Alex Murray

Assistant Professor of Management | Director, Intelligent Futures Lab

Affiliations: Management, Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship

Email: amm16@uoregon.edu

Phone: 541-346-3318

Office: Anstett 398C

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About

About

Biography:

Alex Murray's research focuses on developing theoretical frameworks to explain how entrepreneurs mobilize resources from distributed resource providers and how distributed resource providers use novel technologies to coordinate resource allocations. He addresses empirical and theoretical puzzles stemming from the technologically-driven phenomena of crowdfunding, blockchain-based firms, and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). Theoretically, he contributes to the literatures on organizational theory, strategy, and entrepreneurship by unpacking how entrepreneurs obtain and maintain support from many distributed resource providers over time. Methodologically, he complements inductive field-based approaches with statistical analyses to develop novel insights and advance existing theories in intriguing ways.

He also directs the Intelligent Futures (IF) Lab, a student- and faculty-led research group focused on emerging technologies, including AI, blockchain, decentralized systems, and human-computer interaction.

Degree History:

PhD, University of Washington, 2018
MS, University of Virginia, 2012
BS, University of Alabama, 2011

Previous Positions:

Senior Researcher, ETH Zurich, 2018–2019

Professional Leadership:

Guest Editor, Special Topic Forum on "AI in Management," Academy of Management Review
Editorial Review Board Member, Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal
Editorial Review Board Member, Academy of Management Review

Honors and Awards:

Ersted Award for Distinguished Teaching, University of Oregon, 2024
Best Reviewer Award, Academy of Management Review, 2023
Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award, Lundquist College of Business, 2023
Consumer Protection Grant Award, University of Oregon, 2023
Goulet Outstanding Research Award, Lundquist College of Business, 2023
Dave Petrone Financial Literacy and Wellness Research Award, Lundquist College of Business, 2022
Best Paper Award, Academy of Management Review, 2022
Best Reviewer Award, Academy of Management Review, 2022
Outstanding Faculty in Entrepreneurship, Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship, 2022
Best Reviewer Award, Journal of Business Venturing, 2021
Most Developmental Reviewer Award, Academy of Management Review, 2021
Translational Research Grant, Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship, 2020
COVID-19 Impact Grant Award, 2020
New Junior Faculty Research Award, University of Oregon, 2019

Areas of Expertise

Artificial intelligence
Algorithmic organizing
Blockchain technology
Crowdfunding
Decentralized governance
Entrepreneurship
Innovation
Technology entrepreneurship
Venture finance

Current Projects

Basit, Ameer, Michael Johnson, Ussama A. Khan, and Alex Murray. “Ego-centrists, collaborators, and socializers: How tie-forming motivations impact pivoting.”
Heidl, Ralph, Alex Murray, and Purushothaman Padmanabhan. “Non-human agency in organizations: Action selection with augmenting technologies.”
Hmaddi, Ouafaa, Lauren Lanahan, and Alex Murray. “Tracing entrepreneurial spillovers: Evidence from the U.S. State Small Business Credit Initiative and Kickstarter.”
Jones, Jessica, and Alex Murray. “Invest because of who I am, not what you expect me to be: An examination of the demand side of social investments.”
Majzoubi, Majid, and Alex Murray. “Promises as strategic tools.”
Murray, Alex, Benjamin L. Hallen, and Suresh Kotha. “Levered replication: A study of how entrepreneurs better learn new high-stakes skills from others.”
Murray, Alex, Susan Cohen, and Farhan Iqbal. “Legitimacy buffers: How ventures maintain stakeholder support in the face of operational legitimacy threats.”
Murray, Alex, Vern Glaser. “Artificial intelligence and the reshaping of social evaluations.”
Patel, Dhru, Jordan Brewer, Alex Murray, and Dennie Kim. “Artificial intelligence as a public good.”
Rhymer, Jen, Alex Murray, and David Sirmon. “Synthetic stakeholders: “Combining acknowledged personhood and emergent technologies to achieve stakeholder salience.”

Publications

Journal Articles:

Brewer, Jordan, Dhru Patel, Dennie Kim, and Alex Murray. "Navigating the Challenges of Generative Technologies: Proposing the Integration of Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain." Business Horizons, forthcoming. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bushor.2024.04.011

April 2024

Vivianna F He, Mattias Tröbinger, and Alex Murray (2024). "The Crowd Beyond Funders: An Integrative Review of and Research Agenda for Crowdfunding." Academy of Management Annals 18, no. 1: 348-394. https://doi.org/10.5465/annals.2022.0064

January 2024

Murray, Alex, Dennie Kim, and Jordan Combs. "The Promise of a Decentralized Internet: What is Web 3.0 and How Can Firms Prepare?" Business Horizons 66, no. 2: 191-202. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.bushor.2022.06.002.

March 2023

Murray, Alex, and Greg Fisher. "When More is Less: Explaining the Curse of Too Much Capital for Early-Stage Ventures." Organization Science 34, no. 1: 246-282. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2021.1568.

February 2023

Murray, Alex, Scott Kuban, Matthew Josefy, and Jonathan Anderson. "Contracting in the Smart Era: The Implications of Blockchain and Decentralized Autonomous Organizations for Contracting and Corporate Governance." Academy of Management Perspectives 35, no. 4: 622-641. https://doi.org/10.5465/amp.2018.0066.

November 2021

Murray, Alex, Jen Rhymer, and David G. Sirmon. "Humans and Technology: Forms of Conjoined Agency in Organizations." Academy of Management Review 46, no. 3: 552-571. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.2019.0186.

July 2021

Hallen, Benjamin L., Jason P. Davis, and Alex Murray. "Entrepreneurial Network Evolution: Explicating the Structural Localism and Agentic Network Change Distinction." Academy of Management Annals 14, no. 2: 1067-1102. https://doi.org/10.5465/annals.2018.0063.

July 2020

Murray, Alex, Suresh Kotha, and Greg Fisher. "Community-Based Resource Mobilization: How Entrepreneurs Acquire Resources from Distributed Non-Professionals via Crowdfunding." Organization Science, 31, no. 4: 960-989. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2019.1339.

July 2020

Cases:

Huang, Laura, Maximilian Enthoven, Alex Murray, and Erik Hofmann. "modum.io (B): Bidding Farewell to Crypto." Harvard Business School Case N9-421-068.

January 2021

Huang, Laura, Dominik Roeck, Alex Murray, and Erik Hofmann. "modum.io: Funding a Blockchain-based Start-up's Supply Chain Solution." Harvard Business School Case N9-420-006.

January 2020

Murray, Alex, and Suresh Kotha. "Kickstarter: Using Crowdfunding to Launch a New Board Game." In Strategic Management, edited by F. T. Rothaermel. Burr Ridge, IL: McGraw-Hill.

January 2020

In the News

Employing Blockchain to Combat AI Misinformation

Master of Accounting students are already co-publishing along with faculty on the bleeding-edge topic of blockchain and artificial intelligence.

Setting the Pace for Management Excellence

Lundquist College management faculty are teaching at the highest levels, out-researching some major names in academia, and publishing in the field's top journals, all while earning notice for excellence in teaching.

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Awarding Financial Wellness Research

Four awardees earned special funding to continue and expand the study of financial literacy and wellness.

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The True Cost of Crowdfunding

Research by management professor Alex Murray and coauthor examined why some tech ventures fail on crowdfunding platforms despite meeting their financing goals.