Yufei Zhu

Ph.D. Candidate
Institute of Operations Research and Analytics (IORA)
National University of Singapore (NUS)

Email:

Hi! I am a fifth-year Ph.D. student in the Institute of Operations Research and Analytics at National University of Singapore, working with Zhenyu Hu, Joel Goh, and Zhi Chen.

I am broadly interested in how information and incentives shape strategic decision-making under uncertainty in operational settings. In particular, I study the role of feedback mechanisms and dynamic contracting in innovation sourcing, as well as how policy affects search behavior and outcomes under competition. I also have a growing research interest in healthcare operations management, especially in infectious disease modeling and hospital service system design to improve healthcare delivery. Methodologically, my work draws primarily on game theory and dynamic programming.

I received my B.E. in Industrial Systems Engineering and Management from NUS, with a Minor in Financial Mathematics.

Research Interests

Research Topics: Innovation Sourcing, Feedback Design, Healthcare Operations

Methodologies: Game Theory, Dynamic Programming, Dynamic Contracting

Research

Working Papers

1.
"The Strategic Secretary Problem"
with Joel Goh.
2.
"Delegating Innovation: Sequential and Parallel Search under Competition"
with Zhi Chen and Zhenyu Hu.

Work in Progress

3.
"Managing Human and AI in Innovation: A Dynamic Principal–Agent Framework"
with Ying-Ju Chen, Tian Feng, and Yangge Xiao.
4.
"Sourcing Innovation: Sequential Search under Competition with Leaderboards"
with Zhi Chen and Zhenyu Hu.
5.
"Large-Scale Home Health Care Routing and Scheduling"
with Joel Goh, Stephanie Ko, and Yvonne H. Zhu.
6.
"Sensitivity Analysis for Epidemiological Compartmental Models"
with Peng Dai, Sze-Chuan Suen, and Joel Goh.

Conference Presentations

Delegating Innovation: Sequential and Parallel Search under Competition

36th Annual POMS Conference, Reno, NV, USA May 2026
The 16th POMS-HK International Conference, Shenzhen, China Jan 2026
INFORMS Annual Meeting, Atlanta, GA, USA Oct 2025
INFORMS International Meeting, Singapore Jul 2025
The 15th POMS-HK International Conference, Hong Kong, China Jan 2025
INFORMS Annual Meeting, Seattle, WA, USA Oct 2024
MSOM Conference, Minneapolis, MN, USA Jul 2024
POMS Annual Conference, Minneapolis, MN, USA Apr 2024
Analytics and Operations Young Scholar Workshop, Singapore Mar 2024
INFORMS Annual Meeting, Phoenix, AZ, USA Oct 2023

The Strategic Secretary Problem

36th Annual POMS Conference, Reno, NV, USA May 2026
The 16th POMS-HK International Conference, Shenzhen, China Jan 2026
INFORMS International Meeting, Singapore Jul 2025
The 15th POMS-HK International Conference, Hong Kong, China Jan 2025
INFORMS Annual Meeting, Seattle, WA, USA Oct 2024

Teaching

Guest Instructor

DBA4811 Analytics for Consulting (BBA), Fall 2025
- Designed and delivered lectures on machine learning algorithms, primarily covering non-linear methods.
- Selected comments from students:
- "Very knowledgeable! She also goes around to make sure we are following and incorporates questions within her presentation to encourage participation."
- "I enjoyed her lesson content! It was very clear and easy to follow, the small anecdotal stories she included (e.g. a little bit of history behind the manhattan distance) were also interesting."
- "She's approachable. Her dynamism and ability to break down difficult concepts."
- "Clearly communicated the concepts and provided good examples to explain."

Tutorial Instructor

IE2111 ISE Principles & Practice (Undergraduate Core), Spring 2021
- Conducted 11 tutorial sessions on engineering economics and risk analysis.

Teaching Assistant

BMA5017 Managerial Operations and Analytics (MBA), Fall 2023
DBA4711 Applied Analytics (Undergraduate), Spring 2023
IE6001 Foundations of Optimization (Ph.D.), Fall 2022

Open CV ↗