Call for Scholarly Program Submissions: Management Consulting Division

Program Chair: Uzonna Olumba, University of Michigan, uolumba@umich.edu

The Management Consulting (MC) Division invites and encourages MC division members and colleagues from other divisions to submit academic papers, field reports, case studies, and symposia proposals for the 2020 conference. Our Division is committed to developing and supporting scholar-practitioners, and as such encourage both qualitative and quantitative research. Topics may include the application of theory in the field, generation of new theory from the field, and papers with a strong practical and/or experience-based orientation. We are looking forward to submissions that relate to all aspects of the field of consultancy (theory, research, teaching and practice), especially as applied to the 2020 Annual Meeting of Academy of Management theme: “20/20: Broadening our Sight."

The 21st century challenges are directly or indirectly relative to management and consulting practices. In particular different forms of inclusivity and diversity within organizations, economic progress, climate change and technology disruption. The Academy of Management family plays an important and vital role that is significant in producing and disseminating a thorough understanding of the challenges that are at the forefront of academia and in practice. There are salient issues that arise when knowledge building and boundary spanning. These self-imposed dichotomies create barriers that prevent us from sharing knowledge that would create value for individuals, organizations, society, and our own profession. These self-imposed choices restrict our sight and create a narrow and often incomplete view of organizational phenomena. Using the 20/20 vision analogy, which means that we can see things more clearly, the 2020 theme invites members to break down dichotomies and broaden the way we “see” management and organizations and our own profession.

Extending that to the specific work we do in management consulting, we may consider a variety of research questions:

• How can we integrate qualitative/quantitative and micro/macro methodologies, theories, and domains?
• How can we have impact on both internal (i.e., other academics) and external (i.e., practitioners, policy makers) stakeholders?
• How can we integrate our research and teaching activities?
• How can we value different types of publications that target internal (e.g., other researchers) and external (i.e., practitioners) stakeholders?
• How can we find convergence across different domains to tackle common theoretical and practical problems? How can we balance scientific rigor with the demands for quick publications?

This is just a sampling of the many topics around overcoming dichotomies. Broadening our sight creates synergies, increased value-added, and positive results for individuals, organizations, society, and the field of management and organizations. In short, this year's theme raises the question: How can we as consultants think outside of the box and use our capabilities to broaden our vision and see beyond dichotomies? We look forward to receiving your papers to help answer this highly relevant question.

Let us stress that submissions - research papers, symposia or field-based consulting cases (rich descriptions of interventions with a discussion of lessons learned) - may be about any topic in the area of management consulting whether it relates to the overall conference theme or not.

We strongly encourage submissions from practitioners and scholar-practitioners (including doctoral students) who want to share and reflect on field experience that is either connected to existing theory or generates new theory. Our division is proud to offer a place where seasoned scholar-practitioners share warmth and wisdom, and junior faculty members and doctoral students enjoy a golden opportunity to develop their work. We pride ourselves on the quality of our review process, particularly the quality feedback given by our reviewers. Submitting a paper to the MC Division offers an excellent opportunity for growth to both senior scholars and novice writers alike.

The MC Division depends on wonderful reviewers annually and we hope you will join us in providing high quality reviews to our members yourself, whether or not you submit a paper.

Submission Process: Please carefully review all the submission guidelines and formatting instructions before submitting. All submissions must be made through the AOM Submission Center. All authors of multi-author papers must be noted as such by the lead or contact author when they are submitted. Student papers should be clearly identified as such during the online submission process to take advantage of the extra development opportunities and awards available for students.

Please make a note of these key dates as you prepare your submission and sign up to review. The Submission Center will be available starting early December 2019 and closes Tuesday, 14 January 2020 at 5:00 PM ET (NY Time). Earlier submissions are encouraged, as the Submission Center may slow down during the last few days.

Division Awards: The MC Division offers several best paper awards:

• The Information Age Publishing Outstanding Doctoral Student Paper Award;
• The Thomson South-Western Award for Outstanding Research Based Paper on Management Consulting;
• The Benedictine University Award for Best Paper on Ethical Issues in Consulting and Scholar-Practitioner Research Award; and
• The Management Consulting Division Award for Best Field Report/Practice Paper.

All award winners will be celebrated at the MC business meeting, which will take place during the conference in Vancouver.

We look forward to your contributions!