Past Awards
The INFORMS President’s Award is given to recognize work that advances the welfare of society. William ‘Bill’ Pierskalla is an academic with strong analytic skills and one of the earliest operations researchers to focus his capabilities and energies on health care delivery. He is one of the top leaders in the world for his many contributions to the design and operation of the nation's health care delivery system. Through his numerous publications and lectures, he has made health care managers, policy makers and the public aware of the many causes of healthcare delivery cost, access, and quality problems and provided rationalized solutions to them. He has developed detailed process knowledge for operation of health care enterprises, and information for health care policy level decision-making. He has contributed his health care knowledge in many national academy study committees. He has been a leader in the education of operations researchers as the Chair of a health systems department, Director of a health economics institute, and Dean of the business school in a major university. He has provided extensive service to the OR profession, including serving as the Editor-in-Chief of the profession's premier journal, as President of the ORSA, and as the President of IFORS.
For his wide-ranging and critical contributions to the health services and to public services more generally, INFORMS is proud to present its President’s Award for 2005 to Dr. Bill Pierskalla.
- Richard C. Larson, INFORMS President 2005 (presenting the award in November 2005)