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On Legacy
- Derek Dubois, 1/15/2026
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A few weeks ago, I stopped short outside Ballantine Hall. Above one of the doors, half-hidden, weathered, easy to miss, was a black bumper sticker for an indie rock band. The K-Rex Struts. An awful band name. Unmistakably mine.
Twenty years ago, I was the singer and guitarist in that band. We formed senior year of high school, made a record, and played at local dive bars. At some point, a
fan must have pressed that sticker onto this door.
Somehow, through two decades of campus maintenance, renovations, and buildings rising and falling, it has survived. (For the record, as soon as I found it, I tried to remove it. I don’t condone that sort of thing. But after 20 years of weathering, it's a load-bearing sticker now.)
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I couldn’t shake what it stirred. That band dissolved the way many things do: some moved away, grad school, careers, marriages, kids. Life moved forward. I built a career. But somewhere along the way, for me, the work stopped nourishing the soul.
So, I applied to a PhD program at this remarkable institution.
Now, I’m starting again. Learning how to be a scholar. Carving out a researcher identity. Teaching. Mentoring. Contributing. Trying (slowly, imperfectly) to build something that lasts in a different way.
Legacy isn’t always grand or immediate. Sometimes it’s a sticker no one notices for twenty years. Sometimes it’s a question you pursue because it matters. Sometimes it’s the students you help steady, the ideas you advance, the community you invest in.
That sticker reminded me: we are always leaving traces behind us. The real choice is whether we’re intentional about them.
As you head into this semester, I’ll leave you with the question that’s been lingering with me:
What legacy are you planting here?
Welcome to the next issue of PhD Pulse.
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Lily Bagh Shirin
Marketing
Class of 2028
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Lily is a 2nd-year Ph.D. student in Marketing, specializing in Consumer Behavior. Her research explores the mental landscape of consumer choice, focusing specifically on Consumer Psychology and the core mechanisms of Judgment and Decision-Making.
Lily holds an MBA in Marketing from the University of Tehran and a BA in Mechanical Engineering from Amirkabir University of Technology.
Lily is fundamentally interested in how internal mental states, such as the availability of Cognitive Resources and the interplay of Motivation and Emotion, shape the way consumers approach, process, and ultimately execute decisions.
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Soode Vaezinejad
Supply Chain Management
Class of 2026
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Soode Vaezinejad is a Ph.D. candidate in Operations and Supply Chain Management. She earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Industrial Engineering from Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences and Health Services and Amirkabir University of Technology.
Soode's research focuses on information asymmetry, digital technologies, and sustainability in supply chain networks. She has published journal articles and book chapters and brings over 6 years of professional experience in strategic planning and transformation in the transportation sector.
Outside of academia, she holds a “Dan Two” black belt in Taekwondo.
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Maniraj Muthyala
Finance
Class of 2026
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Maniraj is a Ph.D. candidate in Finance.
His research focuses on corporate governance and shareholder activism, with a particular interest in how boardroom oversight and governance interventions shape firm outcomes, and how AI and machine learning tools can be used in their study.
Maniraj has taught undergraduate courses including Financial Management, Financial Institutions and Markets, and Business Analytics.
More broadly, his goal is to produce research that is rigorous and useful for boards, investors, and policymakers.
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Where Are They Now?
Checking in with past PhD Students
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Wangsuk Suh
Assistant Professor of Marketing
Kennesaw State University
URI PhD: 2025
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Q. What, in your opinion, was the most pivotal moment (either a roadblock or an enabler) between your dissertation and today?
A. For me, the most important moment was realizing the value of taking ownership. During the PhD program, I tried to act like a professor rather than a student. This meant doing more than expected and approaching everything with a strong learning mindset. That mindset helped tremendously.
I’ve noticed that confidence is good, but when it’s used the wrong way, it backfires. Some PhD students are well-trained but not flexible, convinced that what they know is the only “truth.” I tried to keep a humble, learning-oriented mindset based on guidance from my advisor and my community...
| | Recent College of Business PhD News & Events
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Ali Raoufi Passed His Comprehensive Exams
Ali is now a third-year PhD student, marking an important milestone in his doctoral journey.
Congratulations to Ali on this accomplishment!
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2 URI Student Teams won medals in the Global Sustainability Supply Chain Case Competition
Janos Kata co-supervised the paired URI teams Rhode2Istanbul and Rhode2Budapest in the student case competition, supporting students as they tackled complex, real-world sustainability challenges.
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SCM Reunion at DSI
The URI SCM community came together in Orlando during DSI for several energizing days of research, conversation, and connection. Faculty, current PhD students, and alumni reunited to share work, exchange ideas, and enjoy time together beyond the sessions.
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Finance Research Spotlight
A recent paper by PhD student Maniraj Muthyala (with Dr. Choonsik Lee), “Are Boardroom Observers White Knights or Trojan Horses?”, was featured on the Columbia Law School Blue Sky Blog.
The study examines activist investors’ use of non-voting board observers and finds that markets respond negatively to these arrangements, suggesting they provide weaker oversight than full board representation.
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Interdisciplinary Research
A recent article by Shawn P. Scott (Marketing PhD ’21), coauthored with an international team of scholars, including URI Management Faculty Emeritus Dr. Doug Creed, has been published in Organization Studies.
Drawing on an engaged, interdisciplinary collaboration formed in the wake of the 2020 Beirut blast, the study examines how scholar-activists mobilized and sustained collective action amid a creeping crisis.
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Spotlight on Marketing Research
Mona Safizadeh (Marketing PhD student) has coauthored a new research study with Dr. Amir Yazdanparast and Dr. Reto Felix. The study is to be published in Psychology & Marketing.
Drawing on construal level theory, appraisal theory, and research on the temporal self, the study examines how advertising message appeals shape consumer responses to vegan cosmetics. Congratulations to Mona and team!
| | AREA-SPECIFIC INITIATIVES | | |
In October, Dr. John Bai (Northeastern University) presented his work “Thy Bust, My Boom: Micro Evidence on Small Firms’ Tech Evaluations after the Dot-Com Burst,” which examined how small firms reassessed technology investments following the collapse of the dot-com bubble.
Later in the semester, Choonsik Lee shared his paper “AI Meets ESG: Systematic ESG Classification of Shareholder Proposals,” introducing a large language model–based framework to reduce subjectivity and inconsistency in ESG classification.
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URI's first-year SCM PhD students will be attending the annual meeting of the Northeast Decision Sciences Institute (NEDSI) in Philadelphia this April.
The conference will offer early exposure to research presentations, doctoral development seminars, and networking opportunities across the Decision Sciences community.
| | | RECENT URI ALUMNI PUBLICATIONS FROM: | | |
Click each citation to link to recent alumni research:
Yun, G., & Hales, D. N. (2026). Drivers of location advantages in the medical device industry: a qualitative study. Operations Management Research, 19(1), 1-17.
Duan, J., & Brechman, J. (2025). The effects of influencer marketing on purchase intention: Exploring the roles of materialism, envy and wishful identification. Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, 33(3), 434-452.
Ashraf, M. H., Saeed, N., Cullinane, K., & Dresner, M. (2026). Enhancing resilience and sustainability: an inductive approach to innovations in cruise industry. Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment, 150, 105118.
Zhang, J., & Rogers, Z. S. (2025). Consumer tradeoff preferences regarding logistics service and sustainability in last-mile delivery. The International Journal of Logistics Management, 1-24.
Liu, K. L., Özpolat, K., & Shin, S. K. (2025). Insights from lower-tier ICT suppliers: How network centrality in multi-tier supply chain relationships affects buyer financial performance. International Journal of Production Economics, 109840.
Khalaj Hedayati, M., Schniederjans, D. G., & Mosayebi, M. (2025). Innovative knowledge and firm resilience: stock price post-shock percentage changes. Management Decision, 1-25.
Peña, P., Riley, J., & Davis, N. (2025). Emotional intelligence is a marketing superpower—so why aren’t we teaching it?. Marketing Education Review, 35(4), 313-316.
Peña, P., Riley, J., & Davis, N. (2025). Marketing meets the machine: Practical applications and innovative pedagogical insights from the frontlines of AI adoption. Marketing education review, 35(4), 269-270.
Peña, P., Riley, J., & Davis, N. (2025). Beyond the “AI” powered slide deck: exploring emerging tools that engage, empower, and elevate student learning. Marketing Education Review, 1-2.
Strübel, J., Sabik, N., Baker, N., Leger, R., & Peña, P. (2025). Affective Responses to 3D Body Scan Technology: An Exploratory Study. Human behavior and emerging technologies, 2025(1), 9126536.
Micu, D., Xia, F., & Micu, C. (2025). Brand-Related Posts on Social Media: The Effect of Product Type on Consumers’ UGC. Review of Applied Socio-Economic Research, 30(2), 117-128.
Gilbert, J. R., Sheinin, D. A., Xiao, J. J., & Wen, B. (2025). “Pathways” to Financial Well‐Being: The Role of Perceptions of Economic Mobility, Trait Hope, and Financial Capability for Minority and Low‐Income Consumers. Journal of Consumer Affairs, 59(3), e70020.
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