M&SOM Practice-Based Research Competition

The 2027 M&SOM Practice-Based Research Competition:

A Biennial Practice-Based Paper Competition for the M&SOM Journal

Objectives

The objectives of the M&SOM Practice-Based Research Competition are to motivate, help develop, reward and highlight high-quality OM research papers with significant practical relevance, and to publish these papers in the M&SOM Journal. This paper competition is distinguished by the following features: (i) its focus on practical impact; (ii) papers considered are not yet published; (iii) involvement of high-level practitioners to evaluate papers; (iv) presentations at the MSOM conference by contestants;
(v) organization primarily by the M&SOM journal as opposed to the MSOM Society.

Scope and Admissibility

This competition seeks to reward unpublished OM research papers with a high potential or realized impact on practice. Work not implemented yet may be considered, as long as potential benefits to practice can be ascertained with a high level of confidence. More generally, validity (i.e., the extent to which the results presented do or would apply in practice) is a key evaluation criteria.

Entries must be submitted through ScholarOne Manuscripts by September 16, 2026 (please select “Practice-Based Research Competition” for the manuscript type) and include:

• an unpublished paper complying with all existing M&SOM journal requirements;
• additional evidence of potential or realized practical impact, including at a minimum one (possibly confidential) supporting letter by a practitioner who is not a paper co-author;
• a commitment by authors to attempt any requested revision work in good faith and publish their submitted papers in the M&SOM journal if invited to do so by the Academic Competition Committee (see Process section below). This commitment may be stated in a cover letter signed by all paper co-authors.

The main evaluation criteria include the following:

• extent and validity of the realized or potential practical impact claimed;
• academic contributions;
• quality of exposition, including clarity of contributions;
• potential for academic impact and future related work.

Papers having a substantial overlap with another paper that is already published, accepted or currently under review with another journal are not eligible. Suitable papers already under review with the M&SOM journal may be considered at any stage of the competition (see Process section below), provided any missing required material is provided by the authors and consent is given by the paper authors, the Department Editor currently overseeing the review and the Competition Chair.

Process

The competition is supported by an Academic Competition Committee effectively organized as a department of the journal: it is composed of M&SOM journal Editorial Board members and chaired by a Competition Chair appointed by the journal EIC. The Competition Chair may appoint individuals to serve as guest Associate Editors for the competition, in consultation with the journal EIC. The competition also involves a Judge Panel composed of high-profile practitioners. The competition selection stages are as follows:

• In the first review stage, the Academic Competition Committee decides if each submitted paper has enough potential to eventually become an acceptable M&SOM publication within the imposed timeframe and develops some feedback on the paper. This involves an initial desk review, possibly followed by a subsequent review by a committee member serving as AE and input by 1 or 2 referee(s). Considering all available input, the Competition Chair decides whether or not to invite the authors to submit a revision by a specified deadline for consideration in the second stage;
• In the second stage (Finalist selection), assigned AEs review submitted revisions, possibly soliciting further input from referee(s), and the Academic Competition Committee considers their input to decide whether each paper should be selected as a Finalist for the competition, which entails acceptance for publication in the journal, possibly conditional on the completion of minor revision work;
• The final stage (prize awards) involves a Judge Panel composed of the Competition Chair and several high-profile practitioners. The Competition Chair appoints the Judges in consultation with the journal EIC, and coordinates their work. The Judges receive the latest paper version and any other submission material in advance, and also consider an oral presentation of each Finalist paper by their author(s) organized at the MSOM Conference. After reviewing the Finalist presentations (perhaps by video if a judge cannot attend), the Judge Panel meets to (i) decide upon the award of one or several First and Second Prizes further distinguishing papers among the Finalists; and (ii) develop written comments/quotes on the work presented to be subsequently used by the Journal, the Society and/or any other parties interested in the promotion of the Finalist papers (e.g., author(s), letter writers, promotion committees, etc.);
• After revisions are performed by the authors if required, Finalist and prize-winning papers are published in the Journal with a special mention on the paper cover page highlighting their participation and final status in the competition;
• Every submitted paper is evaluated for possible publication in the M&SOM journal as part of a review process organized by the Academic Competition Committee, independently of its status in the competition (e.g., a submitted paper not selected as a Finalist for the competition is still considered for possible publication).

2026/2027 Competition Timeline

• September 16, 2026: Deadline for submission of papers and supporting material;
• September–November 2026: First round review process;
• December 2026–January 2027: Academic Competition Committee decides first round outcomes;
• April 2027: Deadline for selected authors to submit second round paper revisions;
• May–June 2027: Second round review process, Academic Competition Committee selects Finalist papers;
• June 21, 2027: Finalist presentations and results at the 2027 MSOM Conference organized by the University of Calgary in Banff, Canada.

Academic Committee

To be announced.

Industry Judge Panel

To be announced.

Inquiries

Related questions should be sent to Jérémie Gallien (Competition Chairs) and Bernadett Racz (Administrative Assistant) at [email protected], and [email protected].

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Past Competitions

2025 Practice-based Research Competition

First Place

Flexible Data Aggregation for Prediction and Decision Making with Contextual Information: Applications in Retailing
Ying Rong; Zhenkang Peng; Chengzhang Li; Zichao Luo; Guangrui Ma; Mingyong Zhao

Honorary Mentions

Cancer Screening Outreach Guided by Machine Learning: The Benefits of Proactive Care
Minje Park; Carri Chan; Keith Boell; Elliot Mitchell; Abdul Tariq; David Vawdrey

Contextual Stochastic Optimization for Omnichannel Multi-Courier Order Fulfillment Under Delivery Time Uncertainty
Tinghan Ye; Sikai Cheng; Amira Hijazi; Pascal Van Hentenryck

Finalists

Enhancing Volunteer Retention: The Role of Experienced Volunteers
Vinit Tipnis; Christopher Chen; Fei Gao Fei

Data-Driven Pricing for Availability-Based Upgrades Under a Multiple Binary Choice Model with Copula
Ruxian Wang; Ovunc Yilmaz; Zifeng Zhao; Farbod Ekbatani; Andrew Vakhutinsky

The Non-Linear Impact of Promised Delivery Time on Online Purchasing
Shin Oblander; Kinshuk Jerath

2023 Practice-based Research Competition

First Place

Improving Farmers' Income on Online Agri-platforms: Evidence from the Field
Somya Singhvi; Retsef Levi; Manoj Rajan; Yanchong (Karen) Zheng

Second Place

Leveraging Consensus Effect to Optimize Ranking in Online Discussion Boards
Yonatan Gur; Gad Allon; Joseph Carlstein

Finalists

Pooling and Boosting for Demand Prediction in Retail: A Transfer Learning Approach
Sheng Liu; Dazhou Lei; Yongzhi Qi; Dongyang Geng; Jianshen Zhang; Hao Hu; Zuo-Jun Max Shen

Patient Sensitivity to Emergency Department Waiting Time Announcements
Eric Park; Huiyin Ouyang; Jingqi Wang; Sergei Savin; Siu Chung Leung; Timothy Rainer

Decarbonizing OCP
Vassilis Digalakis Jr.; Dimitris Bertsimas; Ryan Cory-Wright

Got (Optimal) Milk? Pooling Donations in Human Milk Banks with Machine Learning and Optimization
Timothy Chan; Rafid Mahmood; Deborah O'Connor; Debbie Stone; Sharon Unger; Rachel Wong; Ian Zhu

2021 Practice-based Research Competition

Winner

Redesigning Sample Transportation in Malawi Through Improved Data Sharing and Daily Route Optimization
Jónas Jónasson, Sarang Deo, Emma Gibson, Mphatso Kachule, Kara Palamountain

Honorable Mentions

Ancillary Services in Targeted Advertising: from Prediction to Prescription
Georgia Perakis, Alison Borenstein, Ankit Mangal, Stefan Poninghaus, Divya Singhvi, Omar Skali Lami, Jiong Wei Lua

Improving Match Rates in Dating Markets through Assortment Optimization
Ignacio Rios, Daniela Saban, Fanyin Zheng

Finalists

Demand Learning and Dynamic Pricing for Varying Assortments
Kris Ferreira, Emily Mower

Estimating Personalized Demand with Unobserved No-purchases using a Mixture Model: An Application in the Hotel Industry
Pelin Pekgun, Sanghoon Cho, Mark Ferguson, Andrew Vakhutinsky

Incentivizing Commuters to Carpool: A Large Field Experiment with Waze
Maxime Cohen, Michael-Davis Fiszer, Avia Ratzon, Roy Sasson

2019 Practice-based Research Competition

Winner

Data-Driven Optimization for Commodity Procurement Under Price Uncertainty
Christian Mandl, Stefan Minner

Honorable Mentions

Detecting Customer Trends for Optimal Promotion Targeting
Lennart Baardman, Setareh Borjian Boroujeni, Tamar Cohen-Hillel, Kiran Panchamgam, Georgia Perakis

Disclosing Product Availability in Online Retail
Eduard Calvo, Ruomeng Cui, Laura Wagner

Finalists

Pricing for Heterogeneous Products: Analytics for Ticket Reselling
Michael Alley, Max Biggs, Rim Hariss, Charles Herrmann, Michael Lingzhi Li, Georgia Perakis

Understanding the Value of Fulfillment Flexibility in an Online Retailing Environment
Levi DeValve, Yehua Wei, Di Wu, Rong Yuan

Forecasting Airport Transfer Passenger Flow Using Real-Time Data and Machine Learning
Xiaojia Guo, Yael Grushka-Cockayne, Bert De Reyck

2017 Practice-based Research Competition

Winners

Analysis and Improvement of Blood Collection Operations
Turgay Ayer, Can Zhang, Chenxi Zeng, Chelsea C. White III, V. Roshan Joseph

Product-Line Pricing Under Discrete Mixed Multinomial Logit Demand
Hongmin Li, Scott Webster, Nicholas Mason, Karl Kempf

Honorable Mention

Dynamic Pricing of Omnichannel Inventories
Pavithra Harsha, Shivaram Subramanian, Joline Uichanco

Finalists

Forecasting New Product Life Cycle Curves: Practical Approach and Empirical Analysis
Kejia Hu, Jason Acimovic, Francisco Erize, Douglas J. Thomas, Jan A. Van Mieghem

Optimal Retail Location: Empirical Methodology and Application to Practice
Chloe Kim Glaeser, Marshall Fisher, Xuanming Su

The Hurricane Decision Simulator: A Tool for Marine Forces in New Orleans to Practice Operations Management in Advance of a Hurricane
Eva D. Regnier, Cameron A. MacKenzie