Building AI-Enabled Tools to Empower IS Researchers

Overview

The ICIS 2026 Hackathon brings the builder’s mindset into the heart of the Information Systems community by turning our focus inward: reimagining how we conduct research. During the hackathon, interdisciplinary teams of IS scholars, doctoral students, and practitioners will design and build AI-enabled artifacts to automate, accelerate, and improve the IS research production pipeline.

Participants will leverage existing open-source tools, agentic systems, and natural language “vibe coding” to create agents, workflows, and services that solve real bottlenecks in the academic lifecycle—from literature synthesis and complex data processing to qualitative coding and peer-review simulation.

Where the Paper-a-Thon accelerates papers, the Hackathon accelerates the tools that make those papers possible. Teams will form around shared research workflow challenges, work together across the hackathon, and close the event by pitching a live demo to a panel of judges. No traditional programming experience is required: thanks to the rise of generative AI and vibe coding, a deep understanding of the research process and a well-reasoned system proposal are just as critical as software engineering skills. Selected teams will be invited to showcase their work during the main conference.

The Challenge

Generative AI is changing how research gets done, and the IS community should be the one designing those tools rather than just using them. The challenge is to build a GenAI-enabled artifact that helps MIS researchers do better research at any stage, from first idea to published paper. That could be an agent, a custom GPT or Claude skill, a pipeline, a plug-in or a workflow. Each team delivers two things: a tool that works (or could work), and an argument for how it improves research practice, including what it does well, where it falls short, and what it means for rigor and transparency.

We want to end the event with a shared toolkit that the whole IS community can use, extend and critique. Every artifact adds to it.

Example directions across the research lifecycle (teams are free to propose their own):

• Literature review: Tools that search, screen, summarize and synthesize literature, map theoretical conversations, or find where two streams haven’t yet met.
• Problem formulation: Assistants that sharpen research questions, test how novel an idea is, question assumptions, or position a contribution against prior work.
• Data collection: Agents that design survey or interview instruments, run pilot interviews, scrape and structure digital trace data, or build synthetic data for testing.
• Analysis: Tools for qualitative coding, computational text analysis, checking the robustness of results, or pairing human and machine interpretation of data.
• Theorizing and hypothesizing: Artifacts that support theory building from data, generate and stress-test propositions, suggest competing explanations, or bring in alternative theoretical lenses.
• Writing: Tools that turn outlines into drafts, help authors reach a journal’s standards, check whether the argument holds together, or translate findings for practitioners.
• Reviewing: Assistants that help reviewers and editors write developmental reviews, summarize what several reviewers said, or find missing literature and methodological gaps.
• Transparency and governance: Artifacts that document how AI was used in a study, make GenAI-assisted research auditable and reproducible, or flag risks such as invented citations and bias.

Who Should Apply

The Hack-a-Thon is open to all ICIS 2026 participants — doctoral students, faculty at any career stage, and practitioners.

Application Process

Applicants may register individually or as a pre-formed team (maximum five members). Individuals will be matched into teams on Day 1.

• Application deadline: December 1st, 11:59 p.m. local time in Lisbon, Portugal

Agenda

All times are Western European Time (WET, UTC+0), Lisbon.

Day 1 — Saturday, December 12, 2026 (13:00–17:00)

Day 2 — Sunday, December 13, 2026 (07:00–13:00)

Showcase — Monday, December 14, 2026 (16:30-18:00)

Selected teams present their artifacts to the broader ICIS community during the main conference on Monday 16:30 – 18:00

What Teams Deliver

1. A working AI artifact — a prototype, agent, app, or service; or, for teams without coding, a detailed system proposal (architecture, user flow, and mock-ups).
2. A five-minute pitch — including a live demo or a walkthrough of the proposal.

Co-Chairs

Aron Lindberg, Stevens Institute of Technology, aron.lindberg@stevens.edu
Anna Sigríður Islind, Reykjavik University
Ke-Wei Huang, National University of Singapore

FAQ

Do I need to know how to code?

No. Teams without coders can submit a detailed system proposal instead of working software. That said, AI coding tools make it easier than ever to build a working prototype in a few hours.

Can I come with a team?

Yes. Pre-formed teams of up to five are welcome. Individuals will be matched into teams on Day 1.

How does this differ from the Paper-a-Thon?

The Paper-a-Thon produces an extended abstract for a research paper. The Hack-a-Thon produces a working artifact and a short insight brief. Both run in parallel on December 12–13.

Is there a fee?

The Hackathon is available to those who have been accepted and registered for the full conference.

For those participating in the ICIS 2026 Hackathon only, a fee of $30 USD. A registration and payment link will be shared once accepted.

All team members must register.

What happens after the event?

Selected teams present at the conference showcase. Teams are encouraged to develop their artifacts and insights into research papers.