Management/OB Research: Bridging an Asian-U.S. Model

1. Management/OB Research:Bridging an Asian-U.S. Model Timothy A. Judge University of Florida Doctoral Graduates of Business Administration at NTU Conference 9 December 2006

2. Outline • The American model • What causes article to be published? • What determines impact once published? • Are American journals publishing more articles by Asian scholars? • Future of American and Asian management research • Questions and answers

3. American ModelWhat causes an article to be published? • Caveat: I most certainly do not have all the answers • With that in mind…what follows is a summary of what I know

4. Recent Decision LetterJournal of Applied Psychology – 9.12.06 Both reviewers indicate that the theoretical underpinnings of your study are weak and have a number of related concerns regarding the theoretical rationale for your hypotheses, ambiguities and confusion in the logic you use to build your arguments, and fundamental inconsistencies between your treatment of constructs and relations and the broader literatures from which they are drawn. These are fundamental theoretical concerns which, when taken together with limitations of your research design, raise serious questions about the potential incremental contribution of your study and paper to the literature.

5. American ModelWhat causes an article to be published? • Generating an Idea • Designing a Study • Getting Data • Writing a Paper • Submitting a Paper • Revising a Paper • Publishing a Paper Focus Today

6. Publishing an Article1. Generating an Idea • What’s a good idea? A mix of: • Methodological quality (independent data sources, reliable measures, eliminates confounds, adheres to measurement principles) • Interestingness (novel, thought-provoking, controversial) • Hole in the literature (“little or no research has looked at X, Y, and Z”) • Note that this can’t compensate for a lack of 1 or 2 (e.g., no one in OB has studied the length of managers’ toenails) • Drawing from outside area

7. Publishing an ArticleInterestingness—Davis (1971) • Interesting theories deny certain assumptions of their audience • All interesting theories…attack the taken-for-granted worlds of their audiences • Interesting propositions involve the radical distinction between seeming and being, between the subject of phenomenology and the subject of ontology • An audience finds a proposition interesting not because it tells them some truth they did not already know, but instead because it tells them some truth they thought they already knew was wrong

8. Publishing an ArticleDavis (Continued) Actually, the mediocre in the social sciences (and probably the natural sciences too) can be defined as those who take the textbook rules of scientific procedures too literally and too exclusively. It should be clear from the above discussion that those who lack what is called "the creative spark" are in fact those who fail to take into account the assumption-grounds of their audiences.

9. Publishing an ArticleExamples: Interesting Ideas Composition • What seem to be assorted heterogeneous phenomena are in reality composed of a single element (Plato) • What seems to be a single phenomenon is in reality composed of assorted heterogeneous elements (Aristotle) Abstraction • What seems to be an individual is in reality a holistic phenomenon • What seems to be a holistic is in reality an individual phenomenon Evaluation • What seems to be a bad is in reality a good phenomenon • What seems to be a good is in reality a bad phenomenon

10. Publishing an Article7. Publishing a Paper • Luck is biggest but least important factor • When do you stop trying to publish a paper and move on? • There is no clear answer to this, but generally if something is rejected twice I “downshift” • How can we from our failures? • With whom do we work? • Work with people who do it well

11. Publishing an ArticleWhat Reviewers Want? • Clear answers to these questions: • Focus: What is this paper about? • Purpose: What is it trying to accomplish? • Theory: More on this in a moment • Conceptual clarity: Are constructs defined? Are relationships between them clearly stated? • Success: Can the study do what it sets out to do? Does it do that? • Need: Do the findings make a significant theoretical and empirical contribution?

12. Publishing an ArticleWhat Is a Theory? Certain basic assumptions, essential to any scientific activity, are sometimes called theories. That nature is orderly rather than capricious is an example. Certain statements are also theories simply to the extent that they are not yet facts. A scientist may guess at the result of an experiment before the experiment is carried out. The prediction and the later statement of result may be composed of the same terms in the same syntactic arrangement, the difference being in the degree of confidence. No empirical statement is wholly non-theoretical in this sense, because evidence is never complete, nor is any prediction probably ever made wholly without evidence. The term "theory" will not refer here to statements of these sorts but rather to any explanation of an observed fact which appeals to events taking place somewhere else, at some other level of observation, described in different terms, and measured, if at all, in different dimensions. – B. F. Skinner (Psychological Review, 1950)

13. Publishing an ArticleProcess Is Imperfect • Contribution often unrecognized • 41st chair (Descartes) • Recognition to the recognized • Matthew effect (Robert Merton) • For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath. • America “bias” – this is narrowing I think

14. Making an Impact • Now turn to impact once article is published (impact=peer recognition) • Increasingly will become metric of success • Merton: two theories of impact • Universalism: idea that success is built by talent and hard work • Particularism: idea that success hinges on status, networks, connections, reputation Source: Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in preparation)

15. Making an Impact • Separating universalism from particularism is easier in theory than in practice • Is journal quality universalistic (good journals are indicators of best articles) or particularistic (good journals merely confer symbols of prestige)? Source: Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in preparation)

16. Making an ImpactIndependent Variables Source: Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in preparation)

17. Making an Impact • Articles published in the top 21 management journals • Based on Gomez-Mejia and Balkin (AMJ, 1992) • For each of the 21 journals, we selected the first and last article from the first issue of each journal 1990-1994 • Thus, selected roughly 30 articles from each journal (6 articles per year); N=614 Source: Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in preparation)

18. Making an Impact • Impact was measured with the number of citations that had accrued for each article, January 1990-July 2006, on the ISI Web of Science • Coded article characteristics using two coders • Average number of total citations was 41.84 Source: Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in preparation)

19. Making an ImpactWhat Mattered Most? • Exploration ideas (vs. refinement) • Meta-analyses • Quality of writing • Only one methodological variable mattered • Citation rating (SSCI impact factor) for journal • Journal’s subjective prestige • Number of top-tier articles by the authors • Prestige of affiliation of the first author Source: Judge, Colbert, Cable, and Rynes (in preparation)

20. Making an ImpactIncremental Variance Explained Primary Review/ Empiric Theory All Articles Articles Articles Combined (N=342) (N=272) (N=614) Article attributes: Controls .058*** .048** .053*** Universalistic attributes .089*** .058*** .037*** Mixed universalism and particularism .103*** .138*** .110*** Particularistic attributes .005 .030** .016** Full model Multiple R .684*** .686*** .645*** Overall Adjusted R2 .428*** .433*** .399*** Notes: Except for Full Model R and adjusted R2, statistics are unique R2 for variable set. * p < .05. ** p < .01. *** p < .001.

21. Making an ImpactConclusion • Universalism and particularism matter • Good and bad news • Good news – quality of idea and writing appear to matter • So what is good idea? • Methodological trade-off • Methodological rigor may get an article accepted but it does not affect its impact • What implications does this have?

22. Asia Rising?Presence of Asians in Top Mgmt/OB Journals • Undertook study to determine whether Asian presence in management/OB research is accelerating • Analyzed percentage of all articles published that were authored by individual with Asian surname

23. Asia Rising?Methodology • Analyzed publications of Asians in two top management journals • Academy of Management Journal (AMJ) • Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP) • Asian Americans (American born) were noted included • Broken down by Asian scholars outside of Asia and Asian scholars at Asian institutions

24. Asia Rising?Methodology (continued) • Only Asian countries included that published in journals during the time • India, Japan, Korea (ROK), Mainland China (PRC), Singapore, Taiwan (ROC), Vietnam • Only first three authors counted • Five two-year periods examined • 1985-1986, 1990-1991, 1995-1996, 2000-2001, 2005-2006

25. Asia Rising?Academy of Management Journal (AMJ)

26. Asia Rising?Journal of Applied Psychology (JAP)

27. Asia Rising?AMJ and JAP

28. Asia Rising?AMJ and JAP

29. Asia Rising?First Authorships: AMJ and JAP

30. Asia Rising?Conclusions • Without question Asian presence in top management/OB journals is increasing • Trends appear to be somewhat different at AMJ vs. JAP • But important to remember numbers are converging • Asian independence is increasing • Asians employed in Asian universities • Asians as senior authors on articles

31. Asia Rising?Limitations and Extensions • Only studied two journals and only several time intervals • Would be interesting to look at 21 management journals • This could be idea in itself! • Asia not monolithic – but not enough in my analysis to break down by country

32. The FutureBridging US/Asian Research • Does culture always matter? • Signs of progress • Asian study blind to culture • American/Western study that considers cultural homogeneity as limitation

33. Questions or Comments? These slides and my articles available at: www.ufstudies.net/tim/VITA