MIT System Dynamics Seminar | A Replication Study of Operations Management Experiments in Management Science

Please visit the MIT System Dynamics Seminars page for more information.

You are invited to attend the System Dynamics Seminar being held on Friday, October 6^th from 12:30-2:00pm EST in the Jay W. Forrester conference room, E62-450, or via Zoom: https://mit.zoom.us/j/98105285349 (Password: SDFA23). Our guest speaker will be Jordan Tong (Wisconsin School of Business) presenting A Replication Study of Operations Management Experiments in Management Science (see abstract and brief bio below, announcement and paper attached). Lunch will be provided to those attending in person and a reminder email will be sent out closer to the date.

If you would also like to schedule a 30-minute 1:1 meeting with him before or after the seminar, please fill out the following Doodle poll by COB Friday, September 29^th and I will confirm times and location with a calendar invite: https://doodle.com/meeting/participate/id/dR1Wz7Eb. Please notify me if you need to meet over Zoom instead.

Abstract 

Over the last two decades, researchers in operations management have increasingly leveraged laboratory experiments to identify key behavioral insights. These experiments inform behavioral theories of operations management, impacting domains including inventory, supply chain management, queuing, forecasting, and sourcing. Yet, until now, the replicability of most behavioral insights from these laboratory experiments has been untested. We remedy this with the first large-scale replication study in operations management. With the input of the wider operations management community, we identify 10 prominent experimental operations management papers published in Management Science, which span a variety of domains, to be the focus of our replication effort. For each paper, we conduct a high-powered replication study of the main results across multiple locations using original materials (when available and suitable). In addition, our study tests replicability in multiple modalities (in-person and online) due to laboratory closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our replication study contributes new knowledge about the robustness of several key behavioral theories in operations management and contributes more broadly to efforts in the operations management field to improve research transparency and reliability.

About the Presenter

Jordan Tong is the Wisconsin Naming Partners Professor and Professor in the Department of Operations and Information Management at the Wisconsin School of Business.

Professor Tong’s research primarily employs mathematical modeling and experimental methods to investigate questions in operations management, analytics, and behavioral science. His research focuses on examining how human cognitive limitations interact with broader system dynamics to inform operations design. He has published in journals such as Management Science, Operations Research, Psychological Science, Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, and Production and Operations Management. He is currently an Associate Editor at Management Science and a Senior Editor at Production & Operations Management.

Professor Tong has taught undergraduate and Master’s-level courses in Operations Management, Operations Analytics, Supply Chain Management, Modeling & Optimization for Business Analytics, and the Psychology of Business Analytics. He received his PhD in Operations Management from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University and his BA in Mathematics from Pomona College.