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Editorial governance and journal impact: a study of management and business journals

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Abstract

In striving for academic relevance and recognition, editors exert a significant influence on a journal’s mission and content. We examine how characteristics of editors, in particular the diversity of editorial teams, are related to journal impact. Our sample comprises 2244 editors who were affiliated with 645 volumes of 138 business and management journals. Using multi-level modeling, we relate editorial team characteristics to journal impact as reflected in three widely used measures: Five-year Impact Factor, SCImago Journal Rank, and Google Scholar h5 index. Results show that multiple editorships and editors’ affiliation to institutions of high reputation are positively related to journal impact, while the length of editors’ terms is negatively associated with impact scores. Surprisingly, we find that diversity of editorial teams in terms of gender and nationality is largely unrelated to journal impact. Our study extends the scarce knowledge on editorial teams and their relevance to journal impact by integrating different strands of literature and studying several demographic factors simultaneously. Results indicate that the editorial team’s scientific achievement is more decisive than team diversity in terms of journal impact. The study has useful implications for the composition of editorial teams.

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Notes

  1. https://www.timeshighereducation.com/.

  2. http://genderchecker.com/.

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Acknowledgements

This research is supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Grant No. 01PY13014).

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Correspondence to Jessica Petersen.

Appendices

Appendix 1: Journals in the sample

Academy of Management Annals

Academy of Management Journal

Academy of Management Learning & Education

Academy of Management Review

American Business Law Journal

Asia–Pacific Journal of Human Resources

Asia–Pacific Journal of Management

Australian Journal of Management

Business & Society

Business Ethics Quarterly

Business History

Business History Review

Business Horizons

California Management Review

Career Development International

Corporate Governance: An International Review

Culture and Organization (formerly Studies in Cultures, Organizations, and Societies)

Decision Sciences

Electronic Commerce Research and Applications

Electronic Markets

Enterprise and Society

Entrepreneurship & Regional Development

Entrepreneurship: Theory & Practice

European Journal of International Management

European Journal of Marketing

European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology

European Management Journal

European Management Review

Family Business Review

Group and Organization Management

Group Decision and Negotiation

Human Relations

Human Resource Development Quarterly

Human Resource Management (US)

Human Resource Management Journal (UK)

Human Resource Management Review

IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management

Industrial Marketing Management

Information & Management

Information and Organization

Information Technology and Management

Interfaces

International Journal of Advertising

International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management

International Journal of Electronic Commerce

International Journal of Forecasting

International Journal of Management Reviews

International Journal of Market Research

International Journal of Operations & Production Management

International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management

International Journal of Research in Marketing

International Journal of Selection and Assessment

International Journal of Technology Management

International Small Business Journal

International Transactions in Operational Research

Journal of Advertising

Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing (The)

Journal of Business and Psychology

Journal of Business Ethics

Journal of Business Logistics

Journal of Business Research

Journal of Business Venturing

Journal of Business to Business Marketing

Journal of Consumer Psychology

Journal of Consumer Research

Journal of Economics & Management Strategy

Journal of Engineering and Technology Management

Journal of Forecasting

Journal of Information Technology

Journal of Interactive Marketing

Journal of International Business Studies

Journal of International Management

Journal of International Marketing

Journal of Knowledge Management

Journal of Macromarketing

Journal of Management

Journal of Management & Organization

Journal of Management Information Systems

Journal of Management Inquiry

Journal of Management Studies

Journal of Managerial Psychology

Journal of Marketing

Journal of Marketing Research

Journal of Occupational & Organizational Psychology

Journal of Operations Management

Journal of Organizational Behavior

Journal of Organizational Behavior Management

Journal of Organizational Change Management

Journal of Product Innovation Management

Journal of Productivity Analysis

Journal of Public Policy & Marketing

Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management

Journal of Retailing

Journal of Service Research

Journal of Services Marketing

Journal of Small Business Management

Journal of Sport Management

Journal of Supply Chain Management

Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science

Journal of World Business (Colombia)

Leadership

Leadership Quarterly

Long Range Planning

Manufacturing and Service Operations Management

Management and Organization Review

Management Communication Quarterly

Management Learning

Management Science

Managing Service Quality

Marketing Letters

Marketing Science

Marketing Theory

MIS Quarterly

MIS Quarterly Executive

New Technology, Work and Employment

Nonprofit Management and Leadership

OMEGA - International Journal of Management Science

Organization

Organization & Environment

Organization Science

Organization Studies

Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes

Organizational Dynamics

Organizational Research Methods

Personnel Psychology

Personnel Review

Project Management Journal

Psychology and Marketing

Public Relations Review

Quantitative Marketing and Economics

Research in Organizational Behavior

Research Policy

Review of Industrial Organization

Small Business Economics

Strategic Management Journal

Strategic Organization

Supply Chain Management: An International Journal

Technological Forecasting and Social Change

Technovation

Tourism Management

Appendix 2

See Table 3.

Table 3 Three-level random effects ANOVA (unstandardized estimates; standard errors in parentheses)

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Petersen, J., Hattke, F. & Vogel, R. Editorial governance and journal impact: a study of management and business journals. Scientometrics 112, 1593–1614 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-017-2434-7

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