Abstract
At its core, this short book by Professor Dean Shepherd has a simple message: If you want to publish well (i.e. in quality journals), you need to ‘work very hard’ (p. 1). Chapter 1 of the book notes that Shepherd’s doctorate training was not at a research powerhouse (he did his PhD at Bond University in Australia) and his ‘dissertation committee did not include highly published scholars’ who could help him much in crafting his papers for publication. Because Shepherd did not have the opportunity to vicariously learn from his advisors the art of writing a research paper and guiding it through the revise and resubmit process, he knew he had to take active steps to learn how to publish in leading journals. As Professor Shepherd observes in Chapter 1, [R]ather than relying on a passive and implicit understanding of publishing research, I took active steps to learn this process, thought about it deeply, and developed a series of heuristics to help improve my performance. (pp. 1–2)
Professor Shepherd’s stated philosophy, which underlies the entire book, is that good scholars are highly entrepreneurial, in the sense that they identify new research opportunities that can be pursued for publication in high-quality journals. Research opportunities are defined as situations ‘in which new knowledge can be introduced through new theory, new methods, and/or new combinations that fill important gaps in our understanding of entrepreneurial phenomenon’ (Chapter 2, p. 7). The entrepreneurship theme informs every chapter, as reflected in chapter headings such as ‘thinking entrepreneurially to identify research opportunities’ (Chapter 2), ‘approaching and managing the publication process’ (Chapter 3), ‘adopting an entrepreneurial mind-set to achieve excellence in teaching’ (Chapter 4), ‘securing an entrepreneurship faculty position’ (Chapter 5) and ‘building an entrepreneurship research record worthy of promotion’ (Chapter 6).
There is much to like in this book. My two personal favourites are (a) taking a portfolio approach to research projects and (b) think of every day as a research day. The former encourages researchers to have multiple papers ‘in play’ at any given time (which translates to about three to five papers under review at good journals). The latter involves spending some time every day on research, including on so-called ‘teaching days’, so that research is seldom ‘out of sight’. Professor Shepherd emphasises that budding scholars should try to do well in all three aspects of academic life (research, teaching and professional service), although he also acknowledges that publications play an instrumental role in hiring and promotion decisions.
In Chapter 3, Professor Shepherd asks scholars to bring a constructive orientation to the review process. In effect, this means that authors take the comments of reviewers seriously and use them to improve and strengthen their manuscript. I concur. I also agree with Professor Shepherd that if the reviewer does not seem to understand something in the paper, then the author(s) should think deeply about how to make it clearer. At the same time, I also believe that not all reviewers share Professor Shepherd’s philosophy of reviewing as ‘service to the community in general’ and to the author in particular (p. 34). There are many who misuse the anonymity of the review process to insult, demean and humiliate authors. While I agree with Professor Shepherd that authors should take a collaborative approach and engage in a cordial conversation with reviewers, I also see a need to inform aspiring scholars that reviewer misbehaviour does happen and the poor author is often not at fault when it happens.
Overall, I found Professor Shepherd’s approach in the book to be quite informative. He uses insights from entrepreneurship research (e.g. the nature of new opportunities) to cast (fresh) light on ‘how to do good research and publish it’, and draws on examples from his own experiences as author and editor to offer practical advice to budding entrepreneurship scholars. Professor Shepherd’s impressive ascent from a teaching-focused doctoral student at a relatively unknown business school to the upper echelons of the research community in entrepreneurship brings credibility and legitimacy to the advice offered in the book. Even when he states what may seem obvious to some (e.g. ‘it is important to learn from each R&R to hone one’s skills in understanding, interpreting, following, and responding to reviewers’ comments’, p. 43), the suggestions and ideas presented in the book are beneficial and constructive for those interested in developing as a serious scholar. I truly hope to see the book become required reading in doctoral programmes that have the mission of producing good entrepreneurship scholars.