A look at the coming year with the 2025 INFORMS President, Part 1

Ashley K:
Welcome to a brand New Year of Resounding the Human Podcasts. Whether this is your first episode or you are a long time listener, thank you for joining us and I hope you’ll subscribe for even more great content highlighting the incredible contributions of INFORMS members. To kick off our first episode of the new year, joining me is the 2025 INFORMS President Dave Hunt, vice President at Oliver Wyman and a 30 plus year informs member who received the INFORMS President’s award for his role in founding informs pro bono analytics and chairing the INFORMS Ethics Guidelines committee. Dave, thank you so much for joining me.
Dave Hunt:
Well of course, Ashley, I’m very happy to be here and
Ashley K:
Happy New Year to you as well.
Dave Hunt:
Same to you. Thank you.
Ashley K:
Alright, so now we’re going to do something a little different with your inaugural presidential interview and divide it into two parts. In this first part we’ll give listeners a chance to get to know you, and in the second part we’ll take a look at exciting new developments coming down the pipeline in the field of OMS analytics, data science, ai and more. So Dave, as a longtime member, I’d love to start off by hearing how your relationship with INFORMS began.
Dave Hunt:
Sure. I was in the transportation program in grad school at Princeton University, which was part of civil engineering and operations research. Now it’s orfe, it’s operations research and financial engineering, but it was CE or when I was there and I started taking operations research classes from people known it in informs such as Warren Powell and John Malvie and my advisor Alan Cornhouser. And I learned about the predecessors of informs at that time the Operations Research Society of America and the Institute of Management Sciences. So I ended up joining ORSA in 91 and then when ORSA and Tims merged in 95, I was part of the group that helped create the railway application section. So that’s when I got much more involved in IT forums. I also went to local meetings of the New Jersey chapter and met people there. And before I knew it, I was on the Subdivisions Council, I was on the informed board and now I’m doing a resoundingly human podcast. So it goes quickly.
Ashley K:
Well now you’ve made it
Dave Hunt:
Exactly. This is it. The final step,
Ashley K:
Dave. So I’d love to revisit some of the objectives you outlined in your candidate statement, which appeared in OMS Today Magazine and to all our listeners, I’ll include a link to that article in our show notes. One particular point you made was regarding the member value. Could you talk a bit about what you mean by that?
Dave Hunt:
Sure, actually, well, I mean, whether you’re a student or well into your career like I am, it’s always important to continue building out your network and staying current with new research and topics. And also to advance your career through volunteering leadership opportunities and peer recognition. So I realized that people have a lot of options in how they go about doing this. And when I think about value, I mean are the benefits that a member gets for investing their money and their time into participating in informs better than the benefits they would get by doing it elsewhere? And I think we have to think about this in two ways. If the member’s participation at INFORMS is being sponsored by their organization. So we have to think about does informs provide enough value for the member to tell their university or their company that informs is a place where they want to participate? And then does the university or company get value and benefits by supporting their employees participation there? I think the answer to both of those is yes, but we have to always keep improving and stay current and make sure that we continue to deliver value to all of our members.
Ashley K:
I love that. So Dave, another topic you highlighted is the importance of championing the OMS profession beyond the INFORMS community, what are some ways you hope to do that?
Dave Hunt:
Well, informs does a great job, I mean, to our advocacy program. I mean Laura Albert was instrumental in starting that and it’s continued with Jeff Cohen and Ashley Smith on the staff and the advocacy committee. I mean, they’re doing great to champion our profession to policy makers. And in the press also we have a NSF liaison committee that provides input on funding opportunities. And the 2024 President Julie Swan added informs representation to a couple of accreditation boards that are helping to shape academic programs. So informs is constantly promoting our profession. However, I think we’re doing a much better job of advocacy for our academic members than we are for our practice members. And a group that I’d like to try to reach better, and I admit this is not an easy group to get to, are the C-suite, the chief information officers, the chief technology officers, to make sure that they understand the value of having their employees participate in forms and to make sure that they appreciate the benefits of operations research and what it can do for their companies.
Ashley K:
Great. So Dave, you’ve previously served as the INFORMS treasurer and in that role have helped ensure the financial stability of informs. Can you share how that will impact your presidency?
Dave Hunt:
Sure. One of the things we did when I was treasurer was implement a five-year financial plan to get us back to a balanced budget that the pandemic threw us off a bit there. And thanks to the leadership of the current treasurer, Susan Martin and the fact that the members have returned to our conferences and the staff, Elena, the executive director and the rest of the staff have been doing a great job of keeping expenses down, we’re actually exceeding the projections in the five-year plan. We’re not at a balance’s budget yet, but we’re getting closer overall, I’m feeling really good about where informs this financially. So to answer your question, I really don’t anticipate the finances will have a large impact on my presidency. We have our reserves that are in good shape and as Elena Kurtzman likes to say, we have the money necessary to make smart investments. So I don’t think it will have much of an impact.
Ashley K:
So Dave, something I’ve also discussed in interviews with previous presidents is informs strong commitment to supporting and furthering DEI in the INFORMS membership. What additional progress are you hoping to make here?
Dave Hunt:
Well, informs has made great progress. I mean, I was first on the board in 20 14, 20 15, and just seeing the progress we’ve made from then until now, it’s been tremendous in terms of broader participation of all the members, making sure that we’re more aware of awards and opportunities for leadership, that we’re being more inclusive of all the members. We have a really good DEI committee and they have plans to continue this progress. I will say it’s unfortunate that the term DEI has become so politicized. It’ll be interesting to see how that’s going to play out in 2025. But regardless, I’m committed to continue doing the right thing for all of our members. And one thing that I do want to promote is that our solutions should be available and equitable to everyone. And what I mean by that is that it’s not just the large companies that should be benefiting from what we do.
And don’t get me wrong, I mean I love big solutions. I mean, I’m just blown away each year by the Edelman finalist and the work that they’re doing. But those projects, I realized they take years and a lot of money to make them happen and make them successful. So I’d like to call on the informed members to consider volunteering some of their time in 2025 to apply their skills to benefit small nonprofit organizations in their communities. If it’s something you can’t do on your own, reach out to the informed pro bono analytics committee and we can help find a team of volunteers to help you out. So just get involved, do something. I like to say our tagline is Smarter Decisions for a Better World. Our tagline is not smarter decisions for those with the resources to hire an analytics team.
Ashley K:
All right, Dave, something I love to do with each of our incoming presidents is a lightning round of fun fast questions to give our listeners the chance to get to know you even better. Are you game?
Dave Hunt:
Sure. Fire away.
Ashley K:
Alrighty, here we go. What was your favorite TV show when you were a kid?
Dave Hunt:
How far back do you want to go with this? So if we go back to preschool, I remember watching Rofer room, so I had my romper stompers, but the best part was at the end of each show, the host would hold up a magic mirror and look through your TV and just call out names. I can see Ashley and I can see Dave, and I have to admit, I occasionally think about Romper room when I’m on video calls, looking at people through their computers.
Ashley K:
Dave, any surprise hobbies others might not know about?
Dave Hunt:
I’m into hot power yoga. I try to go daily just to get some exercise in.
Ashley K:
Excellent. What did you want to be when you were growing up?
Dave Hunt:
President of informs Nofor didn’t exist at that time, but yeah, I’ll probably have to say shortstop For the Cincinnati Reds though for the baseball fans out there, I really liked the big red machine sheen.
Ashley K:
All right. Do you have a favorite snack food?
Dave Hunt:
It’s hard to beat the basic potato chip.
Ashley K:
Agreed. If you could have a conversation with anyone in history, who would it be?
Dave Hunt:
I’d go with Richard Feinman, the physicist. I think he’s a fascinating person and I hope he brings his bongo drums.
Ashley K:
Alright. Name something that’s on your bucket list.
Dave Hunt:
I don’t really have a bucket list. I have list of things that I do, but my whole goal seems to be just how quickly I can cross things off my list. I don’t think a bucket list really works for me. So sorry to disappoint you, but I just don’t have a bucket.
Ashley K:
No, I thank you. I think a lot of people are in that same, my bucket list is mostly on post-its and it’s very rewarding to cross it off.
Dave Hunt:
Exactly. Just be done with it.
Ashley K:
Alright, finally, what advice would you share with your younger self?
Dave Hunt:
I’d say Don, don’t wait to figure everything out. You’re never going to have all the answers, just jump in and do stuff.
Ashley K:
Very good advice. All right, Dave, thank you again for joining me. To introduce yourself to our listeners and give us a look at what’s to come in the year ahead. As a final thought, can you share what are you most looking forward to as the 2025 Inform President?
Dave Hunt:
Just the opportunity to meet with members. I mean, I have a lot of friends at informs that I’ve made over the past 30 some years, and I hope to make a lot more friends. So if you see me at a conference stop, say hello, introduce yourself, feel free to reach out. So just getting to meet more members to me is the most fun and interesting part of this.
Ashley K:
All right, to all our listeners, tune in later this month for part two of my conversation with Dave. When we take a closer look at Dave’s own career, as well as a broader look at the direction, the field of ORMS and analytics, including exciting new buzzwords, groundbreaking areas of research and application and more. If you’d like to learn more about today’s episode and guest, visit resoundingly human.com and check out our show notes. The podcast is also available for streaming and download on Amazon Music, apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Spotify. Wherever you listen, please be sure to leave a five star review to help others find and enjoy the podcast. Until next time, I’m Ashley K and this is resoundingly human.