Publication strategies for academic career development in mining engineering

Abstract

Academics in mining engineering around the world are expected to publish their research as part of their career development. Different schools have different strategies and expectations for publishing and evaluating the value of the publication. Using an online survey, we asked members of the Society of Mining Professors (SOMP) to indicate in which publication types they publish the most (refereed journals; non-refereed journals; refereed conferences; non-refereed conferences); to list the names of top refereed journals in which their research work has been published; to tell whether their universities count conference publications in the same way as journal publications; to explain how they measure the quality of a journal; to give the factors that contribute to the decision to submit their papers to any particular journal; if their universities consider “number of citations” of publications and “h-index” when a faculty member goes through the promotion process; and whether their universities use any kind of metrics to rank contribution as principal author and/or co-author of a publication. The results of this research may be used by SOMP members, particularly junior academic staff members, in planning publication activities and strategies that would support their academic career development.