MARRII Book Assessment Procedural Standards and Selection Criteria

The goal of this initial stage of the assessment process is two fold: (a) to unequivocally establish the identity, legitimacy and principal officials responsible for the candidate book and (b) to establish the scientific quality of the book. Thus to do this, we assess descriptive and scientific quality using the criteria described below:

STAGE I(a) Descriptive Quality Criteria

Upon receiving a request for evaluation from a candidate book publisher in, the book will first of all undergo a descriptive quality assessment that entails assessing the identification and establishment details of the book, its policies, its format, and accessibility to the book's content. Detailed explanation of what these four-item criteria measures is presented below.

Book Identification

Book ISBN:

Candidate books must demonstrate legitimacy by providing a registered ISBN (print, online or both). The book's ISBN must be verifiable through the web portal of the official ISBN database and must be conspicuously displayed on all of the book's portals, platforms and communication materials.

Book Title:

Candidate books must have a unique title that is persistently displayed on its content, web presence, platforms and communication outlets. Most importantly, the book's title and its conceptualization must be consistent with its registered ISBN, stated management domain, aims and scope, published content, editorial board domain expertise and author expertise.

Book Publisher:

To further fulfill the requirement for legitimacy, the candidate book must unambiguously identify its publisher by name as well as the publisher's official physical address(es). Candidate books that are affiliated/owned/domiciled in universities, research institutes or disciplinary associations must provide verifiable identification and contact details of the relevant institution.

Book Website/Webpage Address:

Candidate books must present a verifiable and active website/webpage url. In rare cases where the publisher maintains a print-only model, access details must be provided to the MARRII team.

Contact Details of Book Publisher:

During the assessment process, the MARRII team may occasionally need to maintain direct communication channels with principal officers steering editorial and production processes for candidate books. Therefore, the contact details of these principal officers must be provided.

Book Policies

Stated Peer Review Policy:

Candidate books/publishers are required to provide evidence of and access to an unambiguous peer review policy demonstrating its commitment to rigorous and transparent external peer review processes for all of its published book chapters/content (irrespective of whether the publisher uses a pre- or post-publication peer-review model). It must also provide for sufficient editorial scrutiny of other output types such as edited book introductions and opinion pieces.

Stated Ethics Policy:

Candidate publishers are also required to provide evidence and access to a clear and transparent ethics policy and guidelines for authors as well as for published book chapters/content. Where a publisher adopts well known ethics principles such as COPE or WAME, access to the full document must be provided to authors in a transparent manner either through a downloadable format present on the book's website or via a hyperlink to the full text of the document on the standard organization's website.

Publication Policy (frequency, volume, coverage):

Candidate publishers must make available a clear indication of the regularity of publications by indicating if book series/volumes (where applicable) are published annually, bi-annually, quarterly, monthly, etc. Candidate publishers must also unambiguously describe the coverage scope and demonstrate an ability to attract sufficient volume of publications within its stated scope.

Book Format

Scholarly Content:

Candidate books must primarily publish scholarly content that are original and appropriate to an audience of both management scholars and management practitioners.

Chapter Titles/Abstracts:

With the exception of introductory or synthesizing editorial sections and other similar communications, all scholarly content published by candidate books must contain a clear title and an abstract section. Both of these must be in the English language. Where book chapters are written in a language other than English, English language translations of the title and abstract must be provided.

Persistent Links to Chapter/Content (DOI):

All published book chapters/content must have a link to a persistent and permanent version of the article. They preferably should be assigned a DOI, details of which must be clearly provided on the webpage of the book chapter/content as well as in print versions (where applicable). Where a candidate book deploys post-publications editorial review and publishes multiple versions of the same chapter/content manuscript, access to all versions must be clearly and persistently made available to the public.

Bibliographic Data:

To enable an accurate, quick and smooth indexation process, candidate books must demonstrate that bibliographic information such as author names and affiliations as well as all reference materials cited within a publication are in Roman script.

Chapter/Content Author Affiliation/Contact Details:

Information regarding the name(s) of all contributing author(s) as well as the institutions to which they are affiliated must be clearly provided and appropriately displayed on the web, .pdf or print versions of book chapters/content where applicable. Contact details of at least a corresponding author must similarly be provided.

Book Editor(s) Affiliation:

Sufficient identification, professional and contact details of the principal editor(s) for the candidate book must be provided and clearly stated in all key book level communications. Should the need arise to contact the editor(s), they must be readily available.

Commissioning Team Contact Details:

Candidate books must provide the contact details of the key corresponding in-house commissioning editor and primary production team-lead to establish a direct and seamless channel of communication between the candidate book and the MARRII team.

Access to Book Content

Website Functionality & Information structure:

Candidate books must have fully functioning websites displaying accurate information regarding the aim, scope, volume regularity, ISBN, published content and archiving system applied to candidate books, as well as those of its principal officers including the book editor(s) where applicable, author guidelines, commitment to rigor and relevance, type of access (open/closed) etc. This information must be conspicuously displayed so that visitors can easily find and access them.

Content Access by the MARRII Team:

Candidate book publishers must provide the MARRII team with full access to all of its published content without any viewing restrictions. This may involve the provision of long-term access via a username and password by the candidate journal, or the use of MARRII's IP ranges for access to subscription-only content.

STAGE I(b) Scientific Quality Criteria

After a candidate book has successfully scaled through the descriptive quality assessment sub-stage 1(a), next, it moves to sub-stage I(b) where it is evaluated for its scientific quality using an 8-item scientific quality assessment criteria. Detailed explanation of what these 8-item criteria measures is presented below.

Content Coherence

Candidate books must demonstrate coherence and consistency among its title, stated aims, scope, and statement of purpose.

Adherence to Stated Policies

Candidate books must demonstrate adherence to their stated policy statements. As stated elsewhere, information found on the candidate book/publisher’s website must not only be current, but must also be accurate as false marketing or contentious content of any sort will be thoroughly scrutinized during the assessment process.

Adherence to Scientific/Domain Standards

The policy statements of candidate books/publishers must conform to widely held scientific standards, best practices and principles as recognized by general scientific standards organizations such as COPE, WAME, as well as domain/discipline-specific scholarly standards stipulated or recognized by national, regional or international scholarly organizations/associations such as the Academy of Management (AOM), Strategic Management Society (SMS), American Marketing Association (AMA) and the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) among others, where necessary.

Experience & Expertise of Book Editor(s)

Book editors must be identifiable and must have a proven publication history that largely reflects scholarly expertise in the book's core scholarly discipline and scope. Editors representing practice, must have had substantial practice-expertise within the book's core domain/discipline.

Expertise of Book Chapter/Content Author(s)

Book chapter/content authors must be identifiable and must have a proven scholarly domain and publication history that largely reflects scholarly expertise in the book's core scholarly discipline and scope. Co-authors from practice, must have had substantial practice-expertise within the book chapter/content's core domain/discipline.

Peer Review Rigor

A candidate book must demonstrate the rigor of its peer-review process as conducted by the book's editor(s). Its published content must not exhibit any of the myriad manifestations of a poor peer review process, such as book chapters/content with inadequate/inappropriate methodological or theoretical sections, absence of analytical (qualitative, quantitative or mixed) rigor, poor/unethical use of citations and a considerable amount of chapter/content publications outside the scope of the candidate book, among others.

Diversity of Authors

Book chapters/contents published in candidate books must be by authors whose professional affiliations, geographic diversity, publication history and primary scholarly/disciplinary community reflects the aims and scope of the book.

Funding Disclosure

Candidate books must require and have a mechanism for disclosing the presence/absence and sources of funding within each published chapter/content.

Having successfully passed the assessment of quality in stage I, the candidate book enters stage II of the process. The goal of this second stage of the assessment process is two fold: (a) to establish the candidate book's commitment to, integration of, and prioritization of management-practitioner relevance at the book level, with regard to its operations and processes, and (b) to systematically establish the relevance of the content of its published book chapters to management practitioner audiences. Thus, to do this, we assess relevance in operations and article content relevance using the criteria described below:

STAGE II(a): Relevance in Operations

In sub-stage II(a) the candidate book/publisher is assessed for its commitment to, integration of and prioritization of management practitioner relevance with regard to its operations and processes using an 8-item relevance in operations assessment criteria. Detailed explanation of what these 8-item criteria measures is presented below.

Commitment to Relevance

At MARRII our position is that rigor is crucial in management research, but rigor by itself is not enough. At the minimum, equal prioritization of rigor and relevance must be demonstrated by candidate books/publishers. In other words, candidate books containing rigorous management research that is not relevant to practitioners will not be considered for indexation or coverage. Therefore, candidate publishers must explicitly express their commitment to management research relevance. Either as part of its publication policy or as a stand-alone policy, candidate books must provide a clear and transparent statement regarding their commitment to management research relevance, and must provide relevance-integration guidelines to authors, editorial team members and reviewers.

Relevance in Edited Book Development

Candidate books must demonstrate that beyond an ‘implications for practice’ section, published chapters/content explicitly consider relevance to practitioners while determining the management research problem, in designing the research methodology, data collection, and in the discussion and recommendation sections of their research. This can be demonstrated either by academia-practitioner co-authorship of book chapters/contents or authorship by academic(s) in clearly documented consultation with related practitioner(s). In both cases, the research problem studied must originate from practice (in the case of timely research) or originate from extant scholarly research (in the case of timeless research). In other words, irrespective of the temporal nature of the research problem (timely or timeless), book chapter/content development must have verifiable practitioner input.

Relevance in Peer Reviews

A commitment to relevance also entails that the review process be infused with practitioner insight/input. Therefore, candidate book publishers are required to present a peer review process and criteria that reflects the equal importance accorded to both rigor and relevance.

Relevance in Editorial Operations

The candidate book's editors must comprise both management scholars and practitioners preferably in equal proportion. In other words, expert practitioners from the corresponding management domain must act as co-editors for the candidate book alongside the main editor who must be an academic. Editorial activities and processes must similarly demonstrate equal consideration for the maximization of relevance just as they traditionally do for rigor.

Relevance in Output Format

Candidate books/publishers must demonstrate a prioritization of practitioners' interest with regard to the output format of their publications. Traditional edited book formats have historically made management research contents intellectually difficult for practitioners to access through jargon-filled, uninspiring and dense book chapter/content format designs. Candidate books must demonstrate a commitment to relevance in output format by having a practitioner-friendly book chapter format that is jargon-free and easily accessible to practitioners intellectually.

Timeliness of Publication

One of the pillars of relevance is the prompt availability of research to practitioners. In order for management research to be found useful among practitioners, it must be made available on time to be applied to the resolution of the management problem it seeks to address or to be used in managerial decision making in a timely fashion. This is particularly important given the fast-paced change that happens in the real world of management practice. As such, long periods of convergence of traditional management publications is detrimental to the larger need of management practitioners. Therefore, candidate books must demonstrate turnaround times that are reflective of the needs of management practitioners. MARRII prefers turnaround periods that are a third of the average traditional management publications turnaround period.

Accessibility of Output to Practitioners

While candidate books/publishers operating open or closed access models are eligible to be covered in the MARRI-B, in line with both the ideal future of scientific publication models and management practitioners’ need for easy access to scholarly insights, MARRII recommends the use of access models that allow for easy access, especially those that deploy an open access model.

Reach Within Practice

Candidate books/publishers must demonstrate considerable reach and dissemination efforts targeted at management practitioner communities. Evidence of this includes reach within profession-specific associations, profession-specific consulting communities, domain-specific industry associations and representation in practitioner-oriented media outlets.

STAGE II(b): Chapter Content Relevance

Upon successfully passing the assessment of relevance at the book operations level in sub-stage II(a), the candidate book/publisher is assessed for the relevance of the context of its published book chapters using a 7-item chapter content relevance assessment criteria. Detailed explanation of what these 7-item criteria measures is presented below.

Descriptive Relevance

Traditional management research has been accused of “armchair theorizing”- a phenomenon in which there is a disconnect between the presentation of management problems derived from scholarly theory and real world manifestations of such problems. Book chapters/content published by candidate books must accurately present and describe problems in a manner that is representative of real life management situations; and convincingly demonstrate that research questions are relevant to practice.

Currency Relevance

At MARRII, we recognize two categories of management research under the problem currency relevance category. They are timely and timeless management research. Timely management research are those whose topic/problem are current or trending in practitioner spheres, and for which derived insights are readily implementable/deployable by management practitioners. Timeless management research are those management research whose research questions seek to synthesize extant management research for summary insights of general and non-temporal benefit to practitioners; those which seek to merely stimulate critical thinking among management practitioners and scholars; those which seek to review, initiate or advance management research methodologies or instruments; and those which seek to direct future research. To be considered for MARRI-B coverage, the research problem of all timely research published in candidate books must originate from practice; while the research problem of all timeless research published can originate from management theory/literature, but must be grounded in management practice.

Goal Relevance

To be covered in the MARRI-B, book chapters/content published in candidate books must demonstrate that they contain focal topics, main or dependent variable(s) that are verifiably relevant to outcome(s) of interest to practitioners. This is irrespective of whether such chapters/content represent timely or timeless research.

Operational Validity

To be covered in the MARRI-B, book chapters/content published in candidate books must demonstrate where applicable, that a proper set of independent/predictor variables was used, and that these variables can be manipulated in real world management and organization settings. This is irrespective of whether such book chapters/content represent timely or timeless research.

Non-Obviousness

Book chapters/content published in candidate books must present insights, results or information that are not only useful to management practitioners, but transcend common-sense in the sense that to management practitioners, they are non-obvious, novel or both.

Actionable Advice for Practitioners

Beyond traditional ‘implications for practice’ sections, book chapters/content published in candidate journals must contain a section that explicitly offers actionable and deployable advice to management practitioners. Preferably, ones that are similar to management consulting advice (where possible).

Chapter/Content Readability

To be covered in the MARRI-B, articles published in candidate journals must be jargon-free and presented in a language level that is practitioner friendly. Preferably, language levels that conform to grade 8 levels.

Upon evaluation, candidate books that fully and successfully meet both the descriptive and scientific quality criteria in stage I, move to stage II of the assessment process. However, books that fail to fully meet the descriptive quality criteria for the first time,can resubmit for re-assessment without any time or material restrictions. Failure to fully meet the descriptive quality criteria a second time OR failure to meet the scientific quality criteria once, will lead to the rejection of the candidate book without options of re-submission.

If a candidate book scales through quality assessment in stage I it moves to stage II. If after evaluating it for its relevance to management practitioners in stage II, it is found to meet the relevance in operations and chapter content relevance sets of criteria, the candidate book will be indexed in MARRII-B. If however, the candidate book is judged to be unsuccessful at this stage (stage II), it will not be indexed and will lose any opportunity for re-submission.

Books indexed in MARRI-B in step will be removed from the full collection if such books or the relevant publisher are found to have lost quality, relevance or both.