Benn R. Konsynski, Ph. D., is the George S. Craft Distinguished University Professor of Information Systems and Operations Management. He arrived at Emory’s Goizueta Business School following six years on the faculty at the Harvard Business School where he taught in the MBA program and several executive programs. Prior to arriving at HBS, he was a professor at the University of Arizona where he was a co-founder of the university's multi-million dollar group decision support laboratory and gateway connection of early internet LANs to IMPs. He holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Purdue University.
Benn was named Baxter Research Fellow at Harvard and Hewlett Fellow at the Carter Center in Atlanta. He has been awarded a number of distinguished teaching awards, including a Great Teacher Lecture award at Emory University.
He has published in such diverse journals as Communications of the ACM, Harvard Business Review, IEEE Transactions on Communications, MIS Quarterly, Management Science, Journal of MIS, Data Communications, Decision Sciences, Decision Support Systems, Information Systems, and IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering.
Over the years, Benn has been recognized for best paper awards and cited for several "classic" papers. He is most proud of the SOB (Student of Benn) network of students from Purdue, Arizona, Harvard, MIT and other institutions. He specializes in issues of digital commerce and information technology in relationships across organizations. This work involves extensive domestic and international field work on inter-organizational systems, digital commerce, electronic data interchange (EDI), channel systems, electronic integration, information partnerships, and the electronic marketplace. He also studies "profiling technologies" (e.g. RFID, motes, smart dust, mesh networks, etc.) as a basis for analysis of best practice and theory development in these rapidly developing areas. He is interested in immersion and involved in AR/VR/VW and in reallocation of decision rights.
He has served as a consultant on management and technology issues with many organizations including UPS, IBM, AT&T, Northern Trust, Texas Instruments, U.S. Army, Bestfoods, Northwestern Mutual Life, Ernst and Young, Bank of Montreal, Plasti-line, J.C. Penney, Aetna, TESSCO, and Dillard's Department Stores. He has served on boards including Macquarium, Harbinger, nuBridges, Tessco and Enterra Solutions. In addition, Benn works closely with the entrepreneur community in Atlanta, serving as board member or advisor to a number of start-ups. Benn has been a key advisor to UPS and has facilitated the UPS Information Technology Strategy Committee since 1995.