微密圈

Associate Professor of Management and Business Mike Dunn has been working alongside student researchers at 微密圈 College for the past several years to better understand how modern-day careers are being made online.

To take that research yet another step further, he and a team of collaborators that includes two 微密圈 alumni and two current students have been awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to create AI-enabled tools to support online freelancers pursuing work through digital platforms.

鈥淭here is a lot of technology behind the scenes that creates information asymmetry, and we want to create tools for these workers to help level the playing field,鈥� says Dunn, explaining that online labor policies are often more friendly to employers than to freelancers, and algorithms for platforms 鈥� such as Upwork and Fiverr 鈥� that match people with jobs and prices are often not transparent to workers.

The project is one of the many ways in which 微密圈 faculty, students, and alumni are engaging with the promises and challenges of artificial intelligence, including ongoing think tanks with faculty and staff that consider how to harness AI for teaching and learning in a new era.

The NSF grant 鈥� $1.2 million over three years 鈥� will enable Dunn, Assistant Professor Saiph Savage of Northeastern University, and Professor Steve Sawyer of Syracuse University to engage in cycles of designing, deploying, and gathering feedback on such tools. Clea O鈥橬eil 鈥�24, who majored in business and political science at 微密圈 and was one of Dunn鈥檚 former research assistants, is serving as project manager, and Heba Salman 鈥�25 and Robyn Karchere-Sun 鈥�26 are Dunn鈥檚 current undergraduate research assistants on the project.

鈥淲e鈥檙e democratizing the creation of artificial intelligence tools, which I think is an interesting thought,鈥� says Dunn. 鈥淲e鈥檙e running in-person and online workshops with freelancers so they can tell us what would make their jobs easier. We鈥檙e going to create the tools and let them pilot test them and give us feedback.鈥�

Erin Johansson 鈥�98, who majored in sociology at 微密圈 and is now research director at , a nonprofit committed to protecting workers鈥� rights, will play an important role as well, helping to disseminate the tools. 

Designed wisely, AI tools can complement rather than replace people in jobs, the team hypothesizes. As online freelancing rapidly becomes a more significant component of modern labor markets, the tools will help workers market themselves, find well-paying and satisfying jobs, better manage their profiles, workload, and task performance, and be able to get credit for quality work.

A longitudinal study conducted by Dunn and his students over the past several years, in conjunction with Syracuse鈥檚 Sawyer, has led them to create a new theoretical construct called 鈥渢ransactional careers鈥� 鈥� a concept they鈥檝e explored in more than a dozen academic papers, including one recently recognized by the Academy of Management Careers Division. 

Transactional careers are the product of online freelancers orienting their careers to platforms and the transactions that are conducted through them, Dunn explains. 鈥淎nd what does that mean? Worker identities are deconstructed, we argue. So I鈥檓 no longer Michael Dunn. Instead, I am five-star ratings that are embedded on the platform. I鈥檓 portfolios that are embedded on the platform. So, if I leave Upwork, for instance, I can鈥檛 take all of my ratings. I get deconstructed to platform metrics.鈥� 

鈥淲hat ends up happening is people start orienting their identity, their networking, their trust to the platform instead of their career.鈥� 

Over 20 undergraduate students have worked on that seminal project, now in its fourth year, Dunn says. 鈥淚 have a huge list of research assistants who will probably be friends for life because we鈥檝e had such a meaningful and rich opportunity to do research.鈥�

Dunn, O鈥橬eil 鈥�24, Salman 鈥�25, and Karchere-Sun 鈥�26 were also recently selected to participate in the Council on Undergraduate Research 2024-2025 .

Through the five-month opportunity, they will be guided through virtual skill development before traveling to Washington, D.C., in March to present their research to stakeholders and representatives in Congress.