Dr. Anita Carson

Biography

Anita Carson is a Professor in the Operations and Technology Management department and the chair at the Questrom School of Business at Boston University. She previously taught at prestigious institutions including Wharton, Harvard, and Brandeis Business Schools. With a background in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research for her bachelor’s and master’s degrees, and a doctorate in Business Administration, Professor Carson has over five years of experience with General Mills and Electric Boat division at General Dynamics, bringing diverse manufacturing experiences to her research. Her work focuses on service process design and its influence on quality and efficiency, particularly in healthcare settings. Notably, her research demonstrates how a lack of internal integration can lead to a culture of workarounds that wastes up to 10% of staff time. Through her research initiatives, she helps hospitals adopt principles of operations management to create improvement-oriented cultures. Her accomplishments are recognized through numerous awards including the Dissertation award by AcademyHealth and several paper and abstract awards from respected management associations. She teaches courses in operations management, service operations, quality improvement, and strategy at undergraduate, MBA, executive, and doctorate levels, and has published case studies relating to process improvement in collaboration with hospitals such as Kaiser Permanente and Brigham Women’s Hospital.

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Experience

Awards