Impact In Progress
A podcast about research that is transforming the world from Emory University.

Season 2

23 days ago

S2E1 - Using AI to Transform Business Decision-Making

Episode Notes

Scaling Smarter with Causal AI

How do global giants like Alibaba optimize logistics for millions of packages? In this episode, we are joined by Dr. Ruomeng Cui, the Goizueta Foundation Term Chair Associate Professor at Emory University’s Goizueta Business School. Dr. Cui discusses the shift from traditional machine learning to Causal AI. While standard AI predicts what will happen, Causal AI helps businesses understand why things happen, allowing for personalized interventions that reduce costs, improve customer satisfaction, and protect the environment.

Key Takeaways:

  • Prediction vs. Causality: Standard AI identifies patterns, but Causal AI identifies the direct effect of a business decision (like a discount or a shipping change), allowing for more precise resource allocation.
  • Individualized Optimization: By using causal frameworks, businesses can move away from "one-size-fits-all" strategies to individual-level preferences, drastically increasing efficiency. By estimating how each individual responds to a treatment and then optimizing who receives it, companies can achieve dramatically more with less.
  • Versatile and Expanding Framework: Beyond the wide deployment across industry leaders, Causal AI is currently being adapted for healthcare (e.g., AI scribes) to improve billing accuracy and doctor productivity, ultimately leading to better patient outcomes.

Resources:

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To stay updated on the latest research and impact at Emory, follow Impact in Progress on your favorite podcast platform, and if you are an Emory researcher interested in being featured, please reach out to Dr. Kimberly Eck at [email protected].

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9 days ago

S2E2 - Labor Contracts In Higher Ed

Episode Notes

This episode features Dr. Deepa Das Acevedo, an Associate Professor at the Emory University School of Law. Tenure is often discussed but rarely understood with data. Dr. Deepa Das Acevedo discusses her groundbreaking research and her book, The War on Tenure. She provides a data-driven look at how tenured faculty actually lose their jobs and why the "elite" status of academia often masks the grueling reality of the profession.

Key Takeaways:

  • Tenure as a Contract: Tenure isn't a "job for life" without accountability; it is a high-level "just cause" contract similar to those held by unionized employees.
  • The Productivity Myth: Data suggests there is little to no correlation between getting job security and decreases in productivity. In fact, security often enables more ambitious, long-term research.
  • The Financial Reality: The path to becoming a professor is longer and more expensive than the public assumes, often resulting in a high debt-to-income ratio for many faculty members.

Resources:

Follow the Show

To stay updated on the latest research and impact at Emory, follow Impact in Progress on your favorite podcast platform, and if you are an Emory researcher interested in being featured, please reach out to Dr. Kimberly Eck at [email protected].

This podcast is powered by Pinecast.

Read more…