Abstract
A former vice chancellor at one of my previous universities would often make statements such as: ‘It is not enough for us to do good research; we must ask what our research is good for.’ Inherent in this statement is the idea that the research we do must matter or make an impact; that even though your research methods can be well designed and executed, and your theory may be sound, if no one reads it or, more importantly, uses it, your research is pointless. In academia this idea of producing research that is ‘good for’ something is not a new debate, but it is a growing debate and it is complex. When I say ‘complex’, I mean in terms of the complexity of what the idea of ‘impactful’ or ‘good for’ means. This includes how our research is assessed, funded, valued and rewarded. What research is good for is an especially pertinent issue for people who work in business schools. In this brief editorial piece, I shall explore this idea of impact and offer some advice and also musing for our Journal of Strategic Contracting and Negotiation (JSCAN) authors and readers to think about and debate. More importantly, I hope this article provides a thumbnail sketch of what you should consider at different stages of your research when it comes to making an impact.
Good research and research that is good for something
Good social science research typically refers to research that is well conceived, designed and executed. It is rigorous, credible and verifiable and seeks to explore, describe, understand, interrogate or test ideas about phenomena in the social world and the relationship between variables and phenomena. This is the case whether it is qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods. It is also the case whether it is inductive, deductive or abductive, and it is the case whether it is positivist, interpretivist and so on. Of course, those on opposite ends of the spectrum of methods and methodological stances and traditions might argue with vigour that the other is bad because of philosophical, ontological and epistemological reasons. For example, interpretivists argue that positivists ideas are flawed because the subject matter of social science is distinct from the sciences and no objective reality exists; or those who believe that a researcher can be objective would argue against subjective approaches to research. While all the various debates in what methods matter and who is right and wrong are interesting and valid, I am not engaging in these debates here. Rather, I am ‘clumping’ together research under one banner called ‘research’. So when I refer to research I mean research in the general sense of the word, and an speaking to anyone who classifies themselves as doing research.
It is not that difficult to accept what good research is. It is less easy, however, to agree on what ‘good for something’ actually means. When someone asks what something is ‘good for’, they are talking about its functional use and applicability, its utility. In an age where economics, and especially rational economics, dominates organizational life, much of the answer lies in ‘value for money’. That is, does the research produce any economic value, or does it make economic sense? As such, the research is made sense of in terms of its ability to ‘earn’ or it produces more value than it costs. This is often at odds with how and why many scholars do research – one is often (but not always) more concerned about the quality of reception, application, dissemination and impact of one’s research – especially within one’s own community of practice. As such, we will often aim for very high-quality journals in which our peers judge our work to be high quality and our community of scholars engages with our work.
Research is usually expensive and there is an ever-present tension in universities between value for money for students and the cost of supporting research. Heavy teaching institutions tend to do more teaching, and very little research except by maybe one or two highly active scholars. In research-intensive universities, especially as government funding for research declines, students can often subsidise research through their fees. This places both researchers and students in a problematic relationship with the university where research is being produced. First, a student may ask: ‘How much of what I pay here actually goes directly into my education?’ A fair question. For researchers, a narrative can be produced within the institution that its teaching that pays your wages, and so while your research and teaching are considered equal, teaching is a little bit more important than your research.
At the same time, there is immense pressure for scholars and universities to be research intensive and to be excellent at research in a demonstrable way. This can be in terms of competitive research grants won, publications in high-quality peer-reviewed journals, successful PhD completions, having impact and influence on policy-making or on the practices of people, organizations, governments and/or society at large. For example, the World Wide Web (WWW) is the result of university research and collaboration, as are most of the major medical discoveries, and major technological innovations around today. The impacts of these are immense but their production is also very expensive and time-consuming. Very few – if any – people could have predicted at the time what a disruptive and transformative impact and influence the WWW would have, and I would hazard a guess that if Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau were starting their development and research into the WWW in most universities today, it is likely that their research would not be supported in the way that it should be, for both financial risk and resourcing issues. They would need to fill out lots of forms, write regular impact statements, find multiple sources of funding and work with a wealthy industry partner, all while also running a Massive Open Online Course, do some virtual teaching and perhaps even go to student recruitment fairs somewhere – who knows? This is all on top of a ton of other administrative duties. After all, they must earn their keep.
The question around what research is good for becomes interesting within such contexts, especially when those outside university research get to determine what is and is not worth researching. This means that university research strategy becomes somewhat unstable and will constantly follow the government policy of the time rather than actually be used to lead policy-making. I can promise you one thing in today’s environment: if the government said it was only funding research on cats, almost every research centre, and every publication soon after that, would have ‘cats’ in the title – we would all mysteriously become cat researchers. Special grants would appear for researching cats, and the Times Higher Education ranking would have a new measure called the ‘University CAT-friendly ranking’. This is not to say that good research should not follow contemporary trends and issues, but just because a person studies cats, it does not mean it is good research, nor that it is actually good for anything; and yet everyone will still need to show that their research is on cats. As such, determining what research is ‘good for’ is a highly problematic endeavour, because it might be seen as being good for simply completing some rhetorical, strategic tick-the-box exercise. After all, it is often said that managing and controlling academics is like herding cats: What better way to herd cats than for the government of the day to tell them what research they should and should not be doing in the public's interest.
For a scholarly journal, what research is ‘good for’ is not a straightforward question, nor does it have a straightforward answer. First, the fact is you can do research that is good for something but is not published in journals. Your research design may not be rigorous or perfect and there may be little or no attempt to ensure you do not bias your findings, nor limit the control and influence that the organization you are studying has over your research; and still the business you research may find what you do very helpful and impactful. While there is an entire separate paper that can be written on this topic, for this editorial I want to focus only on research submitted for publication. After all, this is a peer-reviewed, scholarly journal.
For many scholars, the ranking of a journal is critical, and publishing in a high-ranked journal is a sign that one’s research is good for one’s career. For example, many journal quality lists exist, and almost all countries where there are decent universities will have a journal quality guide either at a national level (such as the UK’s Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS) journal quality list) or at an institutional level (such as the UT Dallas journal list). The impact factor is also an important measure for people publishing their research because a sign that one’s research is ‘doing something’ is that it will be read and cited. Similarly, another important measure of success is a specific journal article’s citation scores such as the ones you find on Google Scholar. High citation counts tell us that a paper is being read and cited heavily (albeit it could be cited for negative reasons, not just positive). While for scholars all the above may be important, for many outside the game of academia such concerns are frivolous. As we often hear, what good is a paper that may be in a high-quality journal, but that no one beyond our own community reads or uses? What is it good for?
Getting to the point, when publishing in JSCAN, how can we help you demonstrate what your research is good for? Below are some reasons why publishing your research with us helps you, and in turn our journal, to build a reputation for research that matters and makes an impact. After we consider these I will give some advice on how one can enhance the impact and importance of your research.
Our membership base and readership spans sectors and industries
Unlike many journals, one of the real strengths of JSCAN is that it is the official academic journal of the International Association for Contract and Commercial Management (IACCM). This means the journal is part of a community of strategic leaders and practitioners in the area of commercial management, contracting and negotiations. IACCM currently holds 60,000 members from over 182 countries, and across 25,278 organizations in government, industry and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and third sectors. As such, your research has the potential to be heard at the highest level of government and industry, and beyond.
The IACCM membership means that engaging with JSCAN and IACCM provides you with an incredible opportunity to have your published, peer-reviewed research featured, discussed and shared directly with an audience curious about and looking for strong research findings and ideas to help improve their practice, systems and processes.
We do this through a range of methods, including our global academic symposia and our research webinars, as well as connecting researchers with research partners and/or research sites and research participants. JSCAN has also entered and remains in various journal quality lists (including the UK’s CABS journal quality guide) and is attracting some of the leading management, strategy, contracting and negotiation scholars around the world.
Leading publisher and editorial teams
SAGE publications are our publisher and partner, and also have a range of initiatives and infrastructures in place to ensure your research is seen and heard. Our journal is free to publish in, and is double-blind peer reviewed. Our editorial review board is made up of active, leading scholars and practitioners who are either established or in an upward growth trajectory in their careers. We take a development approach to reviews and help to make your research better. Our reviewers are also asked to pay particular attention to how your paper makes an impact on practice (in addition to theory/research).
SAGE also helps in disseminating your research through social media platforms including twitter and LinkedIn, but also produces quality videos with authors which we can share with IACCM members, as well as the JSCAN family.
Academic and practitioner Voice
JSCAN encourages quality papers both from scholars and from experienced practitioners, especially those that are co-authored. We also try to include one practice-oriented reviewer to consider and assess the practice implications of the research. We also publish practice-oriented essays from top academics, government and industry leaders calling for research on particular topics and issues.
The reasons above are not exhaustive, but these are some core reasons why you should publish your work with us. However, I want to close this piece by offering some pointers on how to increase the impact of your published research at various stages of your research project.
When starting your research, it is a good idea to think about where you want to make a contribution beyond your own scholarly community. Here it is important to ask: who is my research for? Who is the intended audience? Think about whether your research is focused at a micro, meso or macro level. Is the research designed to inform how specific individuals can do things better (micro) – for example, contract managers or commercial directors or workers in a supply chain? Or is the research intended to influence organizational-level decision-making (meso)? Or is it about influencing policy-making in an area – for example, government policy on sustainability in the supply chain (macro)?
When you are clear who the audience is, you can better design and target your research. For example, policy-makers tend to pay most attention to quantitative data or on larger scale qualitative work. If your research does not connect to policy-makers, how they make sense and how they make decisions, it is not likely to have an impact.
Collaborate, collaborate and collaborate. We know that articles written with teams of international authors are cited more than articles written by authors from one institution or even from one country. Also, co-created and co-produced research tends to have a higher impact when done with people in the world of practice (although this opens up some issues which we will talk about in the future). However, researching and understanding real-life problems, especially problems of scale, tends to have more impact.
While there are many problems of scale, I do believe that you should study what you are passionate about. Study that which makes you curious, and which is important to you. You don’t have to study everything, or – the most pressing issue – to do profound and impactful research. If you have a passion and drive for that research, and you can communicate that, you will tend to find that passion and curiosity is contagious. Remember, not everyone needs to study cats.
As you conduct your research, involve people in the process, and get their feedback and perceptions about your ideas to see if they make sense. This includes academics in the area, but also people who do what it is that you are studying as part of their everyday working life. If it makes sense to them, engages them and causes them to think and reflect, its likely they will engage more with your research, and that your research will be more engaged.
Share your work in blogs, and online, and offer to do seminars and webinars with IACCM, for example. Similarly, embed your research into your teaching. If you do not teach on professional programs such as MBAs, offer to do guest lectures on your research, especially to MBA and Executive MBA students.
Also, get your work seen. One very highly cited friend of mine is excellent at linking his work to blogs and opinion pieces, for example, thus ensuring that people click through to his papers. Write pieces on your research for professional magazines and embed or link your journal articles into it. Similarly, be sure to share your work on social media, and if someone ‘famous’ shares research related to your own research, tag them with your own research.
To summarize, there is a lot of pressure on academics to produce research that matters. However, following crowds is not always the best way to make an impact. There are many ways you can design impact into your work, and also things you can do once your work is published to help generate interest and impact. Whatever you do, though, just be sure you enjoy and are interested in what it is you study, and how you study it.