Awni is a professor of practice and director at The John D. Gerhart Center for Philanthropy, Civic Engagement and Responsible Business at The American University in Cairo (AUC). He has been full-time faculty since September 2009. He teaches operations management courses at the undergraduate and MBA levels. His areas of research are in applications of operations management in Egypt and for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in particular, operations and supply chain innovations for the base of the pyramid, upgrading of operations for Egyptian exporters, and suppliers’ selection and evaluation. He teaches operations and supply chain management courses for EMBA and executive education in Egypt, Romania, and Germany. As a director of the Gerhart Center, he led the center's transition to the School of Business, including adding a responsible business theme.

Before joining the AUC, Awni was the head of the Qualifying Industrial Zones (QIZ) Unit at the Ministry of Trade and Industry, Government of Egypt. The unit is entrusted with the administration of all the terms of the QIZ trade protocol. Furthermore, the Unit acts as a catalyst for implementing operational plans to maximize the benefits of the protocol to Egyptian Industries, including promotions of FDI and upgrading of export readiness of QIZ companies. Awni also served as an adjunct faculty at the American University in Cairo, teaching MBA courses in operations management.

Awni was the partner-in-charge of supply chain consulting services at KPMG Hazem Hassan in Egypt, where he guided and directed the successful completion of various projects in supply chain diagnostics, process design and performance improvement in operations and business logistics for clients in food, consumer products, industrial, apparel and pharmaceutical industries. Awni has extensive management consulting, software systems development and operations research experience in the USA, focusing on supply chain management and business logistics improvements.

Awni holds Bachelor of Science in computer science and statistics from Kuwait University, an MS in systems science from the University of Ottawa, and a PhD in operations research from North Carolina State University.