Determinants of faculty research productivity in information systems: An empirical analysis of the impact of academic origin and academic affiliation

Abstract

This manuscript provides guidance to Deans and other academic decision makers in the hiring process and dispels the validity of a widely held assumption commonly used as a decision factor in the selection process. This paper investigates: (a) whether graduates of prestigious information systems (IS) doctoral programs (graduates with high-status academic origins) are more likely to be successful in their academic careers (as measured by research productivity) than graduates of less prestigious programs, (b) whether IS faculty who are employed by esteemed universities (faculty with high-status academic affiliations) are more productive researchers than IS faculty employed by lower-status institutions, and (c) examines faculty productivity in terms of Lotka's Law [LOTKA, 1926]. The findings indicate that in the IS field, productivity does not follow a Lotka distribution. Moreover, our study also shows that academic affiliation is a significant determinant of research productivity in terms of quantity (as measured by publication counts) and quality (as measured by citation counts). Contrary to common expectations, however, the analysis shows that the status of a faculty member's academic origin is not a significant determinant of research productivity in the field of information systems. Therefore, continued reliance on academic pedigree as a primary criterion for hiring decisions may not be justified in the IS discipline.Research productivity, usually measured by the number of articles published in quality journals, is a primary criterion for evaluating faculty at research-oriented business schools, particularly with respect to merit raises and promotion and tenure

Research, teaching and performance evaluation in academia: the salience of quality

“…Bogt and Scapens (2012) report a lack of literature concerning performance measurement systems in universities. However, there is ample evidence that research is valued more highly than teaching (Gomez-Mejia and Balkin 1992;Katz 1973;Konrad and Pfeffer 1990;Newman 2008) and that many universities are placing increasing weight on research performance indicators for promotion, tenure, compensation and performance evaluation purposes (Arnold 2008;Bogt and Scapens 2012;Douglas 2013;Gendron 2008;Hopwood 2008;Long et al 2009;Parker 2012;Sangster 2011).…”

“…In such instances, performance measurement systems often resort to surrogation, whereby a set of measures is derived to represent the unobserved construct of interest (Choi, Hecht, and Tayler 2013). Despite some discord in the academic community (Sangster 2011), the quality of research is usually assessed by its impact and measured by the number of papers published in an exclusive set of highquality (top) journals or the number of citations (Harvey et al 2010;Long et al 2009;Stack 2003). Teaching quality/effectiveness is usually gauged via student assessments (Hattie and Marsh 1996).…”

“…Performance evaluation in academia has traditionally been somewhat biased towards research indicators and it seems that this orientation is becoming even more profound (Bogt and Scapens 2012;Gendron 2008;Parker 2008). A growing number of reports document that universities striving for government funding, research grants and high rankings have adopted strategies including recruitment and reward systems that favour academics with top publications or the potential to secure such publications (Bogt and Scapens 2012;Douglas 2013;Gendron 2008;Hopwood 2008;Long et al 2009;Parker 2012;Sangster 2011).…”

“…More precisely, it investigates the substance of the warnings that research-based performance evaluation in academia is detrimental to quality teaching. As a relative novelty, following a call by Stack (2003), the study revisits the relationship between research and teaching quality by dividing these activities into productivity (quantity) and quality components (Long et al 2009;Moed 2008). Hypotheses are tested using a large cross-disciplinary sample of academics in a university where performance evaluation is predominantly research based.…”

Romanian scholarly productivity: recent history and recommendations

“…The prestige of the institutions in the USA where scholars earned their doctoral degrees does seem to predict the productivity of those scholars (Long, Crawford, White, & Davis, 2009;Smith, Fox, Park, & Lee, 2008). However, the productivity of a scholar's doctoral advisor may be a better predictor (Hilmer & Hilmer, 2009).…”