Recalibrating Management Research for the Post‐COVID‐19 Scientific Enterprise

Abstract

Scientific experts have traditionally enjoyed high public trust, but their stock of social capital is eroding (Jacobs, 2020). This is particularly the case for management researchers, who are already viewed as elites disconnected from practice and the public. The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated lingering concerns about using public resources for university education and social sciences that yield questionable social returns with obfuscated outputs, lack of timeliness and accessibility, and fragmentation, but it has also 'changed science forever' (Yong, 2020): The post-COVID-19 scientific enterprise demands responsible use of societal resources through fast-paced research, social embeddedness, and coordination. Management research is everything but. For management scholars, this means recalibrating how research is conducted, evaluated, and disseminated to society. This commentary briefly outlines some tangible pathways toward that end. CHRONIC PROBLEMS TURNED EXISTENTIALThe notion that management research seldom reaches a broad audience or lacks pivotal societal impact is not new (Buckley et al., 2017), but stakeholder patience for using resources for management research has rapidly depleted due to COVID-19-driven resource constraints. The endless calls for individual researchers to do more 'impactful' or

Microaggressions, Interrupted: The Experience and Effects of Gender Microaggressions for Women in STEM

“…This study contributes to the body of literature on organizational DEI efforts by highlighting the anatomy and effects of gender microaggressions in contributing to the gender leadership gap in STEM and the supportive role that allies can play. Though practical understanding has progressed with respect to workplace microaggressions, theory and scholarship still lag due primarily to the relatively siloed nature of the management literature (Fainshmidt et al, 2021). We address this gap in several ways.…”

“…While research on gender microaggressions has grown, buttressed by decades of research on workplace gender discrimination (Basford et al, 2014;Cortina et al, 2001;Holder et al, 2015), such studies remain siloed across the education, counseling, and management literatures (Fainshmidt et al, 2021). A deeper exploration of how microaggressions manifest and impact women's identities and outcomes in STEM professions-and what can ameliorate their negative effects-presents a way to marry the literatures to better understand women's experience-and exit-from the STEM leadership pipeline.…”

Through the looking glass

“…However, such an event also opens up unique opportunities for health care management scholars to expand the bounds of our current theorizing. In the aftermath of significant disruption, it is therefore important to recalibrate the field and update our current theorizing to ensure our theories remain responsive and connected to the realities and demands of practice ( Fainshmidt et al, 2021 ). In the following sections, we begin by identifying key themes that were prevalent in emergent work in the onset of COVID-19.…”

“…In particular, preexisting challenges are likely to have been reinvigorated ( Hefner & Nembhard, 2021 ) or exacerbated with the onset of COVID-19 (e.g., staff shortages and clinician burnout), but we lack a comprehensive understanding of the challenges that persist for managers now as they move beyond COVID-19 and into the future. With this omission, scholarship also fails to account for how managers may tackle these issues in real time Consequently, proposed strategies may not be as applicable or useful in practice, and management research in the wake of the crisis might remain too far removed from actual practice ( Fainshmidt et al, 2021 ). In addition, health care management literature has failed to consider “grand challenges” ( Hefner & Nembhard, 2021 ) such as COVID-19, leaving a gap in our understanding of (and appropriate responses to) these multifaceted issues.…”

(Im)migrants’ appropriation of culture: Reciprocal influence of personal and work contexts

“…As such, globalisation creates paradoxes of homogeneity and diversity amongst communities, and challenges businesses to understand their employees and customers in the contexts of their cultural identities and dispositions (Andrews et al, 2022;Gielens & Steenkamp, 2019;Lazarova et al, 2023;Ponomareva et al, 2022). As a result, global consumer culture (Demangeot et al, 2015), diaspora marketing (Kumar & Steenkamp, 2013), and diversity management within organisations (Fainshmidt et al, 2021;Hajro et al, 2017) have gained traction recently in international business and marketing research.…”