Operations and Information Management Department

The program in Operations and Information Management trains world-class scholars in the disciplines of decision processes, information and decision technologies, information strategy, operations management and operations research. The program emphasizes research that focuses on real management problems and maintains a balance between theory and implementation.

The program is designed to admit and train a small cohort of exceptionally able PhD students who show promise for an academic career in fundamental and applied research and teaching. Applicants are expected to have completed introductory courses in economics and mathematics (including calculus and linear algebra). Successful applicants typically possess a strong mathematical background and an aptitude for analytical thinking. All applicants must take either the GMAT or the GRE General Test.

The program permits custom-tailoring to each student’s interests. The early stage of the program establishes rigorous foundations through the departmental core (three courses). During this stage students also begin to specialize in coursework. The program provides opportunities for students to conduct research in the form of summer papers under the supervision of faculty members. These papers provide a transition from coursework into the dissertation phase of the program.

About The Wharton OPIM PhD Program

The Operations and Information Management (OPIM) at the Wharton School is one of the largest PhD programs among top business schools. This affords us the ability to have the majority of our PhD courses taught by our own faculty. Both our department and the School are consistently ranked #1 by a variety of academic and business publications*.

The PhD program in OPIM exists within the Wharton School, a business school; however, most students come to us with backgrounds in engineering, the humanities, or the sciences and some have extensive previous training in business or economics. Our diverse group of doctoral students comes from top undergraduate and graduate institutions from around the globe: Chile, China, India, Israel, Italy, Russia, Spain, Turkey, and the United States, to name a few. Each year we admit up to 10 new PhD students to our program.

*See the following source for the ranking of our department:

Operations Research Management Science Today
UTD Top 100 Business School Research Rankings
Academy of Management Journal

Learning, Research, and Working at Wharton

Wharton provides a stimulating and friendly environment for doctoral studies. Students are located in the same suite as faculty enabling daily interactions, as opposed to many other schools where students occupy a different building or a different floor. While at Wharton, students have an opportunity to receive training in a wide spectrum of research methodologies, including observational field studies, experimental work in a laboratory, empirical data analysis, data-mining , economic modeling, and applied modeling for decision support systems. In addition, students obtain rigorous training in operations research methods, optimization, statistics, stochastic processes, and economics. Most other programs specialize in just one or two methodologies. PhD programs in business, in general, graduate fewer students each year than industrial engineering, operations research or economics departments. Consequently, we allow students to get better access to faculty and more personalized treatment.

Our faculty focuses on applied research and, as a result, teach using more applied, business-relevant examples that are directly connected to the business world; shifting away from highly theoretical problems. As a result, we encourage students to engage in research projects with high-level managers while conducting their research, a benefit that is enabled by our high visibility in the corporate world. Such opportunities for close interaction with practicing managers are rarely available elsewhere. A recent emphasis on business-relevant research encouraged by school deans (see “Business Education Under the Microscope,” Businessweek, Dec. 26, 2007) means that our graduates are in even higher demand.

The Department offers students considerable flexibility with the topic they may research and the faculty they may collaborate with. In fact, students have the freedom to select their research topics and advisors. Of course, as this is no simple task, our faculty works closely with students to guide them towards interesting research problems. According to our data, this all relates to better placement statistics and higher post-Wharton research productivity for our graduates. Student research topics span supply chain management, service operations, manufacturing, new product development, decision models, experimental economics, information systems economics, data mining, and econometric data analysis. Students have unprecedented flexibility to work on inter-disciplinary topics and are able to get exposure to issues that they may not encounter in more narrowly focused groups.

Financial Aid and Stipends

We award fellowships and teaching assistantships to all admitted students. A typical financial aid packages includes a four-year award that covers tuition, fees, enrollment in the UPenn Student Health Plan, and an annual stipend of $24,000 for living expenses. During a student’s first four summers, they are awarded a $4,000 stipend for continued research. An annual $800 budget is available to students to support travel to academic conferences and presentations. In addition, the Department and the School fund several teaching and research assistantships that provide additional income. Furthermore, most students receive additional funding directly from their advisors to support their research activities.

Living in Philadelphia

The City of Philadelphia is the largest city in the State of Pennsylvania and the 6th most populous in the United States with nearly 1.5 million citizens. You will find that Philadelphia is centrally located giving you easy access to other large metropolitan areas (New York City, Washington, Boston) and educational institutions along the East Cost. The Atlantic Ocean is only an hour drive to the New Jersey coast.

From within the City, there is easy access to local and national railways, the airport, regional bus service, and public transportation (subway and bus).

In comparison to cities where other major business schools are located, Philadelphia, on average, is a relatively more affordable place to live.

City		Average Rent: 1 BDR Apartment*
Philadelphia, PA		$965
Chicago, IL		$1,000
Los Angeles, CA		$1,180
Cambridge, MA		$1,485
Palo Alto, CA		$1,629
New York, NY		$2,175

Post-Wharton

After completing studies at Wharton, students are more likely to be placed in academia (our placement record is one of the best) as opposed to industry positions. Our recent graduates have taken academic positions at institutions such as Carnegie Mellon, Chicago, Columbia, Duke, Harvard, INSEAD, New York University, Stanford, UCLA and Virginia. Unlike many other more narrowly focused departments, we place our graduates in operations, information systems, marketing, management and other disciplines. Demand for business PhD students in our areas of specialization is very strong and the number of job openings far exceeds the number of graduates. Thus, starting salaries continue to grow steadily. As an extra benefit, we have an extensive alumni network that is very active and dedicated to helping new graduates.

Program of Study

The program is designed to be completed within four uninterrupted years, including summers, of full-time study and research. In a student’s first year the student takes foundational courses including the departmental core, microeconomics and statistics. During this time students identify the area in which they wish to focus their education and research. During their first summer, students work on a research project in their chosen area under the supervision of a faculty member. A paper based on their research is completed by the end of the summer. In addition, at the end of the summer students take a qualifying exam in their area of specialization. There are five areas of specialization: decision processes (DP), information and decision technology (IDT), information, strategy and economics (ISE), operations management (OM) and operations research (OR).

Upon passing their qualifying exam, students develop a program of in-depth study and research organized around their research interests. Advanced courses help in the final choice of an area of specialization and a dissertation topic. During the summer between their second and third years, students write a research paper under the supervision of a faculty member. This paper provides an important transition between coursework and dissertation research, and often becomes a part of the dissertation.

In the third year a student finishes course work and begins the preparation of a dissertation proposal. This proposal provides some initial results and a specific plan for the completion of a dissertation. The formal defense of the dissertation proposal generally occurs at the end of the third year. After formal approval of the proposal, the student completes the dissertation. A student completes the program by successfully defending his or her dissertation.

Departmental Requirements

A total of 20 course credits are required for graduation. Up to eight appropriate graduate course credits can be transferred from another graduate institution, after approval of the student’s advisor and of the PhD coordinator. (For each course a students wishes to transfer the student should submit to their advisor and the PhD coordinator the name of the course, a description of the course, the comparable Wharton course and an official transcript listing the course and grade.) This section outlines the remaining requirements for all PhD students in OPIM.

Core Courses

All students must choose three out of the following four departmental core courses. The four courses are

OPIM 900 Decision Processes
OPIM 940 Operations Management
OPIM 950 Information and Decision Technology
OPIM 960 Information, Strategy and Economics

Students are expected to earn a B+ or better in these core courses in order to satisfy the core course requirement.

Statistics

The Wharton School requires all PhD students to demonstrate proficiency in the material covered in one of the following course sequences: Statistics 510-511; Statistics 540-541 Statistics 550-551; and Economics 705-706. Students may demonstrate proficiency by either receiving a grade of B- or better in each course, or by passing a waiver exam administered by the Economics or Statistics Departments, or by transferring a comparable graduate level course from another institution. Students may choose courses across sequences (e.g., 510 and 551) with permission from the PhD coordinator. Students are expected to complete their statistics requirements within their first year (i.e., before their qualifying exam).

Teacher Development Program

The Wharton School requires all PhD students to complete the Teacher Development Program (TDP). Students should complete this program before being admitted to candidacy. Waivers of the TDP are granted under the following conditions: prior teaching experience, recognized teaching awards, college-level education courses.

Requirement for Each Area of Specializations

This section provides a brief description of each of the five areas of specialization within the department. Furthermore, the required courses for each specialization are listed. Beyond the required courses, students do have the flexibility to construct a set of courses that support their progress towards the completion of a dissertation. The particular program of study adopted by the student should be developed in consultation with the student’s advisor.

Decision Processes (DP)

DP focuses on making choices when faced with ambiguity, uncertainty and conflicting views and motivations of the principal stakeholders. This specialization gives students a theoretical basis and applied orientation for studying the behavior of individuals, firms and policymakers. Students are guided by formal, normative models of how decisions should be made, based on economic and statistical decision theories, as well as by descriptive analyses of how decisions are actually made, drawing on recent work in cognitive and experimental psychology as well as experimental economics.

In addition to the departmental course requirements, students in Decision Process are required to take the decision processes core (OPIM 900), two economics courses (ECON 681-682 or ECON 701-703), two methodology courses (e.g., OPIM 906 and PPM 900) and three research field courses. The research field courses, chosen in consultation with the student’s advisor, provide a foundation for dissertation research.

The qualifying exam in DP draws from material covered in OPIM 900, Microeconomics I (ECON 681 or 701) and Microeconomics II (Econ 682 or 702).

Information and Decision Technology (IDT)

IDT focuses on the analytical and information technology-based methods for managing complex organizations. This specialization concentrates on the theory, development, and application of computer-implemented technology for solving problems. It draws upon rigorous perspectives from the information and decision technologies, and seeks creative syntheses of these symbiotic approaches.

In addition to the departmental course requirements, students in IDT are required to take the IDT core course (OPIM 950), two economics courses (ECON 681-682 or ECON 701- 703) and at least four advanced IDT courses. Exactly which advanced courses are most appropriate depend on the (possibly customized) program being pursued. Examples include OPIM 902 Game Theory II, OPIM 910 Mathematical Programming, OPIM 918 Computation of Equilibria, OPIM 951 Logic Modeling, OPIM 952 Knowledge-Based Systems, OPIM 953 Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining, and OPIM 954 Evolutionary Computation and Adaptive Artificial Agents. The qualifying exam in IDT draws from material covered in OPIM 950.

Information, Strategy and Economics (ISE)

ISE focuses on understanding the strategic aspects of information and information management. This specialization prepares students for the specialized discipline of information systems economics and strategy, concentrating on necessary methodological and theoretical foundations in economic theory, statistics/econometrics, and information technology. Furthermore, it provides familiarity with related disciplines at the introductory doctoral level.

In addition to the departmental course requirements, students in ISE are required to take the ISE core course (OPIM 960), two economics courses (ECON 681-682 or ECON 701- 703) and at least two advanced ISE courses (e.g., OPIM 961 and ECON 780). The qualifying exam in ISE principally draws from material covered in OPIM960, although students will be expected to be familiar with the material in OPIM666 and OPIM669.

Operations Management (OM)

OM focuses on the processes that define an organization’s outputs and are central to its competitive performance. OM is interested in a wide range of organizational types in both services and manufacturing. Specializations within OM include operations strategy, product design, process design, technology management, capacity planning, inventory control, supply chain management and service system planning. This program helps student develop a deep understanding of the fundamental drivers of operating performance.

In addition to the school and departmental course requirements, students in OM are required to take the OM core course (OPIM 940), math programming (OPIM 910), stochastic processes (OPIM 930), two advanced operations management courses (OPIM 941 plus one other), and four tools courses. Example of tools courses include advanced linear programming (OPIM 913), advanced nonlinear programming (OPIM 914), game theory (ECON 713), integer programming (OPIM 916), queuing (OPIM 932), dynamic programming (OPIM 934), statistical methods/data analysis (STAT 541 or SOC 612), econometrics (ECON 705 and/or ECON 706) and research methods (PPMT 900 or MGMT 953).

The qualifying exam in OM draws from material covered in OPIM 930 and OPIM 940.

Operations Research (OR)

OR focuses on the application of mathematical models to social, business and governmental decision problems. This specialization prepares students to do original and creative research by providing a thorough background in the theory of OR and related fields, and an in-depth knowledge of applications of OR methods to a variety of practical areas. Resulting research focuses on the theory and methodology of OR, and/or on applying, extending or designing OR methods and models for specific application areas. In addition to the school and departmental course requirements, students in OR are required to take math programming (OPIM 910), operations management (OPIM 940), stochastic processes (OPIM 930), two probability courses (STAT 530 and 531), two statistics courses (STAT 550 and 551) and five advanced OR courses (e.g., advanced linear programming OPIM 913, advanced nonlinear programming OPIM 914, graph theory OPIM 915, integer programming OPIM 916, computation of equilibria OPIM 918, large scale network programming OPIM 919).

The qualifying exam in OR draws from material in the probability, statistics and optimization courses.

Summer Paper

Students must complete during their first summer a paper under the supervision of a faculty advisor. Students should identify a faculty advisor and a topic for their summer paper by the end of the second semester. At that time a short (1-page) summer paper proposal should be signed by the student and the advisor and returned to the PhD coordinator. Students should work closely with their advisor throughout the summer. A completed paper must be submitted to the PhD coordinator at the end of the summer. Part of a student’s qualifying exam performance depends on the quality of the student’s summer paper. The goal is to write a publishable quality paper. It is recognized that this is an ambitious target for the first summer, but it is a feasible target – several students have indeed published their first summer paper.

Qualifying Exam

The qualifying exam consists of a written exam, an oral exam and the student’s summer paper. The qualifying written exam is taken at the start of the student’s first summer. Each specialization determines the format of their exam. However, the written exam is generally an open book take home exam over a 24 hour period. After the completion of the written exam, the student spends the summer working on his or her summer research paper. The oral exam is scheduled at the end of the summer and students are notified of their results shortly afterwards.

The OPIM faculty evaluate students based on the quality of their summer paper and their responses on the written and oral portions of the exam. A student receives a passing grade if the faculty determines that the student has sufficiently mastered the skills needed to continue progress towards a PhD in the chosen specialization. If the faculty determine that a student is missing some basic skills, the faculty can specify remedial steps the student must undertake to receive a passing grade. These steps typically include, but are not limited to, reworking responses on the exam, improving the summer paper and/or completing specific courses with a sufficient grade. The student must complete all qualifying exam conditions by May 31 of the student’s second academic year.

If the faculty determine that the student is sufficiently far from meeting requirements (or if the student fails to meet all conditions by the May 31st deadline), then the student receives a failing grade and may no longer continue with the program.

Dissertation Proposal

The dissertational proposal is designed to provide a student with early and formal feedback from the faculty on the student’s dissertation plans. The dissertation proposal defense should occur at the end of the student’s third year, with the fourth year dedicated to the completion of the dissertation. The dissertation proposal should include preliminary results as well as a detailed plan for work that will be completed in the dissertation.

Dissertation Defense

The final requirement in the program is the dissertation defense, which should occur around the end of the student’s fourth year.