OR/MS Today - December 1999

December 1999

In the Line of Service

INFORMS bestows Kimball Medals on Harris, Robinson

Carl Harris and Randy Robinson, two longtime members of INFORMS who served the profession and the Institute in a variety of capacities for several decades, received the George E. Kimball Medal at the INFORMS Philadelphia Fall 1999 Meeting.

Kimball Medal Committee Chairman Peter Norden made the presentations. The Kimball Medal is presented annually in recognition of distinguished service to the Institute and the professions of operations research and the management sciences.

In accepting the award, Harris acknowledged a long list of mentors and colleagues, family and friends,

society officers and staffers. "It's important to thank all the wonderful people I've worked with over the years," Harris said, "starting with the two original societies (ORSA and TIMS) and now INFORMS. I had a wonderful time."

Claiming it was easy for him to justify the service part of his life because it was ingrained in him when he was "just a child in the 1960s," Harris told the audience he was "delighted" by the progress the society has made over the years.

"As I contemplate my own retirement, whenever that may be, I know I'll be quite proud to say that I was an operations researcher," Harris concluded.

Randy Robinson, the founding executive director of INFORMS until his retirement last year, said he hopes the Kimball Medal "indicates that I have managed to give back at least a small fraction of what the profession has given to me. I realize that there's not one single thing on the list of milestones that I did alone.

"I had the opportunity to work with many great people," Robinson continued. "The community of active volunteers, staff members and others. This award is for you.

"There are many things left to do to strengthen the professional and strengthen INFORMS," Robinson concluded. "I hope I can continue to help."
Citation Excerpts

Carl Harris: After receiving his Ph.D. degree from the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn in 1966, Carl M. Harris held his first professional position with the Western Electric Company, after which he joined the non-profit Research Analysis Corporation. Following RAC, he began his academic career at The George Washington University, subsequently going to Syracuse University as chair of Industrial Engineering and Operations Research. After Syracuse, he went to the University of Virginia and then finally to George Mason University, where he has been department chair and associate dean. He is currently the BDM International Professor of Operations Research at GMU. For many years, he has also been an active consultant in OR to government and industry. He is the author/co-author of approximately 80 refereed papers, co-author of three editions of the popular text "Fundamentals of Queueing Theory," co-editor of three volumes of research papers, and co-author of two large queueing software packages. He is co-editor of the "Encyclopedia of Operations Research and Management Science."

Carl has been unselfish and generous in providing dedicated service to ORSA, TIMS and INFORMS for many years, ultimately leading to his election as secretary and president of ORSA.

Dr. Harris has served as area/associate editor for the ORSA Journal on Computing, Queueing Systems, Operations Research and International Abstracts of Operations Research. He has served on nearly every major ORSA and INFORMS committee — Lanchester Prize, Practice of OR, Publications and Public Awareness, to name a few; and he has chaired many.

Carl Harris created the INFORMS President's Award and proposed the INFORMS Prize for the Exemplary Practice of OR. As member and past chair of the History and Traditions Committee, he is co-designer of the Presidential Photo Gallery.

Randall S. Robinson: Randall S. Robinson has a passion for operations research and the management sciences. His entire professional career, since earning his doctorate from the Sloan School at MIT in 1964, has been devoted to this field. In his early years, he worked in OR/MS practice for several organizations, often specializing in financial applications. In 1976, he settled into a 19-year career with Babcock & Wilcox and then its successor through merger, McDermott Incorporated, where he rose through a succession of assignments to become director of Decision Technologies and Operations Research. After retiring from corporate life in 1995, he became the founding executive director of INFORMS, from which he retired last year. To this day, he remains active as an OR/MS consultant.

Randy joined both TIMS and ORSA 42 years ago, while a graduate student at MIT. In 1986, he was elected TIMS vice-president for Finance. Toward the end of a second term in that position, in 1993, he became chair of the OR/MS Board (combined Councils of ORSA and TIMS) and its Executive Committee for two years, during which time the merger of ORSA and TIMS into INFORMS was approved by the OR/MS Board and then the memberships. Randy was elected president of TIMS in 1994, but because of the merger served only as president-elect. Also in 1994, he was founding president of the original INFORMS Corporation, when the organizing legal work was carried out. In 1995, he became director at large on the INFORMS Board, and then founding executive director of INFORMS.

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