J. Cochran
    Associate Dean for Faculty and Research
    The University of Alabama
    Tuscaloosa AL
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    Original Message


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