Publications

SSRN

Research Summary

Overview

By: Kris Johnson Ferreira

Professor Ferreira's research primarily focuses on how retailers can use algorithms to make better revenue management decisions, including pricing, product display, and assortment planning. In the retail industry, anticipating consumer demand is arguably one of the... View Details

Keywords: E-commerce; Analytics; Revenue Management; Pricing; Assortment Planning; Field Experiments; Operations; Supply Chain; Supply Chain Management; Retail Industry

Article

Testing Substitutability

By: John William Hatfield, Nicole Immorlica and Scott Duke Kominers

We provide an algorithm for testing the substitutability of a length-N preference relation over a set of contracts X in time O(|X|3⋅N3). Access to the preference relation is essential for this result: We show that a substitutability-testing algorithm with access only... View Details

Keywords: Substitutability; Matching; Communication Complexity; Preference Elicitation; Marketplace Matching; Communication; Mathematical Methods; Economics

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March 2022
Article

Learning to Rank an Assortment of Products

By: Kris Ferreira, Sunanda Parthasarathy and Shreyas Sekar

We consider the product ranking challenge that online retailers face when their customers typically behave as “window shoppers”: they form an impression of the assortment after browsing products ranked in the initial positions and then decide whether to continue... View Details

Keywords: Online Learning; Product Ranking; Assortment Optimization; Learning; Internet and the Web; Product Marketing; Consumer Behavior; E-commerce

November–December 2018
Article

Online Network Revenue Management Using Thompson Sampling

By: Kris J. Ferreira, David Simchi-Levi and He Wang

We consider a network revenue management problem where an online retailer aims to maximize revenue from multiple products with limited inventory constraints. As common in practice, the retailer does not know the consumer's purchase probability at each price and must... View Details

Keywords: Online Marketing; Revenue Management; Revenue; Management; Marketing; Internet and the Web; Price; Mathematical Methods

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17 Sep 2021
News

AI Can Help Address Inequity — If Companies Earn Users’ Trust

17 May 2022
Cold Call Podcast

Delivering a Personalized Shopping Experience with AI

Keywords: Re: Jill J. Avery

Teaching Interest

Big Data Analytics and Machine Learning

Big data in the context of marketing, management, and innovation strategy. Machine Learning algorithms and tools.
View Details

Keywords: Big Data; Machine Learning; Analytics

27 May 2015
Blog Post

What is an HBS Section?

10 sections of 90+ people in your first year. You find out during your first week at HBS which section you’ll be in (A-J), and they use an algorithm to make sure each section has a diverse cross-section of people from different countries,... View Details

November–December 2024
Article

Outcome-Driven Dynamic Refugee Assignment with Allocation Balancing

By: Kirk Bansak and Elisabeth Paulson

This study proposes two new dynamic assignment algorithms to match refugees and asylum seekers to geographic localities within a host country. The first, currently implemented in a multi-year pilot in Switzerland, seeks to maximize the average predicted employment... View Details

Keywords: AI and Machine Learning; Refugees; Geographic Location; Employment

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September 2020 (Revised July 2022)
Supplement

Spreadsheet Supplement to Artea (B) and (C)

By: Eva Ascarza and Ayelet Israeli

Spreadsheet Supplement to "Artea (B): Including Customer-level Demographic Data" and "Artea (C): Potential Discrimination through Algorithmic Targeting" View Details

Keywords: Gender; Race; Diversity; Marketing; Customer Relationship Management; Demographics; Prejudice and Bias; Retail Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Technology Industry; United States

14 Jun 2017
Working Paper Summaries

Minimizing Justified Envy in School Choice: The Design of New Orleans' OneApp

Keywords: by Atila Abdulkadiroglu, Yeon-Koo Che, Parag A. Pathak, Alvin E. Roth, and Oliver Tercieux; Education

Working Paper

Group Fairness in Dynamic Refugee Assignment

By: Daniel Freund, Thodoris Lykouris, Elisabeth Paulson, Bradley Sturt and Wentao Weng

Ensuring that refugees and asylum seekers thrive (e.g., find employment) in their host countries is a profound humanitarian goal, and a primary driver of employment is the geographic location within a host country to which the refugee or asylum seeker is... View Details

Keywords: Refugees; Geographic Location; Mathematical Methods; Employment; Fairness

08 May 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, May 8, 2018

https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=52570 Algorithm Appreciation: People Prefer Algorithmic to Human Judgment By: Logg, Jennifer M., Julia A. Minson, and Don A. Moore Abstract—Even though... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

14 Nov 2018
HBS Seminar

Lindsey Cameron, University of Michigan Ross School of Business

2019
Article

An Empirical Study of Rich Subgroup Fairness for Machine Learning

By: Michael J Kearns, Seth Neel, Aaron Leon Roth and Zhiwei Steven Wu

Kearns et al. [2018] recently proposed a notion of rich subgroup fairness intended to bridge the gap between statistical and individual notions of fairness. Rich subgroup fairness picks a statistical fairness constraint (say, equalizing false positive rates across... View Details

Keywords: Machine Learning; Fairness; AI and Machine Learning

March 2017 (Revised September 2017)
Case

Facebook Fake News in the Post-Truth World

By: John R. Wells and Carole A. Winkler

In January 2017, Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook, was surrounded by controversy. The election of Donald Trump as the next president of the United States in November 2016 had triggered a national storm of protests, and many attributed Trump’s victory to... View Details

Keywords: Facebook; Fake News; Mark Zuckerberg; Donald Trump; Algorithms; Social Networks; Partisanship; Social Media; App Development; Instagram; WhatsApp; Smartphone; Silicon Valley; Office Space; Digital Strategy; Democracy; Entry Barriers; Online Platforms; Controversy; Tencent; Agility; Social Networking; Gaming; Gaming Industry; Computer Games; Mobile Gaming; Messaging; Monetization Strategy; Advertising; Digital Marketing; Business Ventures; Acquisition; Mergers and Acquisitions; Business Growth and Maturation; Business Headquarters; Business Organization; For-Profit Firms; Trends; Communication; Communication Technology; Forms of Communication; Interactive Communication; Interpersonal Communication; Talent and Talent Management; Crime and Corruption; Voting; Demographics; Entertainment; Games, Gaming, and Gambling; Moral Sensibility; Values and Beliefs; Initial Public Offering; Profit; Revenue; Geography; Geographic Location; Global Range; Local Range; Country; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Globalized Firms and Management; Globalized Markets and Industries; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Government and Politics; International Relations; National Security; Political Elections; Business History; Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Information Management; Information Publishing; News; Newspapers; Innovation and Management; Innovation Strategy; Technological Innovation; Knowledge Dissemination; Human Capital; Law; Leadership Development; Leadership Style; Leading Change; Business or Company Management; Crisis Management; Goals and Objectives; Growth and Development Strategy; Growth Management; Management Practices and Processes; Management Style; Management Systems; Management Teams; Managerial Roles; Marketing Channels; Social Marketing; Network Effects; Market Entry and Exit; Digital Platforms; Marketplace Matching; Industry Growth; Industry Structures; Monopoly; Media; Product Development; Service Delivery; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Mission and Purpose; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Culture; Organizational Structure; Public Ownership; Problems and Challenges; Business and Community Relations; Business and Government Relations; Groups and Teams; Networks; Rank and Position; Opportunities; Behavior; Emotions; Identity; Power and Influence; Prejudice and Bias; Reputation; Social and Collaborative Networks; Status and Position; Trust; Society; Civil Society or Community; Culture; Public Opinion; Social Issues; Societal Protocols; Strategy; Adaptation; Business Strategy; Commercialization; Competition; Competitive Advantage; Competitive Strategy; Corporate Strategy; Customization and Personalization; Diversification; Expansion; Horizontal Integration; Segmentation; Information Technology; Internet and the Web; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Internet and the Web; Applications and Software; Information Infrastructure; Digital Platforms; Internet and the Web; Mobile and Wireless Technology; Valuation; Advertising Industry; Communications Industry; Entertainment and Recreation Industry; Information Industry; Information Technology Industry; Journalism and News Industry; Media and Broadcasting Industry; Service Industry; Technology Industry; Telecommunications Industry; Video Game Industry; United States; California; Sunnyvale; Russia

Educators

Article

How to Use Heuristics for Differential Privacy

By: Seth Neel, Aaron Leon Roth and Zhiwei Steven Wu

We develop theory for using heuristics to solve computationally hard problems in differential privacy. Heuristic approaches have enjoyed tremendous success in machine learning, for which performance can be empirically evaluated. However, privacy guarantees cannot be... View Details

2022
Working Paper

Human-Computer Interactions in Demand Forecasting and Labor Scheduling Decisions

By: Caleb Kwon, Ananth Raman and Jorge Tamayo

We empirically analyze how managerial overrides to a commercial algorithm that forecasts demand and schedules labor affect store performance. We analyze administrative data from a large grocery retailer that utilizes a commercial algorithm to forecast demand and... View Details

Keywords: Employees; Human Capital; Performance; Applications and Software; Management Skills; Management Practices and Processes; Retail Industry