Introducing JMSSays
介绍《管理研究杂志》新设的JMSSays栏目，该栏目专门发表管理领域的评论文章，旨在通过这种体裁挑战传统实证研究范式，促进学术与实践的对话，并鼓励学者进行规范性和批判性思考。
Essays occupy a distinct position in the intellectual development of human thought. In contrast to purely theoretical arguments, which synthesize and extend existing empirical work, the essay adopts a uniquely normative epistemological position. Instead of describing the empirical world as it is, the essay offers the opportunity to critique extant reality and, instead, explore the world as it might be. While other disciplines have adopted the essay as a key element of intellectual development, management theory has not yet fully exploited the essay as a generative form of management thought. This is unfortunate, because the essay holds the promise of addressing many of the key issues raised by critics about the legitimacy of management research. As a mechanism of challenging received knowledge, encouraging academic scepticism and creatively extending existing knowledge to common social problems, the essay offers the potential for developing the field of management research in ways that respond to its critics. Writing that is concise, normative and direct has the potential to speak to audiences beyond academe. The essay, thus, offers a useful bridge between academic and practitioner knowledge (Rynes et al., 2001). It creates the space to debate the value of theory (Hambrick, 2007; Pfeffer, 2007; Suddaby, 2014). It also offers an important venue for debating the implications of, and future direction for, management education (Mintzberg, 1996). We are, therefore, pleased to introduce JMSSays in the Journal of Management Studies. JMSSays will showcase the essay as a legitimate form of management scholarship. JMSSays is a new section of the journal that will publish a wide range of essays on a variety of topics in management theory. The intent of this section is to develop the essay as an influential genre of management research and scholarship. But we are not just pleased, we are excited by this initiative. Essays should be moments of pleasure, both to write and to read. We are strongly of the view that too much management scholarship has become formulaic, sterile and just plain dull. This, amongst other things, helps explain why management research is rarely influential in practical circles (despite the facile claims that business schools cause global economic crises and are responsible for the worst that capitalism has to offer). We hope that JMSSays can provide some provocative, engaging and erudite contributions to the important debates in management, organization and business. Our aspiration is that JMSSays will be the first pages that readers turn to, and that the section will spawn a new and more engaged readership. The essay is a well-established genre of scholarship in Western society. As a form of academic discourse, the essay can be traced back even earlier to the writings of de Montaigne and Cohen (1993) who, in turn, attributed his literary style to Plutarch and Aristotle. The term ‘essay’ is derived from the French term ‘essayer’, used by Montaigne meaning to try or attempt, and the Latin term ‘exegium’, drawn from ‘exagere’ which means to weigh, winnow or sift. Over the centuries the analytic essay has emerged as a powerful vehicle for stimulating discourse in a wide variety of disciplines, from George Orwell's political essays, Bertrand Russell's essays on humanitarianism, Jay Gould's essays in evolutionary biology, to Edward Said's observations on cultural imperialism. Perhaps surprisingly, the ‘dismal science’ has been both welcoming of, and profoundly shaped by, the essay with influential contributions by Adam Smith (1795), John Maynard Keynes (1931), Milton Friedman (1953), and Friedrich Hayek (1945), among others. The essay, however, has not had much purchase in management scholarship. There are many possible explanations for this. The most likely reason, however, is the clear dominance of scientific positivism in management research and the concomitant preference for empirical accounts that underpin traditional theory building. The essay is a unique form of scholarship. As a genre, the essay offers five key characteristics that distinguish it from traditional empirical based theorizing, but which offer important advantages for advancing understanding. The most distinctive characteristic of the essay is that it grants the author the freedom to adopt a normative position. Traditional academic theorizing discourages philosophical speculation that might extend too far beyond the scope of prior empirical knowledge. As a result, management theorists have largely failed to engage in any significant discussions of the normative or ethical implications of their research. More importantly, it discourages management theorists from reflecting deeply on the implicit assumptions that drive most research agendas. As critics have observed, this lack of reflexivity has encouraged the perception that business school researchers have unwittingly become ‘servants of power’ (Breif, 2000). The essay, however, allows the author to escape from the inherent conservatism of scientific empiricism. It encourages self-reflection of the researcher and broader philosophical speculation about the limitations of existing world-views. The notion of ‘belles lettres’ encourages broader interrogation of key assumptions about the world as it is. It forces the author to make connections between the subject of inquiry and the social context within which the subject exists. If properly executed, the essay moves the reader between ideas, existing empirical understandings and new realities. The essay is a place for experimentation with new ideas and arguments. The essay is also celebrated for its ability to generate collective interaction and communication. Its aim is to start conversations and continue debates rather than to present the conclusion to a line of enquiry on the basis of empirical evidence. This makes it a particularly powerful form of engagement with wider audiences. It also makes the essay an effective generator of new ideas. We are not seeking essays that offer ‘contributions’ to the existing literature, nor that address ‘gaps’ or ‘lacunae’ in knowledge. We seek stimulating and provocative challenges to conventional thinking not marginal ‘advances’ or ‘elaborations’. Another key characteristic of the essay is that it requires the author to position her or himself in the discussion. It is uniquely personal and permits the author to use the personal pronoun ‘I’ in presenting an argument in which the author addresses an important subject from a position of personal reflection. Montaigne, often identified as the father of the essay, is also attributed with having invented the ‘I’ in literature. We have heard the essay described as being best considered as an intimate form of communication; as ‘writing to and for one's friends’. The essay creates connections between the individual and broader social institutions by encouraging the author to describe his or her personal experiences within the context of making analytic observations about broader social phenomenon. Because the essay uses personal reflection to make normative claims it serves as a powerful form of social critique. As the German social philosopher Theodore Adorno and colleagues (Adorno, Hullot-Kentor and Will, 1984) observed, the essential contribution of the essay as a form has been to construct a voice (i.e., the essayist) that is continually sceptical of all forms of reification and taken-for-granted assumptions about the nature of the world. As a result, the essay offers a novel form of truth-claim, distinct from the empiricism of science and the overt morality of art, that is uniquely positioned to challenge received wisdom about the nature of society. The contribution of the essay, thus, is humanitarian rather than theoretical, grounded in the experience of the thoughtful intellectual in society. The essay, therefore, provides the literary space to question how our theories and empirics become disconnected from, and often damaging to, social experience and practice. It offers, as Edward Said (1983) astutely observed, a unique form of ‘secular criticism’. Finally, the essay is characterized by its attention to the importance of writing. In contrast to the overly precise and often impenetrable style of traditional theory construction, the essay is valued for its elegant simplicity. The intended audience is broad, targeting the intelligent and thoughtful generalist, rather than the focused and narrowly constituted expert. Within the context of management theory, the essay should appeal to the broadest level of business academic and, indeed, extend beyond that to appeal to the curiosity of the reflective practitioner. Because of these distinctive attributes the essay is well positioned to address key issues and debates regarding the scope, legitimacy and future directions of management research. In particular, it is well placed to assist management studies address challenges regarding its wider public value and relevance (Delbridge, 2014). Its simple exposition makes the essay appealing to broader audiences, and is thus a very effective tool for succinctly translating academic research to practitioner audiences. The normative element of the essay allows the researcher to direct scientific attention to (re-)solving managerial problems rather than simply identifying them. The critical roots of the essay encourage the management scholar to challenge the managerial elitism of most contemporary research and, perhaps more importantly, question the taken-for-granted assumptions of their own research. It therefore has the potential to play important roles in what Michael Burawoy has described as the ‘public’ and the ‘critical’ spheres of social sciences research (Burawoy, 2004). This in turn can assist management studies play a part in a more impactful, public value-based and interdisciplinary social science agenda (Brewer, 2013). The purpose of this initiative is to create a series of conversations that push the boundaries of management scholarship by cultivating a space for a more intellectually provocative discourse about organizations, work, and business in their broader context of human experience. Our interest is in essays that view organizations as both outcomes of and producers of social practices. Over the past 50 years, Journal of Management Studies has developed a reputation for its eclecticism and for publishing papers which seek to challenge the conventional wisdom concerning management and organizations. JMSSays is our most recent initiative aimed at ensuring that we continue to provide opportunities for scholars to challenge conventional ways of advancing knowledge; and by doing so, advance knowledge. We have invited initial contributions from a series of leading research scholars in management whose work has included influential essays. Our hope is that these exemplary pieces will help set the tone and showcase the possible templates for future contributions, demonstrating how the essay can be effectively adopted as a form of management scholarship. Our initial essay in this issue is by Yiannis Gabriel, a skilled essayist who offers a thoughtful extension of our conversation about the role of the essay in management scholarship. The next few instalments of JMSSays will feature essays by other leading management scholars and we are now actively seeking proposals from people who would like to suggest an essay topic for consideration. Potential contributors should submit a 300 word proposal which briefly sets out the argument to be made in the essay. Proposals will initially be reviewed by the JMSSays editorial team (Rick Delbridge and Roy Suddaby) and if the evaluation is positive authors will be asked to develop a full essay. Essays will not be subject to external peer review. The JMSSays editorial team and one Consulting Editor of the Journal (Bill Harley) will review full submissions and make a decision about whether to proceed. If the decision on the submitted essay is positive, they will then work with authors to develop their essays for publication. There will be two primary criteria for selection for publication: a) is the essay interesting and, b) does it have the potential to catalyse new ways of thinking and researching a relevant management topic? Full essays should be submitted as complete word documents written in 12 point font and double-spaced. Any charts or diagrams should be embedded in the text. Authors’ names and titles can be included in the original submission. Essays should not exceed a total of 3000 words. Usually, JMSSays will start with an orientating statement (2-3 pages), before the main body of text advances the key argument (6-8 pages) and a final section (2-3 pages) explains how managerial research, practices or organizations might be understood and constructed differently. There is no abstract but the first paragraph should summarize the issue and argument. References should be used sparingly to ensure the readability of the essay. No footnotes or endnotes should be used. To reiterate, we are excited to launch JMSSays. Our aim in doing so is to provide a forum for scholarship which is not constrained by the norms of conventional academic research and theorizing. In the current environment, where there are clear institutional pressures on scholars to produce ‘safe’ and ‘formulaic’ work (‘a “good” paper is one that is accepted’), we believe that it is an important part of our mission to encourage authors to go beyond ‘standard’ papers and to challenge conventional approaches to advancing knowledge. We hope JMSSays will open up space for essayists to produce work which is innovative, interesting and even iconoclastic and which stimulates readers to question the ways that they think about, and research, management and organizational phenomena.