Authors: Eduard Calvo, Ruomeng Cui and Juan Camilo Serpa

Publication: Management Science, Volume 65, Issue 12, December 2019, Pages 5651-5675.

Abstract:

In the U.S., four in ten public infrastructure projects report delays or cost overruns. To tackle this problem, regulators often scrutinize the project contractor’s operations. We investigate the causal effect of government oversight on project efficiency by gleaning 262,857 projects that span seventy-one U.S. federal agencies and 54,739 contractors. Our identification strategy exploits a regulatory bylaw: if a project’s anticipated budget exceeds a threshold value, the contractor’s operations are subject to surveillance from independent procurement officers; otherwise, these operational checks are waived. Using a regression discontinuity design, we find that oversight is obstructive to the project’s operations, especially when the contractor (i) has no prior experience in public projects, (ii) is paid with a fixed-price contract that includes performance-based incentives, and (iii) performs a labor-intensive task. In contrast, oversight is least obstructive — or beneficial — when the contractor (i) is experienced, (ii) is paid with a time-and-materials contract, and (iii) performs a machine-intensive task.

Authors: Paul Intrevado,  Vedat Verter and Lucie Tremblay

Publication: Health Care Management Science, Forthcoming

Abstract:

Authors: Wei Qi, Lefei Li, Sheng Liu, Zuo-Jun Max Shen

Publication: Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, Vol. 20, No. 4, Fall 2018

Abstract:

Authors: Manaf Zargoush, Mehmet Gumus, Vedat Verter, Stella Daskalopoulou

Journal Name: Production and Operations Management, Forthcoming

Abstract:

Hypertension has not been well studied by operations researchers from a clinical decision support perspective. Moreover, little personalized (i.e. patient-centric) guidance is available regarding the number and combination of antihypertensive medications. To fill this gap, we develop a Markov Decision Process (MDP) to characterize the optimal sequence (and combination) of antihypertensive medications under the standard medication dose. Our model is patient-centric as it takes into account a set of relevant patient characteristics such as age, gender, blood pressure level, smoking habits, diabetes status, and cholesterol level. Based on a set of intuitive assumptions, we prove that our model yields a series of structured optimal policies. Having calibrated our model based on real data and medical literature, we analyze these optimal policies and discuss their insights to the real practice. We also compare the benefits, in terms of quality adjusted life expectancy, QALE, obtained from our results with those obtained from British Hypertension Society (BHS) guideline.

The McGill Food Analytics Club (McGill FAC) is a student-driven data analytics club that focuses on food. As the world is heading towards a massive food crisis the next decade, there is an urgent need to come up with solutions. Inspired and supported by Desautels Professor Juan Camilo Serpa, the club members want to contribute to solving this food crisis with data analytics. This includes research, coding and outreach.

Professor Juan Serpa's paper "The Impact of Supply Chains on Firm-Level Productivity," together with Harish Krishnan was selected by the Editor-in-Chief of Management Science one of the three Featured Articles for the February 2018 issue.

Management Science is a scholarly journal that publishes scientific research on the practice of management. Within our scope are all aspects of management related to strategy, entrepreneurship, innovation, information technology, and organizations as well as all functional areas of business, such as accounting, finance, marketing, and operations. We include studies on organizational, managerial, and individual decision making, from both normative and descriptive perspectives.