Notes from the Editors: Restructuring the Journal of Operations Management

• Published date: 01 September 2015
• Author: V. Daniel R. Guide,Mikko Ketokivi
• Date: 01 September 2015
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1016/S0272-6963(15)00073-X

Editorial

Notes from the Editors: Restructuring the Journal of Operations

Management

1. Background

As co-Editors-in-Chief, we take pride in how the journal has

developed throughout its history. JOM has established itself as a

premier outlet for empirical OM research that combines various

theories and methods to tackle operational problems. JOM is also

well-established as a journal that seeks to take practical relevance

seriously; the more recent submissions to the journal are

particularly encouraging in this regard. This is the legacy we as

co-EICs want to nurture during our tenure.

Two key developments—both decidedly positive ones—over the

past ten years of JOM history have led us to conclude that the

journal structure needs redesigning:

(1)

The number of submissions has steadily increased over the

years; we will likely get well over 600 submissions this year.

(2)

Submissions have become increasingly more diverse in terms

of theories, methods, and empirical contexts. JOM authors use a

wide variety of methods (case research, surveys, econometrics,

analytical models, action research, etc.), draw on a broad base

of theories (management theory, organization theory, eco-

nomics, psychology, sociology, etc.) and different contexts

(manufacturing, services, sustainable operations, health care,

humanitarian relief, etc.)

In the face of the constantly increasing scale and broadening

scope, we have concluded that the current editorial system where

the two Editors-in-Chief are in charge of all manuscripts is simply

no longer feasible. The co-EICs’ span of control is prohibitively

broad. The best solution to the problem, used not only in many

academic journals but also in large corporations, is a departmental

structure. This is our plan for JOM as well. The purpose of the

redesign is unambiguous: to improve the manuscript review process

in a way that promotes developmental reviews and matches each

manuscript with the right expertise.

The redesign initiative started in February of this year. We

asked about a dozen senior OM scholars to weigh in on our

restructuring ideas. There was general agreement that a redesign is

not an option, it is a necessity. This sentiment was echoed in the

Academy of Management meeting in Vancouver. Those of you

attending the Academy meeting may recall past Editor Ken Boyer

describing the reality of the situation bluntly: ‘‘Listen people, this is

not an option we are talking about here, this needs to be done.’’ Ken

hit the nail on the head.

In our discussions with OM scholars, there were, however, two

main concerns about the new structure: (1) Does JOM become too

decentralized? (2) Do departments turn into ‘‘fiefdoms’’ that

compete against one another for ‘‘slots’’ in the journal? Both

concerns are understandable, here is our response:

(1)

In contrast with other journals, our aim is to seek integration of

the departments by installing a matrix structure (see below)

and having active dialog between co-EICs and Department

Editors (DE) in particular. The new structure could thus be

described as being ‘‘decentralized with coordinated controls’’

(incidentally, this has been the guiding principle at companies

such as General Motors for decades). We as EICs will continue

to run the journal, period. But with the new structure, we can

spend more time actually running the journal, talking to our

DEs and Associate Editors (AE), and further developing editorial

policy. In the current structure we spend 95 percent of our time

reading manuscripts, which land on our desks at the rate of

roughly two manuscripts each working day of the year.

(2)

There are no ‘‘slots’’ for which departments compete. We live in

a digital world, and are not constrained in terms of how many

pages or articles we can publish. As long as manuscript quality

is intact, each department can publish as much as they want.

We have our publisher Elsevier’s full support on this. Therefore,

there is no competition between departments, which we

believe will further foster cross-departmental collaboration.

Further, we as co-EICs see no need to rank the departments in

terms of research quality. The only relevant quality metric is

the quality of the review process of an individual manuscript—

everything else is either secondary or irrelevant.

We have taken stock all the concerns about the new structure,

and will closely monitor how the new structure functions, and

what some possible unintended and undesirable consequences of

the redesign are. The new structure is by no means cast in stone, it

can be fine-tuned and redesigned as we gain experience of how it

functions.

2. The JOM matrix

The main design principle in the new structure is that as many

individual manuscripts as possible would fall within the domain of

a single department. In thinking of what the specific departments

will be, we asked simple questions: In receiving a manuscript

Journal of Operations Management 38 (2015) v–x

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Operations Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jom

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0272-6963(15)00073-X

0272-6963/ß2015 Published by Elsevier B.V.