It is my great pleasure to announce the results of this year's INFORMS/Organization Science Dissertation Proposal Competition. The eight finalists were selected out of more than 100 submissions based on evaluations by blind reviewers. This past weekend during the INFORMS Annual Conference, these finalists presented their dissertation proposals to a distinguished panel of judges. All of the finalists did an outstanding job presenting their proposals, and the judges had the unenviable task of selecting a winner and a runner-ups based on the quality, potential contribution, and innovativeness of the dissertation proposal.
Before I announce the winner and the runner-ups, I would like to extend my sincere appreciation to the panel of judges. Each judge generously volunteered their time for the competition and provided the finalists with insightful and constructive feedback on their dissertations. This year's panel of judges included:
Ashish Arora (Duke University)
Emily Bianchi (Emory University)
Kris Byron (Georgia State University)
Nan Jia (University of Southern California)
Saerom (Ronnie) Lee (University of Pennsylvania)
Mae McDonnell (University of Pennsylvania)
Lamar Pierce (Washington University in St. Louis)
Sameer Srivastava (University of California, Berkeley)
Basima Tewfik (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Without further ado, please see the results below. If you know the winner, the runner-ups, and/or the finalists, please congratulate them for this significant accomplishment!
The winner of the 2025 INFORMS Dissertation Proposal Competition is:
Clem Aeppli (Harvard University)
Workplace segregation and the structure of American racial earnings inequality
The runner-ups of the 2025 INFORMS Dissertation Proposal Competition are:
Wajeeha Ahmad (Stanford University)
Navigating Strategic and Societal Goals in the Governance of Artificial Intelligence
Hongyuan Xia (Cornell University)
How Does Industry Shape Academic Science? Evidence from "Million Dollar Plants"
The remaining finalists for the 2025 competition were:
Meenal Banga (University of Texas at Austin)
Creating a Road to Space: Counterfactual Imagination and the Creation of Futures in the Space Economy
Ilana Brody (University of California, Los Angeles)
The Descriptive-Prescriptive Paradox of Prioritizing Autonomy to Address Inequity
Laura Lam (University of Toronto)
When 'Who's In Charge' Is Ambiguous: Navigating Control, Voice, And Relationships In Relational Gig Work
Jessica Reif (Duke University)
The future of collaboration in knowledge-intensive organizations
Victoria Zhang (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Customers as a Constraint: How and when space constrains minority entrepreneurial success in U.S. street-level marketplaces
Sincerely,
Mike Park
INFORMS/Organization Science Dissertation Competition Chair, 2025
On behalf of the organizing committee (Summer Jackson, Ronnie Lee, Rebecca Ponce de Leon, and Basima Tewfik)
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Michael Park
Assistant Professor
INSEAD
Fontainebleau
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