Zheng Cui

I am a Ph.D. student in Management at New Mexico State University, with a concentration in Organizational Behavior and Human Resources and a support area in Statistics. My research examines how employees and workers make sense of changing work arrangements, especially work-from-home, hybrid work, and return-to-office policies.

My current work connects management theory with computational social science. I use AI/LLM-enabled text measurement, natural language processing, and statistical modeling to study job demands, job resources, burnout, exit-related responses, and emotion in large-scale public work discourse.

Before entering doctoral study, I worked in product management, data product management, and business analysis roles. That experience shaped my interest in how digital systems, analytics, and organizational policies influence work practices, managerial decisions, and employee experiences.

Work-from-Home and Return-to-Office Reddit Discourse Project

This ongoing research project examines public discourse about remote work, hybrid work, and return-to-office policies using Reddit posts and comments from work-related communities between 2015 and 2026.

The project is grounded in the Job Demands-Resources model, burnout theory, and the Exit-Voice-Loyalty-Neglect framework. It uses theory-derived anchor statements and AI/LLM-enabled text measurement to score discourse for job demands, job resources, demand-resource balance, burnout-exhaustion, exit-related responses, and fine-grained emotion signals.

• Built a large-scale Reddit corpus of WFH/RTO-related posts and comments from work-related communities.
• Developed a theory-anchored text measurement pipeline using sentence embeddings and construct anchors.
• Constructed sentence-level, unit-level, account-month, subreddit-month, and event-centered analysis layers.
• Conducted robustness checks across sentence-mean, direct-unit, and thread-context scoring approaches.
• Estimated preliminary account-month regression models linking demand-resource balance, burnout-exhaustion discourse, and exit-related discourse.
• Submitted a related TREO abstract to AMCIS 2026.

Earlier Computational Projects

• Data Mining for Enterprise Scoring : Implemented predictive models for second-hand car price forecasting using statistical and machine learning methods.
• Bioinformatics Data Analysis : Analyzed RNA and DNA data using R, with attention to single-cell experiments and statistical analysis.
• Desktop Performance Monitoring Tool: Designed and prototyped a real-time performance monitoring tool with user studies, interface iteration, and notification features. [Repository]
• Real-Time Database Processing: Designed and implemented real-time data processing in a database system.

Education

• New Mexico State University
  Ph.D. in Management, Organizational Behavior / Human Resources concentration, Statistics support area, August 2025 - Present
• New Mexico State University
  Master of Science in Computer Science, August 2023 - August 2025
  Relevant coursework: Machine Learning, Data Mining, Database Systems, Advanced Algorithms, Bioinformatics, Natural Language Processing
• Fujian Normal University
  Bachelor of Engineering in Software Engineering, September 2013 - June 2017
• Fujian Normal University
  Bachelor of Management in Financial Management, September 2013 - June 2017

Research Interests

Human resources, organizational behavior, remote work, work-from-home, hybrid work, return-to-office policies, employee discourse, burnout, exit-related responses, computational social science, AI/LLM-enabled text measurement, natural language processing, digital trace data, and statistical modeling.

Teaching Assistant Experience

New Mexico State University
Teaching Assistant, August 2023 - Present

• Fall 2023: CS 371/468 Software Engineering
• Spring 2024: CS 153/453 Python Programming I
• Fall 2024: CS 172/461 Computer Science / Java
• Spring 2025: CS 487/519 Applied Machine Learning
• Department of Management: supported MGMT 309 Human Behavior in Organizations, MGMT 345V Quality and Competitiveness: An International Perspective, and MGMT 470 Project Management in Organization through grading, exam support, and course-related assistance.

Professional Experience

Hundsun Technologies Inc. (Shanghai)
Product Manager, April 2021 - July 2023

• Designed products for a Fund Operation Management System, including databank, data table, and parameter interface modules.
• Led demand analysis and design work for internal and external systems.
• Supported product delivery through roadshows, proof-of-concept work, and client training sessions.

INTSIG Information Co., Ltd.
Data Product Manager, September 2019 - April 2021

• Provided data demand support for products including Qixinbao, SaaS products, and CamCard.
• Conducted demand analysis and competitive product analysis for data products.
• Collaborated with data, search, and backend development teams and delivered product trainings.

Ysstech Info-Tech Co., Ltd.
Business Analyst, November 2016 - September 2019

• Completed user requirement specifications after confirming client demands.
• Analyzed and categorized client demands and aligned them with software functionality and business logic.
• Conducted demand analysis, data modeling, data analysis, interface design, and interaction design for client projects.

Technical and Methodological Skills

• Programming: Python, Java, R, C, SQL
• Data and statistics: pandas, NumPy, statsmodels, regression modeling, panel-style data structures, visualization
• NLP and AI/LLM tools: sentence embeddings, Hugging Face Transformers, PyTorch, GoEmotions, text classification, cosine similarity, large-scale text processing
• Data collection: Reddit / PRAW, API-based data collection, web data structuring
• Tools: Axure, Visio, CRM systems, ERP systems, Jupyter, VS Code
• Languages: Mandarin Chinese, English

• Email: [email protected]
• Phone: 575-312-8956
• GitHub: github.com/Zenith1874