This is Listen to the Editors, a series of interviews with journal editors to unveil the trends in research on Operations and Supply Chain Management.
I am your host, Iuri Gavronski.
This month, we are posting in our podcast a workshop promoted by the Journal of Supply Chain Management, Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management, International Journal of Operations and Production Management, and the Journal of Business Logistics.
The editors-in-chief for these four journals convened online on Aug 20, 2020, to promote a workshop for reviewers and we find very interesting their insights on ethics on publication, how do you interact with the editors, and what is expected from the reviewers. I hope our listeners enjoy this episode.
The editors that were presenting and discussing were:
* Barbara B. Flynn; Professor Kelley School of Business at the Indiana University, co-EIC for the Journal of Supply Chain Management
* David Cantor; Professor of Supply Chain Management at Iowa State University - Ivy College of Business, co-EIC for the Journal of Supply Chain Management
* Wendy Tate; Professor of Supply Chain Management Department of Marketing and Supply Chain Management at the University of Tennessee, co-EIC for the Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management.
* Louise A. Knight, Full Professor at the University of Twente, co-EIC for the Journal of Purchasing and Supply Management.
* Robert D. Klassen; Professor of Operations Management at Ivey Business School, co-EIC for the International Journal of Operations and Production Management
* Constantin Blome, Professor in Operations Management at the University of Sussex Business School, co-EIC for the International Journal of Operations and Production Management
* Beth Davis-Sramek; Gayle Parks Forehand Professor of Supply Chain Management; Auburn University; Co-EIC for Journal of Business Logistics
We also post below some conversations that ensued in the chat for the Zoom session:
09:10:44 From Ted Farris : Never was "taught" how to review as a doctoral student so developed my own process. What order do you suggest one conducts a review...red the whole thing through or in pieces and then the whole thing through. For example, I start with the abstract and then go to the tables and figures (to make sure they stand by themselves), then the references, then the conclusion, then the main text.
09:16:14 From Ted Farris : Time to conduct a review...how long should it take?
09:17:18 From Himanshu Shee : It is my work, wondering why can’t I reuse it in my work again. Looks silly but I am still curious to use!!
09:18:56 From Gina McNally : What is the red flag level for plagiarism checker?
09:19:13 From Louise KNIGHT : Every article must make an original contribution, so recycling your own work is not considered acceptable
09:20:17 From Barbara Flynn : We'll talk about the red flag level during the Q&A, but we start getting alarmed as that number approaches 20%.
09:20:22 From Marika Tuomela-Pyykkönen : What software would you recommend for checking the (self)plagiarism?
09:22:17 From Louise KNIGHT : Déjà lu: On the limits of data reuse across multiple publications Erik M.van Raaij
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pursup.2018.06.002
09:22:19 From Ted Farris : I am writing a reprise of a published paper written in 2002 (since so much has changed) and am submitting to the same journal. What % of the original content is usable?
09:22:24 From Himanshu Shee : Each journal has a fixed format and empirical study has a kind of fixed writing style. So overlapping of text and methodological context get duplicated easily. Wondering how to rephrase or make different!!
09:26:10 From Constantin Blome : @Himanshu: There are of course some overlaps in the methodology section. That is to a certain extent okay, but there are many different ways to express also statistics and everybody makes his or her life easier by avoiding copying also in these sections. Having said that copying particularly in the other sections is a no-go, including self-plagiarism.
09:26:51 From Ted Farris : good tip on authors running a plagiarism checker! As a reviewer should I assume the editors have done this or should reviewers runs a checker?
09:27:28 From Barbara Flynn : Yes, our submission systems automatically do this for every submission, and we pay close attention to it.
09:27:32 From Constantin Blome : @Ted: Most journals run them now.
09:27:52 From Louise KNIGHT : Editors will run checks but a reviewer should raise any concerns with the editor
09:28:26 From Barbara Flynn : Yes, it's always appropriate to contact the editor if you have any sort of concerns as a reviewer.
09:29:08 From Constantin Blome : What editors are often less aware of and where reviewers can do a great job is where similar data has been used before. It is always helpful in case reviewers identify that content-wise (not plagiarism-wise) is similar.
09:30:09 From Louise KNIGHT : Journals provide guidelines to reviewers. Also check out general advice on reviewing provided by publishers, for example from Elsevier: https://www.elsevier.com/reviewers/how-to-review
09:33:49 From Gina McNally : Should reviewers include their recommendation in the comments to the authors?
09:35:53 From Constantin Blome : Some journals don't want to have that recommendation included, they make this explicit, but to a certain extent it also provides clarity. However, most important is the constructive feedback, not the recommendation per se, as the AE/ Editor should come up with the conclusion.
09:36:01 From Louise KNIGHT : For JPSM, we prefer not - you provide the recommendation separately. If it's a difficult call, then add a note to the editor.
09:38:00 From Himanshu Shee : On average two days will be good I guess…. To read and make the report ready…. Can’t afford more than that!
09:38:35 From Beth Davis-Sramek : At JBL, it's fine to include your recommendation. I generally start with an "overview" section. In it, I offer positive comments and then say something like, "however, there are some issues that are offered in more detail below that prevent me from recommending that the paper move forward." There can be a "soft" way to communicate a rejection, but I think it's important to provide clarity to the author(s).
09:40:06 From Ted Farris : at what point as a reviewer is a paper so bad that you stop in the middle and return it to the editor
09:40:06 From Himanshu Shee : Does the editor engage more than 3 reviewers to reject a paper?
09:40:08 From Constantin Blome : I agree here. Sometimes it is strange to receive a very friendly review, but then the author writes to the editor that this is a clear reject. It's important to be friendly and constructive, but also authentic. Not easy at all.
09:41:00 From Constantin Blome : @Ted: I would say, almost never.
09:42:13 From Beth Davis-Sramek : @Ted: My hope would be that if we send the paper out for review, then it is worth a full review. We will desk reject those that do not meet a minimum quality threshold.
09:43:37 From Anníbal Sodero - Ohio State University - Fisher College : I typically read the main paper cited by the paper I am reviewing and usually skim through a couple of other ones. I like to ensure authors are building on the work of others in a "proper" way, that is, that there is no misrepresentation. A common mistake is to cite a work just for the sake of having a reference, while the work actually contradicts what the authors are claiming. It also helps me to understand where the authors are coming from and what is the contribution they are making.
09:44:59 From Himanshu Shee : What exactly the desk review comprises of, it takes up to a couple of wks even to reject or decide on to put forward to review.
09:48:54 From Beth Davis-Sramek : @Himanshu: At JBL our goal will be to return a desk-rejected manuscript very quickly. I think two weeks is reasonable.
09:49:16 From Constantin Blome : At IJOPM desk rejects takes 1-5 days typically. If it takes longer then there is a reason for it (internal discussions on the manuscript etc). I guess 95% are done in 1-5 days. We have two steps: editorial assistant (who is also an academic) and then one of the four EICs.
09:49:22 From Louise KNIGHT : @Himanshu: Desk reviews vary - sometimes it is very clear that the standard is inadequate or there is not a good fit to the journal. Sometimes a much closer reading is needed, and this reveals that we do not think the paper has a fair prospect
09:49:49 From Constantin Blome : Interestingly enough we receive then emails from authors asking whether we read the manuscript at all as the turnaround time is fast. Of course, we do;-)
09:51:53 From Beth Davis-Sramek : HA! - So maybe two weeks isn't reasonable! Good point - some are very clearly desk rejects, and others may require more feedback, especially if we see potential and suggest to authors that they can fix the issues and resubmit.
09:53:26 From Ted Farris : Are there times of the year when it is best to submit something...are reviewers more available at different times (Christmas Break v middle of a semester)
09:54:08 From Barbara Flynn : I don't think so, but there are definitely better times for authors - we see seasonality in submissions. For example, a lot of manuscripts are submitted at the end of the summer, just before classes begin.
09:55:04 From Constantin Blome : Reviews over July/ August take longer. We also see that in the pandemic reviews slowed down.
09:55:12 From Ted Farris : A lot of times I comment to the authors about "unsubstantiated conjecture" where they do not support statements or make statements out of the blue. Reasonable comment to the authors?
09:55:40 From Barbara Flynn : Definitely. It's up to authors to make their points clear, not the reviewers and readers to guess.
09:55:45 From Constantin Blome : absolutely, but always good to give the example and give an example how this could be done better.
09:56:29 From Constantin Blome : Often the authors aren't aware that statements are not supported, but of course you don't have to list every unsupported sentence.
09:57:07 From Barbara Flynn : Agreed, it seems obvious to the authors because they are so familiar with the literature, but it's not obvious to others.
09:57:40 From Beth Davis-Sramek : I might also rephrase it to something like, "you need to provide more evidence from the literature that supports this statement/hypothesis/rationale" etc...
10:02:49 From Louise KNIGHT : I agree with that suggestion for rephrasing the point!
10:04:27 From Gina McNally : Can you post the references here in the chat, please? Thanks!
10:04:39 From Himanshu Shee : What methodology is usually a winner? Survey, interviews, mixed methods, longitudinal studies?
10:04:50 From jmuniz : Thanks for share the knowledge. Go Vols
10:06:35 From Constantin Blome : Important is that plagiarism only show "potential plagiarism" and we have to check then whether it is "real plagiarism".
10:07:06 From Arun Kumar Deshmukh : How much is the tolerable limit of similarity index?
10:07:14 From Juliette : Thank you for they great tips!
10:07:35 From Constantin Blome : There is no fixed percentage, but we look in far more detail with 20% or more.
10:07:38 From Juliette : *the not they
10:08:36 From Arun Kumar Deshmukh : Thanks Constantin Blome
10:09:39 From Himanshu Shee : It is so easy to get over 20% plagiarism adding those 1% coming’s from the references, key words and jargons etc…
10:09:50 From Constantin Blome : However, there are also many papers we still send out that have more than 20% in the software indicated, but it is not showing clear cases of plagiarism. So it depends.
10:10:28 From Himanshu Shee : Thanks Constantin
10:10:50 From Constantin Blome : Just to share, the nastiest emails I got from authors were all around plagiarism scores.
10:11:10 From Barbara Flynn : Huff, A.S., 2009. Evaluation of research design and outcomes. In Huff, A.S., Designing Research for Publication, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.
Koberg, D. & Bagnall, J., 1976. The Universal Traveler. New York: William Kaufman.
De Bono, E., 1999. Six Thinking Hats. Boston: Little, Brown. Also http://www.edwdebono.com/
10:11:27 From Wendy Tate : I agree with Constantin re the emails!
10:14:06 From Louise KNIGHT : A very low (artificially low) score in the plagiarism checker can be a trigger for a closer look. The tool indicates % recognised text, that's all - the rest is for editors to interpret
10:15:28 From Arun Kumar Deshmukh : Sometimes we get a paper with a newer method for review. Should we refuse to review it or the other part of the manuscripts should be evaluated without commenting on the method part?
10:15:56 From Constantin Blome : Personally, I also think that in some institutions PhDs reviews continuously for their supervisors. This would be considered highly unethical.
10:16:45 From Constantin Blome : I. suggest contact the editor.
10:18:17 From Arun Kumar Deshmukh : Thanks a lot
10:22:43 From Ted Farris : the better journals that I review for typically send feedback after all the reviews are in plsace
10:23:04 From Himanshu Shee : I suppose the journal offers a summary of the all reviews so one can see what others have done vs you
10:23:14 From marcon.arthur : Is it appropriate to contact the editor when the reviewers were not clear in their review or when they provide contradictory recommendations? For example, contacting the editor via email when we are working on the corrections of the paper
10:23:59 From Arun Kumar Deshmukh : As an editor, how you decide the fate of manuscripts when two reviewers suggest minor revision and one suggests the rejection?
10:24:03 From Constantin Blome : yes, this is fine Marcon
10:25:14 From Barbara Flynn : It's always fine to contact the editor about anything
10:25:24 From Constantin Blome : @Arun: first, we read the manuscript, but typically AEs would make the call first. But this is not different to any other combination of recommendations.
10:25:48 From Constantin Blome : I agree with Barb.
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“Night & Day” by Dee Yan-Key is licensed under CC-BY-NC-SA
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