AOM CTO Division

Just before meeting a famous sportsman, some disappointing news popped up on my phone. It was hard to just let it go and he immediately sensed it during our meeting. He told me he missed my energy and then began to share a story from his career: "Sometimes it’s already tough enough to just get the ball over the net and you can’t always control whether it lands inside the field or out. What matters most are the people cheering from the sidelines. They are the ones who believe in you during setbacks, remind you that you’re not alone, and motivate you to keep going. But there are also others, those for whom you can turn into inspiration. They measure their own victories against yours and start believing that maybe they, too, can succeed one day. Both groups matter and neither should ever be forgotten." That thought carried me back to my AOM experience. Sometimes it felt like waiting forever for the ball to land in the field. But thanks to my sideline cheerers, I kept practicing and that persistence paid off with unforgettable highlights at this year's AOM in Copenhagen: 1. Through the TIM Doctoral Consortium, I met energized PhDs and faculty members, shoutout to Xinger Wei, Nia Kurniati Bachtiar, Sergei Mozheiko, Xianxian Jiang. I’m grateful to Rem Koning, Lauren Lanahan and many others for their inspiring mentorship and valuable advice. 2. At the CTO Symposium, I presented my research with Tobias Brandt on barriers for digital platform ventures in healthcare. Big thanks to Ziyi (Iggy) Zhao for the excellent organization and to our remarkable discussants Marta Stelmaszak Rosa and Andreas Hein for their thoughtful feedback. 3. A personal highlight of the AOM was taking the backseat while my co-author Tobias Brandt presented our work around digital ventures, grateful to him for this unique experience and for always being one of my sideline cheerers. Finally, it was wonderful to reconnect with friends. Apologies to those I couldn’t meet. I’m sure another chance will come and I’ll plan more time for it. Long story short, sometimes the ball doesn’t land where you want it. But with sideline cheerers and by remembering those you inspire, persistence turns setbacks into victories, rejections into acceptances, sooner or later. Yes, indeed remembering this during the conversation brought me back on track and led to the kick-off of a new joint project. Thanks for sharing your story, being one of my true inspirations & sideline cheerer. To all of you, who haven’t found your sideline cheerers yet, go out and look for them. 😊  

Impressions from this year's AoM: so much inspiration, valuable feedback, new paper ideas - and best of all, reconnecting with friends and colleagues! We presented three posters this year, and I really enjoyed the poster sessions. They were super interactive and full of great conversations. Huge thanks to my amazing co-authors for making this possible: 🧠 Empowering Workforce Transformation – The Impact of GenAI on Work Meaningfulness Hendrik Wache, Laura Watkowski, Mahei M. Li 😈 Hidden Benefits of Dark Personality Traits in Driving Sustainable Workplace Behaviors Isotilia Costa Melo, Jeanne Le Roy, Hendrik Wache, Jéssica Syrio Callefi 🌍 Designing Digital Resources for Environmental Impact Assessment Roxana Ologeanu Taddei, Tuure Tuunanen, Eric van Heck It was so good to see many of you in person! Thanks for the great conversations, Jason Thatcher, Mayur Joshi, Ilias Pappas, Annamina Rieder, Ziyi (Iggy) Zhao, Andreas Janson, Maren Gierlich-Joas, and many more… 🙌 Also, shout-out to the fantastic presentations and moderations by Meri Vikstrom, Sanaz Soltani, and Pauline Weritz, you all rocked it! ❤️ And of course, seeing so many from the ICN Business School family at AoM was wonderful - feel hugged: Sophie Gourevitch, Leonhard Gebhardt, Aurélien Quignon, and my dear co-authors I mentioned above. 💛 On a personal note: I loved how many little ones were at AoM this year. My 4-year-old had a blast meeting so many of the "faces from Teams" in real life. 😄 AOM CTO Division

🗣️ The past weeks have been filled with two enriching yet quite different experiences. In late July, I had the chance to immerse myself once again in one of the largest gatherings in my field: the Academy of Management Annual Meeting. It was my third time attending, and I think I’ve finally started to get used to its scale (13,000 people!), the marathon-length days, as well as enjoying the serendipitous encounters in crowded conference halls. Also, this year felt special for a few reasons. ✅ First, I was glad to help organize the final #OpenInnovation PDW led by Agnes and reconnect with many EINST4INE fellows. ✅Along with that, Yunjung Pak and I co-organized a symposium on "The Socio-Cultural Dynamics of Blockchain Platforms" and the 3rd edition of the #Blockchain in #Academia #Networking #Reception. Both drew fantastic engagement, and we’re already thinking about how to build on this momentum. Heartfelt thanks to Anders, Vicki and Alex for their invaluable support and contributions. ✅The AOM CTO Division #JFC also offered valuable insights, with Tina Blegind Jensen, Robert Wayne Gregory, and Stan Karanasios sharing their advice on my working paper and how to navigate academic careers. 🎉 Finally, I was surprised and honored to be selected as one of the best #reviewers for the AOM Organization & Management Theory Division (OMT). Besides all the training received during the PhD, I have to admit that I greatly benefited from the #AMR Bridge Reviewer Program: https://lnkd.in/gCpyi2Tz (highly recommend their material). Soon after, our departmental retreat at the beautiful Sandbjerg Gods Manor provided a welcome change of pace - a chance to slow down, reflect on our department’s identity, and connect with colleagues beyond the day-to-day rush. Now, time to take a break! AU Herning (former AU-HIH)

Excited to share that our paper, “Rage Against the Machine: Prospective Sensemaking Amidst Algorithmic Technologies,” received the Best Student Paper Award at the AOM CTO Division! 🎉 This project is close to my heart because it does something rare in management research: it brings together organizational scholarship and live theatre. Working with Studio Possible Futures (performed by Isil Vos), we staged a possible future of work where algorithmic management rules, inviting managers, employees, and HR professionals to react, reflect, and debate in real time. At a moment when AI is transforming workplaces faster than ever, this method gave people a safe yet challenging space to imagine the human consequences of algorithmic technologies; and the conversations that emerged were as eye-opening as they were urgent. I’m deeply grateful to Sophie De Winne for initiating the project, Marjan De Coster & Nicky Dries for their qualitative expertise and perspective intake, and Rein De Cooman & Sibilla Di Guida for co-promoting my PhD. It was also extra special to share the stage with Lindsey Cameron, who won the Best Published Paper Award, as it felt like a full-circle moment after my visiting period at The Wharton School where I learned so much from her inspiring research. Grateful for the guidance, collaboration, and community that made this possible!

My first AOM experience exceeded my expectations! I had the pleasure of attending inspiring and insightful sessions. Just to name a few, I learned a great deal from Profs. Brad Greenwood, Youngjin Yoo, Jason Thatcher, Michael Jensen, Stefan Seidel, and Lars Andraschko. There were so many exciting sessions that I wished I could attend them all! It was also an honor to participate in the AOM CTO Division Doctoral Consortium and present my research poster and benefit from constructive feedback. Another highlight was presenting my research paper in a session on open source software and innovation, and receiving insightful feedback from distinguished scholars like Prof. Likoebe Maruping. One of the most meaningful and exciting moments was discussing my dissertation topic with Prof. Jason Thatcher, whose kind and generous guidance I deeply appreciate. And of course, some of the most memorable experiences came from friendly, thought-provoking conversations, like a meaningful chat on life and purpose with Prof. Yasser Rahrovani, and making new friends such as Munsifa Hoor, Georgia Meyer, and Masoomeh Kalantari to name just a few. You can find pictures from these wonderful moments below.

Just wrapped up my first AOM experience and what an enriching journey it was! I had the incredible opportunity to participate in the #DoctoralConsortium at the AOM CTO Division, where I presented my research and received thoughtful, constructive feedback. A special thank you to my mentor, Prof. Noshir Contractor, for his generous guidance and encouragement. I'm especially grateful to Prof. Steven L. Johnson for organizing such a meaningful and well-curated consortium. The discussions on the academic job market, career trajectories, and work-life balance were incredibly valuable for doctoral students like me. I also presented a poster based on my thesis, co-authored with my supervisor Prof. P. Vigneswara Ilavarasan., which sparked engaging conversations and gave me actionable feedback to refine it further. Many thanks to him for the continued support and direction that made this possible. It was a privilege to connect with and learn from distinguished scholars, Prof. Suprateek Sarker, Prof. Carol Hsu, Prof. Maha Shaikh, Prof. M.N. Ravishankar, Prof. Vishal Gupta, Prof. Raj Krishnan Shankar, and Prof. Fauzia Jabeen. Grateful to Prof. Sanjay Dhir for his continued support and for hosting us for a warm and memorable lunch in Copenhagen. This experience has been deeply rewarding, filled with learning, reflection, and truly meaningful conversations. Signing off with inspiration and gratitude! #AOM2025 #CTODivison #Research #Netwroking

Reflecting on nearly a week since #AOM2025 and how the various discussions, dialogues, and debates left me feeling quite inspired! At this year’s AOM, I had the particular pleasure of co-organizing a symposium on the application of a relational ontology to studying the future of work with colleagues from across the world, which captured the kind of exuberance I experienced throughout the conference. What brought my co-organizers, Laura Lam and Valerio Iannucci, and me to plan the symposium came through conversations about how paying attention to the transactions and interactions in-between is especially critical right now when so many of us are asking what the future of work and organizing might look like, and how that might be different from what we already know or what has long been taken-for-granted as being stable. Each of the four fantastic presenters—Virginia Leavell, Pauli Pakarinen, Abhishek Gupte, Corentin Curchod (& Stella Kyratzi)—brought their research to this theme. And, Anca Metiu, our discussant, surfaced new questions and drew out themes across the presentations (highlighting the relationality between these relational studies, if you might think of it that way!). I thought I'd share some of my favorite quips/remarks/questions from each speaker that : - Virginia: “Why focus on what the future is rather than how people are making the future now?” - Pauli: “The whole mandate of the social sciences is relational,” and “With big tech and occupational struggles, where technology comes from huge networks, the work is on the relations.” - Abhishek: “What happens when the entity isn’t there?” (on experts’ knowledge claims and stances toward clients who are also experts) - Corentin (& Stella): “It’s an opaque optimization technique… what future is explaining the current.” (speaking about algorithmic management in gig delivery work) - Anca: “If everything is in flux, what do we hold on to?” and “All work is knowledge work.” Thank you to everyone who attended the symposium for such great engagement and a packed room—in what we were fortunate to have been the best room in the Bella Center! And thank you to the AOM Organization & Management Theory Division (OMT) and the AOM CTO Division for sponsoring our session.

💡An idea from AOM Chicago 2024 turned into a packed PDW in Copenhagen a year later! 🚀 As an IS scholar with interests in Design Science, I hardly found matching sessions at AOM 2024 in Chicago despite some scattered presentations here and there. To cater to scholars working on design-oriented research in AI, together with Lan Sang, we initiated the groundwork to organize a Professional Development Workshop (PDW) at AOM Copenhagen. We could gauge the interest and the need at ICIS – The International Conference on Information Systems 2024 in Bangkok, which strengthened our determination to proceed with the idea. In our search, we found the Information Systems Research - An INFORMS Journal editorial authored by Ahmed Abbasi, Jeffrey Parsons, Gautam Pant, Olivia Sheng, and Suprateek Sarker immensely useful in guiding design research on AI. Therefore, we were eager to invite the authors to share their insights and spark deeper discussions inspired by their editorial. Fast forward to AOM 2025, and we had a full house at our PDW in Copenhagen! 🚀 A big thank you to all the veteran design scientists and emerging scholars in the field who contributed to our PDW! 👏 🎤 Keynotes: Ahmed Abbasi (University of Notre Dame) & Ramayya Krishnan (Carnegie Mellon University) on Responsible AI 'By Design' Jeffrey Parsons (Memorial University, Newfoundland and Labrador) on the critical role of Data Design 📑 Paper presentations: Matthias Söllner (University of Kassel) – AI-powered learning system for legal writing Anuschka Schmitt (The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) – Design and effects of algorithmic output Gemza Ademaj (Lund University – ML dashboard design for mental health decision-making 📚 Mentorship: Alongside our speakers, Matti Rossi (Aalto University) joined to mentor early-career researchers, offering personalised feedback to help advance their design-oriented AI research. 🙏 Special thanks to Steven L. Johnson for his guidance and to the AOM CTO Division for their generous sponsorship. 🤝Thank you so much, Lan Sang (University of Colorado Boulder), it was so much fun working with you to turn this idea into a reality! 👥Last but not least, we thank the wonderful audience that engaged actively throughout. 🥲Apologies from our side that the number of seats and the room size were not sufficient to accommodate the full audience. With this lineup, it was no surprise that the room was overflowing! In the coming years, we hope that this community keeps growing! 👥👥 #AOM2025 #DesignScience #ArtificialIntelligence #AI #HumanAISystems #InformationSystems #IS #Academia #PDW #ISResearch #ThankYou

Congratulations to all of the CTO Division winners and a big thank to everyone who participated in CTO Division sessions and activities in Copenhagen. We hope to see you again next year in Philadelphia!