Overcoming Challenges to Impactful Research

• The incentive structures in business schools often prioritize top-tier journal publications over collaborative, impactful research.
• Engaging with stakeholders can be difficult for faculty to balance with other academic responsibilities, but these collaborations are critical for addressing real-world problems and securing necessary resources.
• A team approach to research that draws on the diverse strengths of different faculty members can enhance the overall impact of research efforts.

Learn about AACSB's Influential Leaders program at aacsb.edu/influential-leaders.

Transcript

Jennifer Griffith: [00:15] I think one of the largest challenges to having a real impact is the incentive structures that we have in place in business schools.

[00:24] Many of us are focused on publications and thinking about how we can make a big impact using top-tier journals. High-impact research is often considered those that are in those big top-tier journals, and not all of the work that is de-siloed, that is really collaborative, is a good fit for those journals.

[00:51] But that doesn’t mean that it’s not impactful, and if we want our faculty to work on high-impact, tangible, practical solutions, then we have to make sure that we are recognizing and rewarding that particular behavior.

Brad Price: [01:09] So, some challenges to producing timely research is the time it takes to get the information out there. So the time from doing the research to it appearing in a journal or appearing at a conference can be months, if not years.

[01:23] So getting that information out there takes time, and it takes patience, and working the peer-review process takes a long time. So the question becomes, how do researchers get their information out quicker? How do they bring it to society? How do they bring it to the business community? How do they bring it to organizations even faster?

The time from doing the research to it appearing in a journal or appearing at a conference can be months, if not years.

[01:42] That’s the major challenge we face because I think business school researchers do amazing work. It’s just a question of how can we get our information out there faster. How can we talk about the impact we’re having with our students and the community?

[01:55] How can we do that type of thing faster and get the information out there quicker, without having to wait years to talk about what the true impact is?

Vera Blazevic: [02:03] Having that impact means that there are quite some challenges in the sense that if we engage with all these stakeholders, that takes time, first of all, that takes resources. We need to have access.

[02:16] In the daily routines of teaching and administration, performing the research, doing the data analysis, all of that, there also needs to be time to reach out and to talk to them, and so on.

[02:30] And that’s sometimes difficult because there’s sometimes also barriers in that they might not find us, we might not find them, they also need to make time in their busy lives to talk to us. So I think time and access to resources is one of the key challenges and also the interest to really go out there and talk to them.

It’s really important to build a network so that you have access to additional sources of funding that you might need or reach out to your community to ... really understand what’s going on in those places so that you can help to provide those solutions.

[02:47] So I also know quite some researchers who love sitting in their room, writing their papers, and I like that too, but at the same time, I’m someone who really likes to be diverse in the tasks I do, so maybe it comes a bit more naturally to me, but I think that’s really important to be open, communicate, and listen. We should really listen.

Griffith: [03:08] I think collaboration is really critical. Although that is challenging at some business schools, I think it’s really important to build a network so that you have access to additional sources of funding that you might need or reach out to your community to understand what the problems, again, on the ground are and what’s happening in the workplace in order to create partnerships with industry and really understand what’s going on in those places so that you can help to provide those solutions.

Price: [03:36] For me, it’s about posting to websites early and putting preprints out to say, here’s what we’re doing. I think it’s about talking at workshops and conferences about, here’s what we’re working on now. I think it’s about getting our industry partners who we work with to talk about the problems we’ve solved with them. I think it’s about having the community talk about the solution that was presented as well.

[03:58] I think that’s really where the impact comes from, and it starts to snowball from there. I also think it’s not just about the publications. Sometimes, I think it’s about the true impact of the research being felt.

Blazevic: [04:08] We have quite a diverse profile in the business schools in terms of researchers, and not every researcher can do all of this, first of all, in terms of the time aspect, but also in terms of their personalities. Maybe some other researchers are really good at writing those papers in his or her secluded room.

[04:25] If we approach it a little bit more as a team and as a group, I would also love that, so that also maybe the trajectories in terms of careers would notice that there are different types of people and would maybe incentivize us more as a team, as a group, I would love that. It’s still often a lot of individual success.