Find Academic Supervisors

Roberto Martin-MartinView profile

Assistant Professor

• Robotics
• Computer Vision
• Machine Learning
• +7 more

Roberto Martin-Martin is an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of Texas at Austin, where he leads the Robot Interactive Intelligence (RobIN) Lab. His research bridges robotics, computer vision, and machine learning to enable robots to operate autonomously in human-centric environments like homes and offices. Previously, he was a Postdoctoral Scholar at the Stanford Vision and Learning Lab working with Fei-Fei Li and Silvio Savarese, and an AI Researcher at Salesforce AI. Education: Ph.D. and M.Sc. in Robotics from Technische Universität Berlin (TUB), advised by Professor Oliver Brock B.Sc. from Universidad Politécnica de Madrid Dr. Martin-Martin's research focuses on developing AI algorithms that combine reinforcement learning and imitation learning with advanced planning and control to address core challenges in robot perception. His work spans mobile and whole-body manipulation, dexterous and contact-rich interactions, and long-horizon tasks in unstructured environments. He takes inspiration from human cognition through psychology and cognitive science to develop solutions for skills ranging from simple pick-and-place operations to complex tasks like cooking and furniture assembly. His recent publications demonstrate a strong trend toward enabling robots to learn from human demonstrations, particularly through video, and to safely adapt these demonstrations to their own morphology. There's significant emphasis on mobile manipulation, bimanual tasks, and developing hardware that supports robust robot learning through trial and error. His work shows increasing integration of large language models and vision-language models to enhance robot understanding and task execution. Scientific Awards: RSS Pioneer (2020) Winner of Amazon Picking Challenge (2015) RSS Best Systems Paper Award (2016) ICRA Best Paper Award IROS Best Mechanism Award Amazon Faculty Award AAAI Young Faculty IJCAI Early Faculty Nominated for Best Paper at IROS (2014, 2017) Dr. Martin-Martin advises PhD students including Arpit Bahety, who is working on mobile manipulation and learning. He serves as Chair of the IEEE Technical Committee on Mobile Manipulation and is a co-founder of QueerInRobotics. His research is supported by industry partnerships and academic funding sources that enable his lab to develop both hardware and software innovations in robotics. He directs the Robot Interactive Intelligence (RobIN) Lab at UT Austin, which takes a holistic approach to robot intelligence, developing both the hardware (like the BaRiFlex gripper) and software frameworks necessary for robots to learn from interaction. The lab's research addresses the full pipeline from perception to action, with particular emphasis on learning from human demonstrations, safe exploration, and adapting to novel objects and environments.

Om NarasimhanView profile

Professor

• Entrepreneurship in Emerging Markets
• Innovation
• Pricing
• +2 more

Om Narasimhan is Professor of Marketing at the London School of Economics and Political Science. His research focuses on entrepreneurship in emerging markets, innovation, pricing, and distribution channels. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Southern California and previously held the Board of Overseers Chaired Professorship at the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management. Education: Ph.D. in Business Administration (Marketing), University of Southern California M.S. in Physics, University of Virginia B.S. in Physics, University of Delhi His work explores how microentrepreneurs navigate informal economies and how marketing strategies adapt to emerging market constraints. Research integrates behavioral economics, supply chain dynamics, and consumer psychology to address real-world business challenges. Publications emphasize empirical analyses of market mechanisms, with recurring themes in retail strategy, compensation models, and global business development. Article keywords frequently include entrepreneurship, consumer behavior, and emerging economies. Awards: SIG Best Paper awards (American Marketing Association) John D. Little award finalist Marketing Science Institute Young Scholar Outstanding Researcher Award (Carlson School) Best MBA Professor Award (Carlson School) He teaches in the Masters in Management and Global Executive programs, with executive education engagements at companies including 3M, Samsung, and Target. Leads the Marketing Faculty Research Group at LSE.

Alireza KeshavarzView profile

Assistant Professor

• Strategic Marketing
• Sales Force Management
• Compensation and Incentives
• +5 more

Alireza Keshavarz is an Assistant Professor/Lecturer in Marketing at Maynooth University Business School. He holds a PhD in Management Sciences (Marketing) from HEC, Paris. His research focuses on strategic marketing, salesforce management, and compensation dynamics, particularly examining gender pay gaps and salesforce mobility. He is affiliated with organizations such as AMA, EMAC, CNRS Lab GREG-HEC, and Labex ECODEC. His teaching spans marketing analytics, sales management, and business analytics across undergraduate, graduate, and MBA programs. Education: PhD in Management Sciences (Marketing), HEC Paris Research Interests: Sales Force Management Compensation and Incentives Sales Force Mobility Digital Literacy B2B Marketing Strategic Marketing Ambidexterity Recent Research Trends: Recent work emphasizes the interplay between salesforce structures, organizational strategies, and labor market dynamics, with a focus on gender disparities and incentive systems. Professional Contributions: Member of the Editorial Board for Journal of Business Research Regular presenter at conferences like AMA, EMAC, and INFORMS Labs/Teams: No specific labs or collaborative teams explicitly noted in available data.

Jodi HalpernView profile

Professor

• Empathy
• AI Ethics
• Bioethics
• +8 more

Jodi Halpern is a full-time Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and a co-founder of the Kavli Center for Ethics, Science and the Public (2022). She serves as Faculty Director of BERGIT (Berkeley Group for Ethics and Regulation of Innovative Technologies) and actively consults for organizations including the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, Kaiser Permanente, Intel, Salesforce, and the Mayor’s Office of Los Angeles. Halpern’s work bridges psychiatry, philosophy, and bioethics to address empathy in leadership, AI ethics, and gene editing. Professor at UC Berkeley Co-founded Kavli Center (2022) Faculty Director of BERGIT Consults for tech, healthcare, and government entities Halpern’s research focuses on empathic curiosity as a tool for conflict resolution and trust-building in healthcare, post-war reconciliation, and AI ethics. Her current projects include Engineering Empathy (investigating AI’s impact on emotional relationships), Gene Editing from Bench to Bedside (exploring scientists’ beliefs about gene editing), and Remaking the Self in the Wake of Illness (narratives of adaptation to illness). She integrates philosophical analysis with empirical research in psychology, neuroscience, and behavioral economics. Her notable scientific awards include the 2022 Guggenheim Fellowship in Health and Medicine, the 2019 Chancellor’s Chair at UC Berkeley, and the Yale University Award for the best PhD of significance to humanity across disciplines. Halpern received her MD and PhD through the NIH Medical Scientist Training Program Award , completed psychiatry residency at UCLA, and held fellowships at Princeton, Greenwall, and Townsend centers.

• Marketing Strategy
• Product Development
• Innovation Management
• +5 more

Sumitro Banerjee is an Associate Professor of Marketing at Grenoble Ecole de Management (GEM), where he teaches strategic and international marketing, digital marketing, brand management, and product development. Previously, he held positions at ESMT Berlin and Syracuse University. He holds a PhD and MSc from INSEAD, an MBA from IIFT, and a Bachelor of Technology in Mining Machinery from IIT-ISM Dhanbad. His research focuses on new product development, innovation diffusion, market entry strategies, and salesforce incentives, employing microeconomic and game theory frameworks. He has published in journals like Production and Operations Management and serves on the editorial board of International Journal of Research in Marketing , where he received an award for editorial excellence in 2023. Before academia, he worked in international trade at Tata Steel and as an engineer at Jessop & Company. His executive education programs have served Fortune 500 clients, and he consults for organizations globally.

Weiran WangView profile

Assistant Professor

• Machine Learning
• Speech Processing
• Artificial Intelligence
• +7 more

Weiran Wang is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Iowa. Previously, he worked as a Staff Research Scientist at Google (2021-2024), Senior Research Scientist at Salesforce Research (2019-2020), and Amazon Alexa (2017-2019). He completed his PhD in 2013 at UC Merced under Miguel A. Carreira-Perpinan and postdoctoral research at Toyota Technological Institute at Chicago (2014-2017) with Karen Livescu and Nathan Srebro. PhD: EECS Department, UC Merced (2013) MS: Computer Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences (2008) BS: Computer Science, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (2005) His research focuses on machine learning algorithms for speech processing , multi-view representation learning , and optimization . Key contributions include advancements in end-to-end speech recognition, stochastic canonical correlation analysis, and deep variational methods for multi-modal data. Notable work includes improving WER metrics for telephony speech and developing GPU/TPU implementations for ASR biasing. The 15 most recent publications span 2024-2018, emphasizing speech recognition (2024 NAACL/Interspeech), multi-view learning (2022 ICLR), self-training (2020 Interspeech), and acoustic modeling (2018). Trends include deep learning, attention mechanisms, and distributed optimization techniques. No scientific awards are explicitly mentioned in the provided texts. Current teaching includes CS4980: Deep Learning (Spring 2025) and CS4420: Artificial Intelligence (Fall 2024).

Brian RutherfordView profile

Professor

• Sales Management
• Marketing Strategies
• Organizational Behavior
• +6 more

Brian Rutherford is a Professor of Marketing and Professional Sales at the Coles College of Business, Kennesaw State University. His research focuses on sales management, buyer-seller relationships, employee burnout, and international sales dynamics. He has published extensively on topics such as salesforce burnout, job satisfaction, cross-cultural selling, and crisis-driven market adaptations. Dr. Rutherford’s work examines how disruptions (like the pandemic) impact sales strategies, buyer behaviors, and workforce welfare. He explores themes such as emotional labor in retail environments, multi-faceted job satisfaction among salespeople, and the design of retail spaces. His research also addresses global market challenges, including post-disruptive sales interactions and industrial buyer-seller exchanges. Key trends in his recent articles include analyzing burnout mitigation strategies for road warriors, optimizing salesforce go-to-market strategies, and measuring the impact of disruptions on international sales processes. His work bridges theoretical frameworks with practical insights for sales management and organizational effectiveness.

Yanhui ZhaoView profile

Associate Professor

• Marketing Strategy
• Brand Management
• Sales Management
• +3 more

Dr. Yanhui Zhao is an Associate Professor of Marketing at the University of Nebraska at Omaha (UNO), affiliated with the College of Business Administration. He holds a PhD in Marketing from Michigan State University and dual degrees (MA and BA) in Marketing from Nanjing University, China. His research focuses on marketing strategy, brand management, sales management, and inter-organizational relationships. He is an associate editor for the *Journal of Business-to-Business Marketing* and has published widely in top-tier journals. Dr. Zhao teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in Marketing Analytics, Marketing Management, and Principles of Marketing. Education: PhD in Marketing, Michigan State University (2016) MA in Marketing, Nanjing University (2011) BA in Marketing, Nanjing University (2008) Research Interests: Dr. Zhao explores strategic marketing challenges such as brand repositioning, salesforce dynamics, and cross-cultural business relationships. His work emphasizes empirical analysis of consumer behavior and organizational collaboration, leveraging bibliometric methods to map research trends. Key themes include service recovery strategies, sales ethics, and the impact of green innovation on supplier-customer ties. Awards and Recognition: James M. Comer Award (2016) Multiple Distinguished Marketing & Entrepreneurship Professor Awards (2020–2024) NBDC Faculty of the Year (2019) Service & Media Contributions: Dr. Zhao contributes to industry discussions via media outlets like BBC News and CNN Money, addressing topics such as brand rebranding (e.g., Twitter/X) and retail strategy (e.g., Weight Watchers). He actively reviews for top marketing journals and advises on salesforce management practices.

Gregory A. RichView profile

Professor

• Sales Management
• Organizational Behavior
• Marketing Strategy
• +4 more

Gregory A. Rich is a Professor of Marketing at Bowling Green State University's Schmidthorst College of Business. He holds a Ph.D. from Indiana University (1995) and has served as Department Chair of Marketing (2007–2011). His research focuses on leadership theory in sales management, with 15+ publications in top journals like the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science and Personnel Psychology. He authored a sales management textbook, co-authored a professional selling textbook, and co-developed the Cantopia simulation game. Recognized as 2020 Sales Educator of the Year by the AMA, he has coached students in national sales competitions for over two decades. Rich teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in sales management, marketing principles, and marketing strategy. Education: Ph.D., M.B.A., and B.A. from Indiana University (1985–1995). Academic roles include Chair of Marketing at BGSU and prior faculty appointments since 1995. His expertise spans sales leadership, textbook authorship, and experiential learning tools like Cantopia. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Professional Selling and Sales Management. Research interests emphasize salesforce management practices, leadership behaviors impacting sales performance, and innovative pedagogical methods. His work bridges theory and practice, addressing real-world challenges in sales organizations and educational settings. Awards and Recognition: 2020 AMA Selling and Sales Management SIG Sales Educator of the Year. Professional contributions include over 20 years of sales competition coaching and leadership in academic sales education. Labs/Teams: Involved in the Paul J. Hooker Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership and the College's Sales Programs, contributing to student competitions and experiential learning initiatives.

• Customer Orientation
• Corporate Identification
• Marketing
• +5 more

Dr. Todd Donavan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Marketing at Colorado State University's College of Business. His research focuses on customer orientation and identification, exploring how personality traits and environmental factors influence employee and customer behavior. Customer Orientation: Investigates traits predicting CO disposition and its benefits for organizational commitment and satisfaction. Identification: Analyzes drivers of customer and employee identification with firms, including personality and situational factors. Todd teaches principles of marketing and a sports marketing seminar, collaborating with the Denver Nuggets to provide students practical industry experience and contribute to a marketing scholarship. His recent publications examine service recovery, brand endorsement dynamics, and statistical methodologies. Notable trends in his research include the interplay between employee traits and customer satisfaction, social identification in sports marketing, and methodological advancements in factor analysis. He has also developed software tools for statistical research.

Conor HendersonView profile

Associate Professor

• Customer Loyalty
• Digital Marketing
• Sports Marketing
• +3 more

Conor Henderson is an Associate Professor of Marketing and Judy and Hugh Oliphant Research Scholar at the University of Oregon's Lundquist College of Business, affiliated with programs including Oregon MBA, Undergraduate Programs, and the Warsaw Sports Business Center. He holds a PhD from the University of Washington (2013) and has been a Research Fellow at the Sales and Marketing Strategy Institute since 2019. His research focuses on marketing strategy, customer loyalty, and digital/sports marketing. He explores how firms can optimize customer relationships through strategies that balance acquisition and retention, leveraging insights from service, sports, and B2B contexts. Recent work addresses topics like sponsorship effectiveness, brand-value through diverse advertising, and the impact of customer inertia. His articles span journals such as Journal of Marketing and Marketing Science , with themes including sponsorship performance, consumer engagement, and organizational structure. Henderson teaches marketing strategy and advises on customer-centric practices. He contributes to academic discourse through book chapters and case studies, emphasizing practical applications of marketing theory. Affiliations include leadership roles in Lundquist's Marketing Department and collaborations with industry groups. His work bridges academic research and real-world business challenges, aiming to enhance financial performance through strategic customer management.

Michael MallinView profile

Professor

• Sales Management
• Sales Leadership
• Salesforce Motivation
• +5 more

Dr. Michael Mallin is a Full Professor of Marketing and Sales at The University of Toledo’s John B. and Lillian E. Neff College of Business & Innovation, serving as Faculty Director for EMSL/MBA/EMBA programs and Academic Director of the Edward H. Schmidt School of Professional Sales. He holds a Ph.D. in Marketing from Kent State University, an MBA from The University of Dayton, and a BS in Computer & Information Sciences from The Ohio State University. Education: Ph.D. in Marketing, Kent State University (2005) MBA, University of Dayton (1988) B.S. in Computer & Information Science, Ohio State University (1984) His research focuses on sales leadership, salesforce motivation, intergenerational dynamics, and ethical behavior in sales. Key contributions include frameworks for evaluating sales managers, studies on salesperson-brand identification, and analyses of unethical sales behavior neutralization. He has published extensively in journals like Journal of Personal Selling & Sales Management and Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing . Awarded the Emerald Literati Network Excellence Award (2012) and the University of Toledo Outstanding Junior Faculty Research Award (2009), Dr. Mallin has advised honors theses on sales ethics and perceptions of trust. His industry experience spans roles at AT&T Corp., including Sales Director and Account Executive, where he managed multimillion-dollar sales teams. He serves on editorial boards of sales-focused journals and actively contributes to professional organizations like the American Marketing Association and National Conference in Sales Management. His outreach includes leadership training for companies like Habitec and Tenneco, emphasizing salesforce development and ethical practices.

• Cryptocurrencies
• Blockchain Interoperability
• Blockchain Scalability
• +3 more

Giulia Scaffino is a PreDoc Researcher in the Security and Privacy group at the Technical University of Vienna (TU Wien). Her research focuses on cryptocurrencies, blockchain interoperability, scalability, off-chain protocols, and decentralized finance (DeFi). She holds an MSc in Nuclear and Particle Physics from the University of Pavia, Italy, and is pursuing a PhD at TU Wien. Before her PhD, she worked as a Salesforce developer at Deloitte Digital in Milan. Giulia is involved in projects such as CDL-BOT (2020–2025), Browsec (2018–2024), CoRaF (2022–2025), and SFB SPyCoDe (2023–2026). Her work includes developing frameworks for cross-blockchain smart contracts, optimizing light clients for DeFi, and creating scalable blockchain bridges. She has contributed to publications on topics like IoT data marketplaces and distributed key generation using zk-SNARKs. Her research trends emphasize solving blockchain scalability challenges through innovative protocols and enhancing interoperability between different blockchain systems. Projects like Glimpse and Alba highlight her focus on efficient, secure, and decentralized solutions for modern blockchain ecosystems.

Ahmet KircaView profile

Associate Professor

• International Marketing & Strategy
• Marketing Research
• Marketing Strategy
• +3 more

Ahmet Kirca is an Associate Professor of Marketing and Director of the MSU-CIBER (International Business Center) at Michigan State University's Eli Broad College of Business. His research focuses on international marketing strategy, marketing research methodologies, and the impact of cultural and contextual factors on business decisions. He has conducted extensive meta-analytic studies exploring topics such as multinational firm performance, innovation adoption, and global retailing strategies. As Director of MSU-CIBER, he leads initiatives to enhance global mindset development among students and professionals, supported by a $1.2M U.S. Department of Education grant. His work bridges theoretical frameworks with practical applications, particularly in understanding how firms navigate cultural diversity and institutional environments during international expansion. Key research themes include the internationalization-performance relationship, contingency factors in new product launches, and the role of firm-specific assets in multinational operations. His publications often synthesize empirical evidence from diverse industries, such as automotive, retail, and construction, to provide actionable insights for global business strategies. Dr. Kirca's contributions are recognized through his editorial roles in academic journals and his leadership in international business outreach programs. The MSU-CIBER center under his direction hosts annual case competitions and global conferences, fostering collaboration between academia, industry, and policymakers.

Laura F. BrightView profile

Associate Professor

• Social Media Analytics
• Consumer Behavior
• Digital Wellbeing
• +5 more

Laura F. Bright is an Associate Professor of Media Analytics in the School of Advertising and Public Relations at the University of Texas at Austin's Moody College of Communication. She serves as Co-Director of the Nelson Center for Brand and Demand Analytics, a position she assumed in August 2024. Previously, she held leadership roles including Acting Associate Director (2022-2024) and Interim Associate Director (2021-2022) within her department. Bright is a graduate of UT Austin's advertising program, holding a Ph.D., M.A., and B.A. in Advertising with concentrations in New Media, Consumer Behavior, and Information Studies. Her research focuses on understanding consumer behavior within social media feeds, with particular emphasis on privacy, digital wellbeing, and data analytics. Bright's work spans social media effects, consumer behavior, digital wellbeing, and privacy, with over 20 years of professional experience in market research, interactive advertising, and social media strategy. Her research has appeared in top journals including Journal of Advertising, Journal of Business Research, and Journal of Interactive Advertising. Analysis of her recent publications shows a strong trend toward AI and big data applications in advertising, privacy concerns in digital environments, and emotional aspects of consumer engagement. Her work increasingly examines the intersection of technology adoption, consumer psychology, and ethical considerations in digital marketing. Aspiring Leaders Academy Inaugural Cohort Graduate, 2024 Provost Faculty Fellows Mentoring Program Graduate, 2023 Best Reviewer Award, Journal of Current Issues in Research and Advertising, 2021 Key Contributor in Media Analytics, Texas Health and Human Services Grant ($6,000,000), 2021-2023 "Most Influential Articles", Journal of Current Issues in Research and Advertising, 2019 Bright has successfully mentored numerous doctoral students, including Pooja Iyer and Asma Safaoui, on research projects examining AI adoption, privacy concerns, and social media effects. She has secured significant grant funding, notably contributing to a $6 million Texas Health and Human Services Grant. Beyond research, she has developed innovative curriculum and co-teaches the popular "Script to Screen Commercials" course with Matthew McConaughey, analyzing commercial campaigns for brands like Salesforce. As Co-Director of the Nelson Center for Brand and Demand Analytics, Bright leads research initiatives focused on B2B and D2C analytics, bridging academic research with industry applications. Her work connects academic insights with practical applications in advertising and marketing analytics.