There is a new paper in the OR Forum area of the journal Operations Research. Written by ManMohan Sodhi and Chris Tang, it is entitled “The OR/MS Ecosystem: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats” and analyzes the state of the field, with a particular emphasis on the relationship between academia and practice. Check out the paper and commentaries, and provide your own thoughts on the issues! I am the Area Editor of the OR Forum: you can read more about what the area is about in this posting.
One bittersweet aspect: Mike Rothkopf provided a commentary one week before his death. I wish he could be here to add to the conversation (on this and many other things).