This award is given annually to only one tenure track faculty member who has demonstrated excellence in research and scholarship at the University.  In 2003, he was recognized by the Board of Trustees at Oakland University for his scholarly research accomplishments.  He was recognized with the Research Professor Award from 2004-2007 in the School of Business Administration at Oakland University.  Notably, his research paper in the premier academic journal -- Information Systems Research received the 2007 Best Published Paper award. Dr. Rajagopalan was nominated twice by students for the Teaching Excellence Award in 2002 and 2005.

Dr. Rajagopalan has made significant contributions to management information systems research, particularly in the areas of virtual communities and open source software. His research papers have appeared in several journals including Information Systems Research, Communications of the ACM, IEEE Transactions on Systems Man and Cybernetics, Decision Support Systems and over 25 conference proceedings. As the Co-Principal Investigator, he received a research grant of US $500,000 from the National Science Foundation (2002-05) and US $30,000 Michigan Entrepreneurship Education Network (MEEN), 2003.  He serves as a reviewer for premier academic journals in management information systems and is the Senior Editor of the Journal of Information Technology: Theory and Applications. Dr. Rajagopalan has worked with several Fortune 500 companies on research projects, consulting or advisory services. As part of his research/consulting activities, he has interacted with several firms including Daimler Chrysler, EDS, Covansys, Thomson-Gale, Kelly Services, Handleman, Cap-Gemini, PWC, EMC, GM, Ford, St. Joseph Mercy, Beaumont Hospitals, & ITC Infotech.