Operations Research Workshop 2025: Empowering decisions through applied analytics.

By Klara Engelbrecht, Charlize Kriek and Rohan Naidoo

Last month, from the 10th–12th September, an Operations Research Workshop was hosted at the University of Cape Town. It was open to academic staff as well as Honours, Masters and PhD students with an interest in applied decision-making and analytics. The programme included talks, tutorials, and hands-on sessions with speakers from academia, government, and industry. Each day was split into two morning sessions and one afternoon session, with tea and lunch breaks in between, giving space for networking and discussion.

Day 1

Wednesday morning started with a presentation from Prof Franklin Djeumou Fomeni, who shared four different operations research projects he has worked on. These included work in air traffic management, tea blending in the UK, water supply optimisation, and smart logistics systems. These projects were striking examples of how OR can make a real-world impact. 

The second morning session was led by Prof Sheetal Silal, who introduced the different types and uses of web-based applications. She explained how they can be used as dashboards that tell a story with data, as engines that allow strategy testing, as facilitators that evaluate the impacts of changes, and even as debuggers to help spot errors in your code visually. Following this, Mr Retselisitsoe Monyake gave a live tutorial on building applications with the Shiny package in R-Studio, inviting the audience to code along with him. Mr Monyake also recommended Mastering Shiny by Hadley Wickham, which he described as a great resource for diving deeper.

In the afternoon, Dr Lieschen Venter gave an insightful talk on what a career as an OR graduate might look like in the private sector, public sector, or academia. She laid out the pros and cons of each: the private sector gives the satisfaction of seeing your work implemented quickly but comes with risk, academia offers a stable path and intellectual freedom but carries constant publication pressure, and the public sector allows you to make a social impact, though political risks and ethical responsibility can complicate the work. 

The day ended with an interactive session from Dr Robert Bennetto. He revisited a previous project he worked on where a South African coal transport company needed an automated scheduling tool for its trains. Just understanding the problem took months, and the project raised plenty of data and ethical challenges. As the audience, we debated which methods we would have tried, simulation, MIP, heuristics, metaheuristics, before hearing how the project actually unfolded. It was a lively way to wrap up the day and showed how technical modelling and human decision-making often collide in practice.

Day 2

On Thursday, Dr. Robert Bennetto began the day with an engaging session on Industrial Scheduling, focusing on exact methods for solving the Capacitated Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows (CVRPTW). He elaborated on the various constraints and cutting methods that can be applied to this problem. After explaining the theoretical formulation, Dr. Bennetto shared practical applications, including a waste collection scenario and a mixed in-source–outsource scheduling case. 

In the afternoon, Prof Renette Blignaut presented a thought-provoking session on the Use of Artificial Intelligence in Operations Research (OR). She highlighted the contrast between traditional OR, which is typically structured and deterministic, and AI-enhanced OR, which leverages adaptive and dynamic models. A major discussion point centred on the ethics of AI use, particularly the importance of maintaining human judgment. Blignaut emphasised that practitioners should not rely solely on AI outputs, but also apply intuition and critical thinking, asking whether the model or its results truly make sense.

Dr. Jonas Stray’s then presented on Analytics in Retail. He began by outlining the structure of analytics teams within the retail sector and how they collaborate with business and executives. Dr. Stray then discussed a range of retail-focused analytics projects, including demand planning, price optimisation, distribution allocation, target arrival optimisation, markdown optimisation, and safety stock management, among others. He concluded by showcasing the tangible impact of these projects, with some initiatives achieving profit improvements of up to 12%.

The day ended with an introduction to systems thinking and dynamics by Dr Lieschen Venter.

Day 3

We began the final day right where we left off on Thursday, with this session having a focus on implementing what we learned about systems dynamics. Dr Venter guided us through the process of representing complex behaviours, and the paradigm shift that is required to think in this way. With the knowledge we had acquired, we were able to build a small model in AnyLogic; a powerful tool for simulation. This allowed us to mark areas for improvement in the system, and to see how distinct parts of a system can affect the outcome.

After breaking for tea, Dr Isabel Meyer presented her work at the CSIR and delved into the different strategies that are employed in the institute’s decision-support applications. The talk helped shed light on the role of the CSIR as a trusted intermediary that works with various bodies to contribute to existing knowledge. A great emphasis was placed on the importance of soundly structured problems, and the understanding that can be gained from well-constructed models.

Dr Meyer’s talk served as a suitable introduction to Prof. Leanne Scott’s session on overviewing problem structure methods. The presentation provided clarity on the purposes of soft and hard OR and displayed the usefulness of techniques like MCDA by the means of some interesting case studies. Once again, attention was drawn to the importance of problem structuring, along with the myriad nuances that accompany it. A key takeaway was on maintaining stakeholder involvement within the decision process, especially in solving problems where these are the people affected.

After a good lunch, we entered our final session of the workshop. Prof Fomeni, who had presented on the first day, briefly introduced us to the quadratic knapsack problem. What followed was a fun competition to see who could develop the best sorting criteria algorithm in the time that we had left, with the winners receiving a cash prize.

In conclusion, the workshop was a wonderful event for so many soon-to-be OR graduates like me. The opportunity to observe practical implementations and engage with seasoned professionals was of immeasurable value. Heartfelt appreciation is due to the speakers and to UCT for hosting us!