Publishing in Management Education Journals

Report on a seminar by Jon Billsberry at Middlesex University on the 5th of March 2018

At Middlesex University, I run a range of staff development activities including paper development groups and writing boot-camps. Recently, I also started working with staff who are keen to publish their teaching-based research. As part of that initiative I was very happy to find Jon Billsberry prepared to share some of his wisdom on publishing in Management Education Journals with us. Despite being seriously jet-lagged, Jon gave us a very engaging and informative presentation. The slides of the presentation can be downloaded here. The entire presentation was recorded and is available for viewing here. [Thanks to Marta Sobotka who did the recording, it was her first time but she did a great job!]

Presentation abstract

Publishing in management education journals is relevant to most management academics. In an age of ‘publish or perish’, innovation in teaching is a ready source of data that appears easy to write-up and publish. Despite this, publishing in highly-rated management education journals is limited to a relatively small number of scholars and is quite elusive. Part of the problem is a lack of knowledge about the different journals, people trying to publish with little knowledge of what has gone before, and weaknesses associated with emerging scholars trying to publish their first paper. In this seminar, I hope to touch on all these issues. I shall (1) discuss the reasons why you might want to engage in management education research, (2) explain the differences between the various journals, (3) use a filmmaking metaphor to help conceptualise the writing process, and (4) highlight some of the major challenges in management education research.

Jon Billsberry bio

Jon is Chair in Management at Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia. Previously, he worked at the Open University, Coventry University, and eight years in industry before turning to academia. He has recently served as the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Management Education, Chair of the Management Education and Development (MED) division of the Academy of Management, and is currently guest editing a special issue of Academy of Management Learning & Education on academic careers and rhythms. His research has been published in Academy of Management Journal, Journal of Business Ethics, British Journal of Management, Journal of Business and Psychology, Journal of Sport Management, Journal of Managerial Psychology, New Technology Work and Employment, Higher Education, Journal of Management Education, and Journal of Leadership Education. He has also published 8 books and 23 book chapters. His research interests are in the fields of organizational fit and misfit, implicit theories of leadership, the cinematic portrayal of work and working life, and innovation in management and leadership education.

Teaching leadership through film-making

Jon teaches leadership through film-making. In one of his classes students get one week to find their idea and write their screenplay, two days to shoot their film, and two days to edit it. Students have to produce two versions of their film. In one version they have to manipulate one character so that the audience perceives him or her as a leader. But in the other version, the same character must come across as someone who isn't a leader. The same screenplay had to be used for both films. You can find some of his students' films here.

Related readings

Other Middlesex seminars