Dr Alireza Nili
Faculty of Science,
School of Information Systems
Biography
I am a Senior Lecturer in Service Science. I investigate digitisation of services from the customer-centric perspective, design and evaluate personalised digital services, and propose and evaluate solutions for increasing trust and confidence in the services (user level and organisational level). I propose and validate frameworks, guiding principles, and theories to achieve these goals. I love what I do. I have won several awards such as the Educator of the Year award (Executive Dean's Outstanding Achievement Award, ECR/MCR, 2023). I am a Level 3 (mentoring) PhD supervisor with award-winning PhD graduates. My research focuses on several types of digital services and technologies such as Internet of Things (IOT), Industrial IOT (IIOT), artificial intelligence (particularly chatbots), social media platforms, and technologies for sustainability. My research is domain-independent, but I have been particularly interested in digital public services and retail technologies. I use research methods and approaches such as design science, grounded theory, and empirical methods of theory building and evaluation (design workshops, focus groups,...).I have had roles such as track chair and associate editor (referee) at major conferences in the field such as International Conference on Information Systems, European Conference on Information Systems, and Australasian Conference on Information Systems. I have published in several high quality journals such as International Journal of Information Management (A*), Communications of the ACM, Sustainable Cities and Society, Electronic Commerce Research, MIT Sloan Management Review, Public Performance & Management Review, IEEE Software, and Smart Cities as well as top conferences in the field (e.g. European Conference on Information Systems and International Conference on Information Systems).
Personal details
Positions
- Senior Lecturer in Service Science
Faculty of Science,
School of Information Systems
Research field
Information Systems
Field of Research code, Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification (ANZSRC), 2008
Qualifications
- PhD (Victoria University of Wellington)
Teaching
Teaching and supervision:
Teaching: I have been coordinating and teaching IT Systems Design (IFB103). I have been leading a large team of IFB103 tutors and students (usually, around 10-20 tutors and several hundreds students) every semester since February 2018, and have been constantly receiving the highest teaching and coordination quality scores in the unit’s history. I won the Educator of the Year award (Executive Dean's Outstanding Achievement Award, Science, 2023). I also designed the online version of the Systems Analysis and Design unit. Prior to this, I was teaching several similar Management Information Systems units and Business units (e.g. project management and business innovation) at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand.
Supervision: I am a Level 3 (mentoring) PhD supervisor with award-winning PhD graduates. I have supervised six PhD students (as principal supervisor and associate supervisor). Among them, three completed their PhD and three are working on their research projects. New PhD students are welcome.
Recent Teaching History:
Experience
Industry engagement/projects:
- A Chief Investigator of the "Securing Critical Agriculture Technology and Emerging Solutions" project: a collaborative project with several universities and industry partners such as CISCO as well as Data 61 (total value: $1,400,000 ; contributed to $360,000). Project context: IOT in agriculture
- A Chief Investigator of a research project with industry partners such as Amazon, Kmart and Bunnings in 2021-2022: As a part of an ARA project, I wrote a research proposal and led the research activities related to "Designing chatbots that meet the unique needs of consumers". Overall value of the project: $200,000. Project context: retail sector and AI/chatbots
- A Chief Investigator of the project “Reducing Consumer Uncertainty in Spatial Data” (a CRC project with PSMA Australia) in 2017 and 2018: my activities included contribution to collecting and analysing qualitative and quantitative data from twenty major consumers and producers of spatial data products in Australia and New Zealand. Overall value: $172,000. Project context: public services, private sector, and not for profit
- Contributing to the “Connected Communities” project (an ARC Linkage project with Bank of Queensland) in 2017 and 2018: I helped with designing a social media platform that connects communities of property seekers with businesses such as banks and conducted an extensive user behaviour study in the context of using the wisdom of crowd in decision making. Overall value of the project: ~ $400,000
- A post-doc project with Services Australia (Department of Human Services) in 2017: The project focused on designing a digital service process in the service ecosystem of the enterprise to enhance effectiveness of service delivery. Overall value: ~ $150,000. Project context: public services
- New projects in the area of supporting customer trust and confidence for using AI, IOT and IIOT technologies (e.g. chatbots) in delivering customer-oriented services. Sector /domain of research: public services and retail
Publications
- Nili, A., Desouza, K. & Yigitcanlar, T. (2022). What Can the Public Sector Teach Us About Deploying Artificial Intelligence Technologies? IEEE Software, 39(6), 58–63. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/234285
- Makasi, T., Nili, A., Desouza, K. & Tate, M. (2022). A Typology of Chatbots in Public Service Delivery. IEEE Software, 39(3), 58–66. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/209837
- Nili, A. & Barros, A. (2022). Salient design features that your social media platform needs: The case of online communities of interest. First Monday, 27(3). https://eprints.qut.edu.au/228835
- Barros, A., Sindhgatta Rajan, R. & Nili, A. (2021). Scaling up chatbots for corporate service delivery systems. Communications of the ACM, 64(8), 88–97. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/212564
- Makasi, T., Tate, M., Desouza, K. & Nili, A. (2021). Value–Based Guiding Principles for Managing Cognitive Computing Systems in the Public Sector. Public Performance & Management Review, 44(4), 929–959. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/207981
- Nili, A., Tate, M., Barros, A. & Johnstone, D. (2020). An approach for selecting and using a method of inter-coder reliability in information management research. International Journal of Information Management, 54. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/202308
- Makasi, T., Nili, A., Desouza, K. & Tate, M. (2020). Chatbot-mediated public service delivery: a public service value-based framework. First Monday, 25(12). https://eprints.qut.edu.au/204999
- Nili, A., Tate, M. & Johnstone, D. (2019). The process of solving problems with self-service technologies: a study from the user's perspective. Electronic Commerce Research, 19(2), 373–407. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/119315
- Nili, A., Barros, A. & Tate, M. (2019). The public sector can teach us a lot about digitizing customer service. MIT Sloan Management Review, 60(2), 84–87. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/125613
- Nili, A., Tate, M. & Johnstone, D. (2017). A framework and approach for analysis of focus group data in information systems research. Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 40, 1–21. https://eprints.qut.edu.au/108997
QUT ePrints
For more publications by Alireza, explore their research in QUT ePrints (our digital repository).
Awards
- Type
- Other
- Reference year
- 2023
- Details
- Winner of the Executive Dean's Outstanding Achievement Awards: Educator of The Year (ECR/MCR, Faculty of Science, 2023)
- Type
- Other
- Reference year
- 2021
- Details
- Finalist of Faculty of Science 2021 Dean's Outstanding Achievement Award for Educator of the Year
- Type
- Other
- Reference year
- 2021
- Details
- Teaching Excellence, School of Information Systems, Faculty of Science, QUT
- Type
- Other
- Reference year
- 2023
- Details
- Outstanding Paper Award at the International Conference on Electronic Business 2023