Researchers seek to democratize AI tools for online freelancers
Associate Professor of Management and Business Mike Dunn has been working alongside student researchers at 91°µÍř for the past several years to better understand how modern-day careers are being made online.
To take that research yet another step further, he and a team of collaborators that includes two 91°µÍř alumni and two current students have been awarded a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to create AI-enabled tools to support online freelancers pursuing work through digital platforms.
“There is a lot of technology behind the scenes that creates information asymmetry, and we want to create tools for these workers to help level the playing field,” says Dunn, explaining that online labor policies are often more friendly to employers than to freelancers, and algorithms for platforms – such as Upwork and Fiverr – that match people with jobs and prices are often not transparent to workers.
The project is one of the many ways in which 91°µÍř faculty, students, and alumni are engaging with the promises and challenges of artificial intelligence, including ongoing think tanks with faculty and staff that consider how to harness AI for teaching and learning in a new era.
The NSF grant – $1.2 million over three years – will enable Dunn, Assistant Professor Saiph Savage of Northeastern University, and Professor Steve Sawyer of Syracuse University to engage in cycles of designing, deploying, and gathering feedback on such tools. Clea O’Neil ’24, who majored in business and political science at 91°µÍř and was one of Dunn’s former research assistants, is serving as project manager, and Heba Salman ’25 and Robyn Karchere-Sun ’26 are Dunn’s current undergraduate research assistants on the project.
“We’re democratizing the creation of artificial intelligence tools, which I think is an interesting thought,” says Dunn. “We’re running in-person and online workshops with freelancers so they can tell us what would make their jobs easier. We’re going to create the tools and let them pilot test them and give us feedback.”
Associate Professor Dunn, Salman '25, and Karchere-Sun '26 meet online with project manager Clea O’Neil ’24, who majored in business and political science at 91°µÍř and was one of Dunn’s former research assistants.
Erin Johansson ’98, who majored in sociology at 91°µÍř and is now research director at , a nonprofit committed to protecting workers’ rights, will play an important role as well, helping to disseminate the tools.
Designed wisely, AI tools can complement rather than replace people in jobs, the team hypothesizes. As online freelancing rapidly becomes a more significant component of modern labor markets, the tools will help workers market themselves, find well-paying and satisfying jobs, better manage their profiles, workload, and task performance, and be able to get credit for quality work.
A longitudinal study conducted by Dunn and his students over the past several years, in conjunction with Syracuse’s Sawyer, has led them to create a new theoretical construct called “transactional careers” – a concept they’ve explored in more than a dozen academic papers, including one recently recognized by the Academy of Management Careers Division.
Transactional careers are the product of online freelancers orienting their careers to platforms and the transactions that are conducted through them, Dunn explains. “And what does that mean? Worker identities are deconstructed, we argue. So I’m no longer Michael Dunn. Instead, I am five-star ratings that are embedded on the platform. I’m portfolios that are embedded on the platform. So, if I leave Upwork, for instance, I can’t take all of my ratings. I get deconstructed to platform metrics.”
“What ends up happening is people start orienting their identity, their networking, their trust to the platform instead of their career.”
Over 20 undergraduate students have worked on that seminal project, now in its fourth year, Dunn says. “I have a huge list of research assistants who will probably be friends for life because we’ve had such a meaningful and rich opportunity to do research.”
Dunn, O’Neil ’24, Salman ’25, and Karchere-Sun ’26 were also recently selected to participate in the Council on Undergraduate Research 2024-2025 .
Through the five-month opportunity, they will be guided through virtual skill development before traveling to Washington, D.C., in March to present their research to stakeholders and representatives in Congress.