Yufei Zhu

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

Email:

Hi! I am a Ph.D. candidate in the Institute of Operations Research and Analytics at the National University of Singapore, advised by Zhenyu Hu and Joel Goh.

I study how firms should design dynamic operational processes when participants respond strategically: what information to reveal, how to structure incentives, when to introduce competition, and whether to grant agency. Seemingly beneficial policies can backfire through the behavior they induce. I examine these questions in contexts including labor-platform hiring, innovation sourcing, and human–AI contracting.

More recently, I have been studying healthcare operations, focusing on how to optimize care delivery in hospital-at-home programs, drawing on an ongoing collaboration with practitioners at the National University Health System.

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

Research Interests

Research Topics: Information and Incentive Design, Search and Matching, Human–AI Operations, 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.
3.
Racing Against Automation: Dynamic Incentives When AI Can Preempt the Human
with Tian Feng, Yangge Xiao and Ying-Ju Chen.

Work in Progress

4.
Sourcing Innovation: Sequential Search under Competition with Leaderboards
with Zhi Chen and Zhenyu Hu.

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

Racing Against Automation: Dynamic Incentives When AI Can Preempt the Human

2026 INFORMS Revenue Management and Pricing Section Conference, Ann Arbor, MI, USA Jul 2026

Teaching

Guest Instructor

DBA4811 Analytics for Consulting (BBA), Fall 2025 & Fall 2026
- 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.”

Teaching Assistant

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

Tutorial Instructor

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

Open CV ↗