Swanand Kulkarni

Hello! I am a Visiting Faculty member in the Supply Chain and Operations Department at the Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota. Previously, I was a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Operations and Management Science area at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. I completed my PhD in Operations Management at Georgia Tech, where I was fortunate to be advised by Basak Kalkanci.

Upcoming presentations :

INFORMS 2025: Emerging Topics in Behavioral Operations Management
[Sun, Oct 26, 2:45 PM - 4 PM, Building B Level 4 B404]
Talk title: Pay Model Intuitiveness and Transparency on On-Demand Service Platforms

Education

PhD in Operations Management (minor: Industrial and Systems Engineering)
Scheller College of Business, Georgia Institute of Technology
Dissertation: Information Sharing and Operational Transparency on On-Demand Service Platforms (Link)
Committee: Basak Kalkanci (Advisor), Chris Parker, Ravi Subramanian, Beril Toktay, Manpreet Hora
**Finalist, 2024 INFORMS TIMES Doctoral Dissertation Award**

Master of Science in Statistics
School of Mathematics, Georgia Institute of Technology

Master of Science in Economics
School of Economics, Georgia Institute of Technology

B.Tech in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering
Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology, Nagpur

Research

My research examines how to design digital operations to better align technological capabilities with human behavior, with an emphasis on platforms in ride-hailing and on-demand delivery.

I focus on effectively designing key features of platform innovations from a user perspective, such as the intuitiveness, fairness, and transparency of price- and wage-setting algorithms; the nature of the real-time information on market conditions shared with workers; and workers’ wage levels under digital customer tipping.
By identifying the behavioral mechanisms that link design choices to user decisions and firms’ outcomes, my work examines how technology can realize its economic potential while preserving user welfare.

Topics: Digital Operations, Human-Technology Interaction, Future of Work, Socially Responsible Operations, Behavioral Operations.

Methodologies: Game-theory, laboratory and large-scale online experiments.

Spatial Information Sharing on On-Demand Service Platforms
(with Basak Kalkanci)
[Methodology: Game-theory modeling, Behavioral lab experiments]
(Accepted at Management Science)
**Honorable Mention, POMS College of Behavioral Operations Management Junior Scholar Paper Competition (2022)**
More details

Pay Model Intuitiveness and Transparency on On-Demand Service Platforms
(with Basak Kalkanci and Chris Parker)
[Methodology: Large-scale online experiments]
Under final preparation for resubmission (Major Revision at Management Science)
**Accepted at MSOM SIG Conference, Technology, Innovation and Entrepreneurship Track (2024)**
**Finalist, POMS College of Behavioral Operations Management Junior Scholar Paper Competition (2022)**
**Accepted for full presentation at Early-Career Sustainable Operations Management Workshop (2023)**
More details

Platform Commission and its Transparency on Ride-hailing Platforms
[Methodology: Online experiments]
(with Basak Kalkanci)
Work in progress (More details)

PhD thesis (projects 1-3): Information Sharing and Operational Transparency on On-Demand Service Platforms (Link)

**Finalist, 2024 INFORMS TIMES Doctoral Dissertation Award**

Wages and Tipping on On-Demand Service Platforms
[Methodology: Game theory modeling, Online experiments]
(with Laurens Debo and Raghav Singhal)
Work in progress (More details)

Awards & Recognitions

Research and Teaching

Finalist, INFORMS TIMES Doctoral Dissertation Award 2024
Finalist, POMS CBOM Junior Scholar Paper Competition 2023
Ashford Watson Stalnaker Memorial Award for PhD Student Excellence 2023
Honorable Mention, POMS CBOM Junior Scholar Paper Competition 2022
Graduate Student Instructor of the Year 2021-22, Scheller College of Business 2022

Research Funding and Scholarships

Research funding from the Business Analytics Center at Georgia Tech 2022
DAAD Rise Professional Scholarship 2017
Travel award to visit IE Business School as a Research Scholar, Georgia Tech 2017
Graduate Assistantship, School of Economics, Georgia Tech 2017-18

Conference Presentations

Spatial Information Sharing on On-Demand Service Platforms

INFORMS Annual Meeting 2022, Indianapolis, IN, USA
Behavioral Operations Conference 2022, Fayetteville, AR, USA
Marketplace Innovation Workshop 2022, Online
POMS College of Behavioral OM Junior Scholar Paper Competition Finals 2022, Online
POMS Annual Meeting Conference 2022, Online
INFORMS Annual Meeting 2021, Anaheim, CA, USA
POMS Annual Conference 2021, Online

Pay Model Intuitiveness and Transparency on On-Demand Service Platforms

INFORMS Annual Meeting 2025, Atlanta, GA, USA (scheduled)
POMS Annual Conference 2025, Atlanta, GA, USA
Operations Rookiepalooza 2024, Kellogg School of Management, Evanston, IL, USA
INFORMS Annual Meeting 2024, Seattle, WA, USA
M&SOM TIE SIG Conference 2024, Minneapolis, MN, USA
Behavioral Operations Conference 2024, Boulder, CO, USA
POMS Annual Conference 2024, Minneapolis, MN, USA
INFORMS Annual Meeting 2023, Phoenix, AZ, USA
Behavioral Operations Conference 2023, Baltimore, MD, USA
POMS Annual Conference 2023, Orlando, FL, USA
POMS College of Behavioral OM Junior Scholar Paper Competition Finals 2023, Orlando, FL, USA
Early-Career Sustainable Operations Workshop 2023, Amherst, MA, USA

Wages and Tipping on On-Demand Service Platforms

POMS Annual Conference 2025, Atlanta, GA, USA

Information Sharing and Operational Transparency on On-Demand Service Platforms

INFORMS TIMES Doctoral Dissertation Award Finals 2024, Seattle, WA, USA

Service

Peer-review

INFORMS TIMES Dissertation Award Committee member 2025
Invited Reviewer for M&SOM Conference 2024, 2025
Invited Judge, INFORMS BOM Best Working Paper Competition 2022
Invited Reviewer for MIS Quarterly 2022

Conference Organization

Session Chair, “Emerging Topics in Behavioral Operations Management”, INFORMS Annual Meeting 2025
Session Co-chair with Basak Kalkanci, “Emerging Topics in Behavioral Operations Management”, INFORMS Annual Meeting 2024
Session Co-chair with Basak Kalkanci, “Emerging Topics in Behavioral Operations Management”, INFORMS Annual Meeting 2022
Session Chair, “Behavioral Operations and Technology”, POMS Annual Conference 2022

Teaching

Business Statistics and Analytical Tools

Instructor: Business Statistics in R (UG, University of Minnesota, 110×2 students) [Fall 2025]
TA: Pricing Analytics and Revenue Management (MBA, Georgia Tech) [Fall 2021]
TA: Analytical Tools for Decisions (MBA, Georgia Tech) [Fall 2019 - Fall 2020]
TA: Econometric Analysis (UG, Georgia Tech) [Spring 2017 - Spring 2018]

Operations and Supply Chain Management

Instructor: Sustainable Supply Chain & Operations (UG, University of Minnesota) [Spring 2026]
Instructor: Operations Management (UG, Georgia Tech, 53 students, Eval: 4.4/5) [Spring 2023]
Instructor: Operations Management (UG, Georgia Tech, 44 students, Eval: 4.8/5) [Spring 2021]

**Graduate Student Instructor of the Year 2021-22, Scheller College of Business**
**Nominated for CETL Institute-wide Graduate Student Instructor of the Year 2021-22**

TA: Operations Management (UG, Georgia Tech) [Fall 2021]
TA: Supply Chain Modeling (MBA, Georgia Tech) [Spring 2020, Spring 2022]

Teaching Approach

In the past, I have relied on using the following teaching methods to support student learning*:

Connecting Theory and Practice
Supporting Comments:
“I think that I am learning a lot of topics in this class that I am able to apply to real-world understandings of the companies I see on the news or buy from and that's been really cool to experience..”, “Great real world examples..”, “Really appreciated how knowledgeable about the topic the professor was and the effort he exhibited to tie in real examples to make topics relatable to students”, “I really enjoyed the videos in the lectures- i think they help me learn, especially when they relate things were learning to other companies.” , “He was great at lecturing and finding examples that relate to the topic.” , “I really enjoyed the real life examples that were brought up in class.” [Spring 2021 and Spring 2023 Survey Text Responses]

Encouraging Independent and Critical Thinking
Supporting Comments:
“The homework assignments helped us take what we were learning and apply it to the real world they always made me think and stretch my mind”, “Assignments gave us a lot of creative freedom at points to give recommendations and were good exercises.”, “I thought the assignments were the most interesting part.”, “The assignments did a great job of checking if we knew the material.”, , “I liked the assignments! Helped me understand the content” [Spring 2021 and Spring 2023 Survey Text Responses]

Building Intuitive Understanding
Supporting Comments:
“I thought the professor explained everything he taught very well.”, ”...explains material very well”, “Whenever a concept was a little confusing I felt that the professor always explained it and broke it down in a way that was more understandable (especially the more difficult math concepts)”, "He covered everything very well and nothing was ever too confusing.” , "Great at explaing all topics pertaining to the class” [Spring 2021 and Spring 2023 Survey Text Responses]

Student-centric Course Design and Policies
Supporting Comments:
“Very compassionate for the students”, “..he was super nice..” , “Clearly cared about teaching and his students.”, “Effort was expected and I was not overwhelmed”, “the amount of work was perfect, not too much and not too little either.”, “I am learning a lot but it isn't necessarily stressful like some of my other classes, which is great.”, “Well structured course.”, “Very organized.”, “I think he just cares a lot about his students, and he wants us to succeed as best we can.”, “Professor Kulkarni cares about his students and wants them to do well. As mentioned previously, he makes it clear what is needed to succeed in this class. I would say that transparency and clarity is a great strength of his. I never had to wonder what assignments were coming up because expectations were set clearly.”, “He really seemed to care about the students, we has very kind and understadning of what it is like to be a student and often gave helpful reminders and advice.” , “Ability to empathize with students.” [Spring 2021 and Spring 2023 Survey Text Responses]

Being Accessible to Students
Supporting Comments:
“Response time is great”, “How responsive the professor was, and how easy it was to follow along in the class”, “easy to communicate with”, “Very approachable”, “Accessible was very easy to connect and go over assignments”, “Helpful and available”, “I appreciate that you make time to meet with students outside of class and discuss the exam and any other questions or concerns we have”, “Very clear communication through email”, “Communicated well with the students.”, “Very helpful if I ever needed guidance.”, “Always excited to help students and very knowledgeable about course material” [Spring 2021 and Spring 2023 Survey Text Responses]

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