The College of Supply Chain Management (SCM) of the Production and Operations Management Society (POMS) announces its 2026 Best Student Paper Competition (submission deadline: Sunday, November 16, 2025). Each submitted paper will be judged based on its contribution towards the advancement of theory and practice of supply chain management. Finalists will be selected and invited to present their paper in a special session at the 36th Annual POMS Conference, which will be held in-person from May 7, 2026, to May 11, 2026, in Reno, NV (USA). The first prize is accompanied by a $750 honorarium, the second prize is accompanied by a $500 honorarium, and further finalists receive a $250 honorarium.
Conditions for eligibility:
- The entrant must be a student on or after November 16, 2025, and the research must have been conducted while the entrant was a student.
- Each entrant may submit only one paper.
- Applicants must submit an abstract to the Supply Chain Management Track at POMS by the POMS submission deadline.
- The paper may not be submitted to any other paper competition organized by any other
- POMS colleges in the same year, whether it is a student paper competition or an open competition.
- Past first or second place winners are not allowed to participate again. Past finalists may participate again but only with a different paper.
- The submitted paper must present original research conducted primarily by the entrant(s) while being a Ph.D. or Masters student. Collaboration with other individuals (such as the entrant's faculty advisor or other students) is permitted but the research advisor of the entrant(s) must certify that the contribution of the entrant(s) to the paper is at least 50%. Papers co-written by two students who both meet the eligibility conditions can be submitted as one entry with the understanding that any prize would be divided equally between the two students.
- The topic of the paper should fall within the scope of supply chain management. For a more detailed description, please see the Google form below for the list of topics.
- The submitted paper can be a working paper and may be under review for journal publication. It may not yet be accepted for journal publication or already be published in a journal.
The entrant should visit to fill out the Google form https://forms.gle/TUFD5QqJZzudA2aEA and submit the following documents to sharepoint upload by Sunday, November 16, 2025.
- A cover letter from the advisor, including a statement that the entrant meets all eligibility requirements. For papers which have two student authors, the advisor is asked to carefully explain each student's role and contribution in the work. The file should be named as "yourFirstNameLastName_letter."
- The paper in PDF, with at most 32 pages (including all references and appendices) in standard format (1" margins, double-spaced, 11 point font). Author names should not appear on the paper. Papers exceeding the page limit will be returned without review; this will be enforced strictly. The file should be named as "yourFirstNameLastName_paper."
- Everyone submitting a paper to the competition should submit an abstract of the same paper to the Supply Chain Management track at the conference by the conference deadline.
- All competition finalists will be announced by February 10, 2026.
- As of this year, conferences fees will not be reimbursed for finalists. Instead, the honorariums have been increased.
Please refer any questions to the co-chairs of the POMS College of Supply Chain Management 2026 Best Student Paper Competition:
Rob Basten
VP of Special Events, POMS College of SCM
Associate Professor, Operations Planning Accounting & Control
Eindhoven University of Technology
Email: R.J.I.Basten@tue.nl
Moritz Fleischmann
Professor, Chair of Supply Chain Management
University of Mannheim
Email: moritz.fleischmann@uni-mannheim.de
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Yue Zhang
Visiting Research Scholar
Duke University
University Park PA
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