Topic Selection (jms-topic-selection)

When to trigger

• You have a dataset, a field site, or a phenomenon but not yet a question JMS would call a contribution
• The idea feels like "an interesting finding" rather than "a problem in a management conversation"
• You are unsure whether the paper belongs at JMS versus AMJ, Organization Studies, JoM, or SMJ
• A practitioner-relevant phenomenon is in hand but the management-theory angle is missing
• The question could be answered better with qualitative depth than with the quantitative design you defaulted to (or vice versa)

The JMS topic bar

JMS publishes work that engages an organizational or management phenomenon and moves a theoretical conversation about it. Two features distinguish a JMS-fit topic. First, it is phenomenon-rooted: there is a real-world organizational puzzle (a strategic shift, an entrepreneurial process, an institutional tension, a managerial practice) that the paper takes seriously, not just a gap-in-the-literature. Second, it is pluralism-friendly: JMS will reward the question whether you answer it with a structural equation model on survey data, an inductive multi-case study, a longitudinal process narrative, or a critical/interpretive reading — so choose the method the question demands, not the one your sub-field defaults to. The journal's identity is internationally oriented and European-rooted, so context-sensitivity (institutions, national settings, comparative variation) is a strength, not a liability.

Sharpen the question before you commit

Run the question through three filters, in order: