1. Anabela Mesquita ISCAP / IPP
Doing research and getting published – challenges and possible solutions
Anabela Mesquita
ISCAP / IPP

2. Anabela Mesquita
Instructor profile
PhD in Management Information Systems from Minho University, Portugal (2002)
Lecturer since 1990
Vice Dean of ISCAP (one of the schools of Polytechnic Institute of Porto)
Editor in chief of the IJTHI
Co-editor of two special issues – JCIT and IRMJ
AE for IRMJ, JCIT
Scientific Committee of several international conferences for some years
Some books edited and papers published (journals and conferences)
Book about how to do a Master or a Phd – the process
Coordinator of European Projects and coordinator of partner

3. Anabela Mesquita
The process

4. What is a process? definition
Anabela Mesquita
actions
results
inputs
What is a process? definition

5. The “Process” Research process Conference paper writing process
Anabela Mesquita
The “Process”
Research process
Conference paper writing process
Journal paper writing process
Electronic submission process
Resubmission process
Paper review process
Paper publishing process
Academic networking process
Scholarly process
Where can the process be applied to? Where can we find it?

6. Let’s start with the research process
Anabela Mesquita
Let’s start with the research process

7. Writing and submitting a journal paper
Anabela Mesquita
Writing and submitting a journal paper

8. Before looking for a journal ask yourself…
Anabela Mesquita
Before looking for a journal ask yourself…
Do I have a contribution to make?
Who is going to be interested?
How does it build on what we already know?
How significant is my message?
How sure I am about my findings?
Anyway…
It is important for the career
Publication is part of our academic role

9. Tips before submitting
Anabela Mesquita
Tips before submitting
High risk submissions: conversion of a big report or monograph or doctorate thesis; straight conference paper, not focused for the journal, not formatted for the journal and it might be published elsewhere in the conference proceedings (not original)
Low risk submissions: papers written for the journal, i.e., it fits with the genre, the scope of the journal, engages with the debates, refers to previous work published in the journal and related publications.

10. Anabela Mesquita
A target journal
What is the mission / policy / objective of the journal? Does the paper fit the journal’s aim and scope?
What type of submission is it? Empirical research, review paper, brief report, thought piece, book review. Does the journal publish these kinds of papers?
Does the journal have a good reputation in the field? Are the Editor and Editorial Board high profile?
What is the acceptance / rejection rate?
What is the turn-around time?
Does the journal have an international audience?
Special issue?

11. Anabela Mesquita
Example

12. Is the journal peer reviewed? Who are in the editorial board?
Anabela Mesquita
Is the journal peer reviewed?
Who are in the editorial board?
Is the journal available online?
Is the journal published by an international association, University or a publishing company?

13. Anabela Mesquita
Is the journal in the ISI-ranked database? Or is it ranked highly with other metrics, eg h-index, ABS, ERIH, ERA, SCOPUS, SCIELO, Web of knowledge?
IJTHI

14. Anabela Mesquita
Example of an
academic journal

15. It is possible to know which journals are listed in each index
Web of Knowledge index
Anabela Mesquita
It is possible to know which
journals are listed in each index

16. The same for SCOPUS http://www.elsevier.com/online-tools/scopus
Anabela Mesquita
The same for SCOPUS

17. First homework… Read the journal’s aim and scope
Anabela Mesquita
First homework…
Read the journal’s aim and scope
Look at past issues of the journal
See what kind of things / topics / research designs are published.
Look at the best papers and see how they have been constructed and try to do the same
You may wish to discuss your paper with the journal Editor

18. Look for the adequate journal
Anabela Mesquita
Sometimes, as Editor in chief, I receive papers that do not fit within the scope / mission of the journal and I have to reject them, before sending them for review
Advise…
Look for the adequate journal

19. IGI Global journal collection
Anabela Mesquita
IGI Global journal collection

20. What should you do to prepare your manuscript?
Anabela Mesquita
What should you do to prepare your manuscript?
Read the manuscript submission guidelines. Make every effort to improve the quality of the manuscript before submission
Ba as objective as possible about your work
IJTHI

21. Anabela Mesquita
More details

22. Paper title It should be concise, accurate and informative
Anabela Mesquita
Paper title
It should be concise, accurate and informative
Titles are often used by Google search engines
The title should be specific and it should contain words that readers might be searching for
Impact of the paper title: strong and attractive

23. Anabela Mesquita
Paper title
The title will make it more likely people will find and want to read your article
The title must reflect the content of your article; if not readers will be confused and disappointed
The title must also be comprehensible to the general reader outside your field
The title should not bear any abbreviations

24. Anabela Mesquita
Example
“Improving Decision Making in Extreme Situations: The Case of a Military Decision Support System”
methodology
Topic (depend. variable)
Topic (indep. variable)
“Factors Influencing Citizen Adoption of E-Government in Developing Countries: The Case of Jordan”

25. Anabela Mesquita
Abstract
Your abstract is what readers / reviewers / editors will use when they are deciding whether to read through your article or not
You should spend some time making sure that it is readable and that it contains a complete description of your research

26. Must be accurate as a reflection of what is in your article
Anabela Mesquita
Must be accurate as a reflection of what is in your article
Must be self-contained, without abbreviations
Check the journal’s Authors Guidelines to see what length of abstract is required
See if there are specific guidelines such as word count, subject matter, method of submission ( , paper copy, or fax, for example), as well as qualifications and letters of recommendation the journal might require
Selling points
Check that the abstract reads well
Structured abstract

27. Example of an abstract
Anabela Mesquita
“The main purposes of this study are to investigate citizen adoption of e- government services in Jordan and to explore factors affecting the level of adoption of e-government services. Importantly, this study aims to develop a conceptual framework that is based on previous literature of Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) in order to examine the relationships between certain factors (government trustworthiness, service quality and citizen satisfaction) and citizen adoption of e-government services. A self-administered questionnaire was used to capture data from 356 Jordanian citizens across the country randomly. The findings indicate that perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, citizen satisfaction and trustworthiness are significant predictors of the Jordanian intention to use an e-government service. The results also showed that the service quality dimensions: responsiveness, reliability, and empathy have significant impacts on the citizen satisfaction. The study has made significant contributions to the body of knowledge at academic and practical levels as an important exploratory study that was conducted in the context of Jordan, a developing country with genuine need for more research works on e- government issues. In addition, this study provides some valuable insights into the performance and adoption of e-government in Jordan that could help government agencies to improve the effectiveness of their services.”

28. Anabela Mesquita
Writing
The language should be clear and to an acceptable standard. Ask a colleague to read through your final draft, in particular if you are not an English native speaker
Reviewers are not expected to correct or copyedit manuscripts

29. If English is not your first language…
Anabela Mesquita
If English is not your first language…
Emerald provides a service for any articles that might need copyediting: ervice/index.htm
SfEP* suggested minimum freelance rates: s.asp
The copyediting editors will be editing primarily for the quality of the english and will not necessarily be able to advise on the quality of the content
*SfEP – Society for editors and proofreaders

30. Copyediting solutions allow you to:
Anabela Mesquita
Copyediting solutions allow you to:
Prepare an error-free manuscript, ready for submission to journals
Convey your research ideas and results clearly and effectively
Increase the chances of acceptance of your paper

31. Journal styles Sometimes journals have a style associated with it
Anabela Mesquita
Journal styles
Sometimes journals have a style associated with it
global.com/publish/resources/journal- guidelines-for-submission.pdf
Look for the guidelines or template, if available

32. Anabela Mesquita
Keywords
It is essential that authors, editors, publishers make every effort to ensure articles are found online, quickly and accurately, ideally within the top five hits
The key to this is the appropriate use of keywords. This will help to increase the chances of the article being located and therefore cited
Recent evidence suggests that a strong correlation exists between online hits and subsequent citations for journal articles. Search engines rank highly as starting points

33. Anabela Mesquita
After submitting an article, it is ok to stay in touch with the journal / editor. Most journals allow to login to the system to check on the progress of the review process.
If you see that it is stuck for some weeks at any stage, don’t be afraid to send a polite and respectful inquiry, asking if there is anything you can do to help it along.
If you are in a time-crunch because you are looking to make a job-change or are being considered for a promotion, it is ok to kindly mention this in the note.

34. Other processes in research
Anabela Mesquita
Other processes in research

35. Steps in Research Process
Anabela Mesquita
Steps in Research Process
1. Formulating the Research Problem
2. Extensive Literature Review
3. Developing the objectives
4. Preparing the Research Design including Sample Design
5. Collecting the Data
6. Analysis of Data
7. Generalisation and Interpretation
8. Preparation of the Report or Presentation of Results-Formal write ups of conclusions reached.

36. Anabela Mesquita
Literature review
Show what is already available in your area of interest.
It is an integral part of entire research process and makes valuable contribution to every operational step.
Can be time-consuming, daunting and frustrating, but is also rewarding. Its functions are:
a. Bring clarity and focus to your research problem;
b. Improve your methodology;
c. Broaden your knowledge;
d. Contextualise your findings.

37. Literature review helps you to show…
Anabela Mesquita
Literature review helps you to show…
What has already been said about a topic.
Step 1 – Framing questions for a review
Step 2 - Identifying relevant work (databases, e.g., b-on; search engines)
Step 3 - Assessing the quality of studies
Step 4 - Summarizing the evidence
Step 5 - Interpreting the findings

38. Anabela Mesquita
Importance of Literature Review A common mistake is wanting to publish papers in areas without ever referring to previous papers in the same area

39. Anabela Mesquita
Research method
If the paper covers empirical research (survey, desk- based research, etc.) it is necessary to tell the reader something about the methods. At least give enough information for the reader to have a sense of whether he can trust you.
Moreover, it is needed to prove that theoretical framework and literature review clearly influence any empirical study that is being reported
Research
questions
Research
Framework
Empirical
study

40. Research method Need to justify the research method
Anabela Mesquita
Research method
Need to justify the research method
Justify the sample size
Clarify how the stratified random sampling methods was implemented (if the case)
How the survey instrument was developed, validated, administered
How the interview script was created
What are the hypotheses (if any)

41. Anabela Mesquita
Qualitative research
Use words rather than numbers to describe findings
Emphasize seeing the world from the perspective of the participants
Goal is understanding rather than predicting
Emphasize the subjective dimension of human experience
Holist rather than reductionist
Associated with the interpretive approach which is discovery oriented, explanatory, descriptive and inductive in nature

42. Conclusion Research contributions and / or implications for research
Anabela Mesquita
Conclusion
Research contributions and / or implications for research
Implications for practice
Research limitations
Future research directions

43. Anabela Mesquita
Limitation - example
Our study has some limitations within which our findings need to be interpreted carefully. Some limitations of this study should be mentioned. First as in most empirical studies, the research presented here was limited by the measures used. Because environments are composed of numerous uncorrelated facets, …
Second, our study was cross-sectional in nature and assessed respondent perception of the obligations at a specific time.
Third, our study did not examine the impact of …
Last but not least, results of this study may not be completely generalizable because the sample was restricted to XXXX

44. Future research directions - example
Anabela Mesquita
Future research directions - example
The results of this study suggest that the concept of… This study is therefore a pioneering attempt to adapt the concept of … Opportunities for further are abundant. This study suggests the following future research directions. First…
Second this study concentrated on… among three dimensions of a … We encourage other to carry out further research in this area.
Third, while XXX theory is based on the assumed difficulty of… future research may wish to explicitly consider this aspect of XXX in understanding…

45. Initial screenng process
Anabela Mesquita
Initial screenng process

46. Important screening criteria include:
Anabela Mesquita
Editor’s decision
The aim of the initial screening of new submissions is to prevent editors wasting their time on submissions that are
Unsuitable, erroneous or malicious
Important screening criteria include:
Fit with the mission of the journal
Significance of the research
Likelihood of moving forward acceptance in two rounds of review

47. Understanding the review process
Anabela Mesquita
Understanding the review process
Work is received electronically by the Editor and skimmed for reasonable fit, quality and impact
Work is sent to 2 reviewers (at least)
Work is judged be reviewer’s report:
Major revisions
Minor revisions
Reject
Associated Editor

48. Example of a template used for review
Anabela Mesquita
Need to justify the marks given
for each criteria
Some criteria
Include some comments that should not
be available to authors

49. Anabela Mesquita
Resubmission process
Respond point-to-point to each suggestion / comment (e.g. using a table)
Update the manuscript
Deadline
Attitude
Online resubmission

50. Typical research process problems
Anabela Mesquita
Typical research process problems
Too many focus
Poor literature review
Database & Sampling Subjects
Un-researchable or poor research questions
Not defined research problems
Project management
Weak conclusion
Outdated references

51. Good research does not publish itself
Anabela Mesquita
Good research does not publish itself
Logic alone is not enough to win the approval of reviewer, editors and program chairs
Becoming an expert on the logical side of research is critical too.

52. Tips for increasing your impact
Anabela Mesquita
Tips for increasing your impact
Actively involve academic conferences
Choose an attractive title
Get known in your community
Improve your web presence
Make sure that relevant terms are included in the abstract
Publish with an author with high h-index
Review papers for conferences / journals
Target journals in rapidly growing research fields
Use blogs to leverage ongoing researcher discussion
Write a review article

53. Summary of a journal submission process
Anabela Mesquita
Summary of a journal submission process

54. Anabela Mesquita
Questions?

55. Anabela Mesquita ?
Anabela Mesquita