Jiaxi Zhu

Title

  • Head of Analytics, Small & Medium Business Division, Google

Education

  • MBA, Business Analytics and Entrepreneurship & Innovation, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
  • BS, Industrial Engineering & Operations Research, University of California, Berkeley

Professional Experience

  • Currently serves as Head of Analytics in Google’s Small & Medium Business Division. In this role, Jiaxi leads decision-critical analytics that inform enterprise planning and customer service strategy across global operations, supporting millions of businesses worldwide.
  • Previously worked in consulting roles at McKinsey & Company and PwC, advising Fortune 500 organizations on data and analytics strategy and digital customer experience transformation.
  • Visiting Lecturer, UC Berkeley Master of Analytics Program. Taught practitioner-focused modules on decision-centric analytics design.
  • Startup mentor at leading startup accelerators, including Berkeley SkyDeck, Google for Startups, and Founder Institute. Advised early-stage technology startups in data, AI, and enterprise software.
  • B2B Data Excellence Committee Member, Association of National Advertisers (ANA). Led industry programming and roundtable discussions on enterprise data governance and analytics strategy.

Selected INFORMS and Related Activities – Member since 2025

  • Treasurer and Executive Committee Member, INFORMS Analytics Society
  • Board Member, INFORMS Practice Section
  • Committee Member, Franz Edelman Award
  • Co-Chair, Innovative Applications in Analytics Award (IAAA)
  • Practice Curated Sessions Co-Chair, 2026 INFORMS Annual Meeting
  • Planning Committee Member, 2026 INFORMS Analytics+ Conference

Selected Publications

  • Author, “How One Google Team Built Storytelling Into Analytics,” MIT Sloan Management Review
  • Author, “Beyond Use Cases: A Strategic Framework for Scaling AI in B2B Sales,” INFORMS Analytics Magazine
  • Featured or quoted in major trade publications, including Associations Now, AI in Business Podcast, MarTech.org, Revenue Brew, DestinationCRM, and CMSWire on topics spanning data governance, analytics, AI deployment, and decision systems
  • Invited speaker or panelist at industry conferences including the MarTech Conference, Open Data Science Conference (ODSC), Revenue Operations Summit, and Informa TechTarget’s AI-Driven Data Analytics and Decision Intelligence Summit

Candidate Statement

Why this moment matters

As you read this statement, our field’s future is being shaped in university labs, Fortune 500 corporations, and perhaps a three-person startup tucked into a neighborhood garage. Headlines herald a new era enabled by AI, quantum computing, and other emerging technologies. Concurrently, they surface real uncertainty and unanswered questions, not just about technology, but also about decisions, principles, and ethics. At this juncture, our operations research and analytics community needs a trusted home to learn about and actively shape how these technologies evolve in our domain. This is the moment INFORMS is uniquely positioned to seize: to lead at the global frontier with rigor, inclusivity, and responsibility.

That is why I am running for Vice President, Emerging Fields & Technologies. I want to work with the INFORMS community to shape how our profession engages with one of the most consequential transitions in its history.

What I want to build with INFORMS

I look forward to building durable structures, mechanisms, and partnerships that allow us to define what comes next:

Create real member value with enhanced programming: One of my biggest priorities is ensuring emerging technologies deliver real value to INFORMS members. I would empower our global, interdisciplinary community to actively shape this future by setting up structured channels, including member-led working groups and cross-sector forums. These would bring together practitioners, researchers, and entrepreneurs to create tangible resources such as technology scans, case repositories, best-practice playbooks, and new programming for the broader INFORMS membership.

I am also especially committed to our early-career members, who are entering the field as it transforms. I would introduce emerging technology career roundtables, curated learning tracks, and early-career competitions that recognize emerging talent and help them navigate career exploration and upskilling.

Keep INFORMS standards and offerings ahead of the curve: INFORMS has an opportunity to ensure its standards, frameworks, and professional offerings keep pace with our evolving field. Working with existing INFORMS groups, I would help evaluate how resources such as the Certified Analytics Professional (CAP) and the INFORMS Analytics Framework can remain current as emerging technologies reshape the field. I would strive to connect what we learn through working groups and member programming back into the tools and standards that guide our profession.

Expand and diversify partnerships at the frontier: Building on existing partnership models, I would deepen collaboration with peer professional societies and universities. I am especially interested in how INFORMS can more deeply engage the startup ecosystem, where new ideas are developed and tested early. I would explore selective partnerships with incubators and founder networks so that INFORMS can engage those developments earlier, connect them to our academic and practitioner communities, and expand access to emerging knowledge and practice.

What I would bring to this role

What I would bring to this role is experience and leadership at the boundaries where our field is changing fastest. At Google, I have led AI-era analytics and decision-making at enterprise scale. Through my work at McKinsey, I have advised Fortune 500 organizations on how to adopt new technologies without sacrificing rigor, transparency, and trust. Within INFORMS, I have contributed through community leadership roles spanning society governance, programming, and awards evaluation. More broadly, I have spent years working across academia, practice, and entrepreneurship, including mentoring students and startup founders, and contributing thought leadership through speaking and industry media. Those experiences have prepared me to connect our communities and transform emerging ideas into shared direction, pragmatic action, and lasting member value.

The next chapter of our field is already being written. I want INFORMS – and all of us – to be its authors, not its spectators.

For more information, please visit https://www.linkedin.com/in/jiaxi-zhu/