Editorial

Citation

van der Wiele, T. (2006), "Editorial", International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, Vol. 23 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/ijqrm.2006.04023baa.001

Editorial

The editorship of the International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management is about to change.

Barrie Dale was the founding editor of IJQRM with the first issue published in 1984. During that period he has been responsible for the growing reputation of the Journal, which is now in its 23rd volume (2006). Today, IJQRM is accepted worldwide as a top academic journal in the field of quality management and has a large readership. There is little doubt that academics are keen on getting their research published in the journal. The waiting time between acceptance of a paper and its publication in the journal averages one year, even though the rejection rate is more than 60 per cent.

One of the reasons for the enduring success of the journal is the research reputation of Barrie Dale and the way he has implemented the basic thinking of quality control in the handling of manuscripts. In particular, he strictly controls the time between the submission of a paper and the decision to reject or to publish the paper in IJQRM. A number of authors have shown their appreciation with respect to the review process control mechanisms and for the valuable feedback they received from the reviewers, even when papers were rejected.

Barrie Dale leaves a well-organised iournal in the hands of his successors. Associate Professor Ton van der Wiele (Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands) will join IJQRM as Quality Editor from 2006 with Barrie Dale as consulting editor. A further change to the editorship will be the introduction of an Associate Quality Editor who will support the Quality Editor with his duties. Jos van Iwaarden (Researcher at Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands) will become the Associate Quality Editor for IJQRM. Our aims for the coming period are:

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  Continue the way the manuscripts are managed, with the goal to respond as soon as possible to manuscripts that are submitted.

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  Maintain the high quality of the journal articles by continuing the involvement of a group of experts reviewing the manuscripts.

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  Shortening the waiting time between acceptance of the manuscript and the date of publication by increasing the rejection rate.

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  Getting an ISI rating which is becoming more important in the academic valuation of the journal. There is currently an application at ISI for IJQRM, which we hope to hear the result of soon.

These aims will contribute to a further strengthening of the journal.

The incoming Quality Editor and Associate Quality Editor acknowledge the tremendous amount of work that has been done over the years by Barrie Dale and wish to thank him for the well-organised systems that have been set up by him in managing the Journal. We know Barrie Dale will be available in the coming years for advice, and we will certainly make use of this opportunity in order to learn as much as possible from his experiences.

Ton van der WieleThe incoming Quality Editor

Jos van IwaardenThe incoming Associate Quality Editor