Sharon Ferguson

Sharon Ferguson

Assistant Professor in Management Science and Engineering at the University of Waterloo

About Me

I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Management Science and Engineering at the University of Waterloo and a faculty affiliate with the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society. My research looks at how we can use digital trace data created from modern communication platforms to better understand and improve teamwork, by building algorithms to measure complex social phenomena from Management and Engineering literature. I have looked at how we can identify cycles of convergence and divergence within the engineering design process using Topic Modelling. I have analyzed Slack communication using a gender lens, investigating the gendered communication patterns and engagement on these platforms, which was presented at CSCW 2023. In the engineering design space, I have investigated how, why, and when conflict happens in design teams using these platforms, and under what circumstances does it lead to improved innovation. I have studied Psychological Safety, and am in the process of investigating how we can support teams in building shared understanding. I am currently recruiting graduate students to work on these projects with me at the University of Waterloo–please reach out if interested.

I completed my Ph.D. in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto. I was part of the Ready Lab led by Dr. Alison Olechowski and I was also a graduate affiliate (and a graduate fellow) with the Schwartz Reisman Institute for Technology and Society. My doctoral work was supported by the National Science and Engineering Research Council (NSERC). I was formerly a graduate research fellow at the university’s Centre for Ethics, Ethics of AI lab from 2021-2022. In summer 2023, I interned on Slack’s Future of Work research team, studying meeting-free weeks and asynchronous attention negotiation. I also worked as a research assistant under Dr. Anastasia Kuzminykh at the COoKIE Group investigating explanations human-AI collaboration in subjective decision making. I continue to lead a project investigating student persistence in Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence. I presented the first part of this project at the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) Conference in June 2022, and you can see a summary of this work in video form or podcast form.

I am passionate about increasing diversity in Engineering, and served as the President of the Graduate Society of Women Engineers in 2022-2023, after serving as the Vice President of Finance from 2021-2022.

I hold a Bachelor of Applied Science in Industrial Engineering from the University of Toronto, and have work experience in the energy industry.

News

  • December 2024: I was part of the organizing committee for the 3rd Canadian Design Workshop held at the University of Waterloo.
  • December 2024: I successfully defended my PhD in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto!
  • November 2024: I attended CSCW in San Jose, Costa Rica.
  • October 2024: I led a webinar entitled “Partners in Progress: Effectively Collaborating with AI in the Workplace” for the ILead Community of Practice.
  • October 2024: I spent a month as a visiting student at MIT with the Bernard M. Gordon-MIT Engineering Leadership Program
  • July 2024: I was part of the workshop committee for the workshop “Transparency and Collaboration: A Workshop on Open Access Design Team Data” at the Design Computing and Cognition Conference in Montreal.
  • June 2024: Our paper “Social Capital and Persistence in Computer Science of Google’s Computer Science Summer Institute (CSSI) Students” was presented by Marjan at the ASEE 2024 conference.
  • June 2024: Dr. Alison Olechowski, Dr. Sirisha Rambhatla and I received the Microsoft AI & The New Future of Work Grant entitiled “A Novel AI-Powered System for Building Shared Understanding in Teams”
  • May 2024: I attended CHI in Honolulu, Hawaii.
  • May 2024: I accepted an offer to join the Management Science and Engineering Department at the University of Waterloo as an Assistant Professor in 2025!
  • April 2024: Our paper “The Explanation That Hits Home: The Characteristics of Verbal Explanations That Affect Human Perception in Subjective Decision-Making” was accepted to CSCW 2024!
  • March 2024: Our late breaking work “No Risk, No Reward: Towards An Automated Measure of Psychological Safety from Online Communication” was accepted to CHI 2024!
  • January 2024: Our paper “The Effect of Meeting-Free Weeks on Distributed Workers’ Unstructured Time and Attention Negotiation” which was completed during my internship in the Future of Work department at Slack was accepted to CHI 2024!
  • January 2024: I am teaching MIE459: Organization Design in the department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering this semester
  • December 2023: I was awarded the NSERC Canada Graduate Scholarship - Michael Smith Foreign Study Supplement award for a study abroad at MIT
  • October 2023: I will present my work on gendered communication patterns and engagement on Slack at CSCW 2023!
  • July 2023: Out work on conflict on Enterprise Communication Platforms was published in and presented at the International Conference on Engineering Design
  • June 2023: I won the Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Teaching Assistant Award for 2022-2023
  • June 2023: Our work on Social Belonging Confidence in Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence students was presented at the American Society of Engineering Education Annual Conference 2023
  • June 2023: Our work on remote work in the aerospace industry was published in Systems Engineering
  • June 2023: I will start my role as a Future of Work PhD Reserarch Intern at Slack!