For more than 20 years, the Alexander Hamilton Awards from Treasury & Risk have recognized corporate treasury, finance, and risk management teams that have pursued innovation—and succeeded wildly in that pursuit. Speaking with the professionals who drove the award-winning initiatives is always an honor and a learning experience.

This year's winners in the Operational Risk Management & Insurance category demonstrate the benefits an organization can achieve when risk management decision-makers think outside the box.

• Silver Award: To improve agility in its casualty reserving practices, Herc Rentals developed a new model that an internal risk analyst can use to calculate monthly adjustments.
• Gold Award: The U.S. Postal Service harnessed a machine learning solution to predict and guard against fraud in customers' debit-card payments.

What these two projects have in common—in addition to their successful pursuit of creative new uses for analytics technologies—is a focus on working collaboratively across functional boundaries. “The data science and exploration group had never interfaced with finance before,” says John Greaves, chief data scientist in the advanced analytics division of the U.S. Postal Service. “Tapping their domain knowledge was extremely valuable.” Adds Elizabeth M. Schafer, treasurer of the U.S. Postal Service: “Our secret to success was our willingness to listen to one another. We always respected one another's expertise and opinion, which built a culture of collaboration and helpfulness that enabled this project to thrive.”