Launching the Journal of Indian Business Research

Citation

Mukherjee, A. and Shainesh, G. (2009), "Launching the Journal of Indian Business Research", Journal of Indian Business Research, Vol. 1 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/jibr.2009.41301aaa.001

Launching the Journal of Indian Business Research

Article Type: Editorial From: Journal of Indian Business Research, Volume 1, Issue 1

Welcome to the inaugural issue of the Journal of Indian Business Research ( JIBR). It is with great deal of enthusiasm and optimism that we, the Co-Editors of the journal, welcome readers to this issue. A growing body of academic research is paying cognizance to the need for developing new business paradigms for big emerging markets like India. Business professionals have also shown tremendous interest in developing a scientific understanding of the world’s 12th largest economy overall and 5th largest by purchasing power parity estimates. As one of the four BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries, Indian business is of great interest to a large section of global academics and practitioners. Special issues on India have been published recently in the Academy of Management Review, the Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, etc. There is a long-felt need for a high-quality peer-reviewed scholarly journal on Indian business.

India has the second largest number of business schools in the world. A large number of business faculty teaching in Indian institutes and universities produce significant research that can be made available to a global audience. Universities outside India (particularly in the USA, the UK, Australia, New Zealand and the Middle East) have a large number of professors of Indian origin on their faculty. The JIBR will enable a meaningful dialogue between researchers in Indian universities and those of Indian origin in international universities. Also, there is a growing number of India-scholars among non-Indian faculty in universities around the world. The JIBR will serve as an outlet for scholarly discussion and debates between parties hitherto unconnected in their research dialogues.

We felt that this is the right time for the Emerald Publishing Group to introduce a new journal on Indian business. Several factors fuel the importance of Indian business in the global context. These characteristics give birth to unique managerial challenges and create opportunities for replication. For example, several enterprises in banking, insurance, telecom, airlines, petroleum refining and retailing, etc. are owned by the government but operate in very competitive markets. The government’s multiple roles, as policy maker, regulator and a competitor, create unique challenges for public and private enterprises in these sectors. Successful business models in product as well as service markets, which leverage the potential of the “bottom of the pyramid”, is a source of inspiration as well as admiration for businesses around the world. Low-cost innovations like the Nano (automobile) and service delivery models including “dabbawalas” (tiffin-carriers) of Mumbai, Narayana Hrudayalaya (cardiac care), Arvind Eye Hospital (cataract operation), etc. have potential applications in other countries, including the western world. Innovations in leveraging existing technologies and outsourcing have enabled Indian telecom service providers to offer the cheapest mobile call charges in the world’s fastest growing telecom market.

No wonder, Indian business has recently caught the attention of scholars and practitioners alike and it is developing as an area of serious academic inquiry and study within management. However, management theory as applied to India currently remains relatively under-explored. While research on Indian business is essential to building a critical body of knowledge in this emerging context, a disproportionately small attention has been devoted to this sector in business research. The purpose of this new journal is to bridge this gap, and to advance our theoretical and empirical understanding of Indian business. As Indian business promises to become a very fruitful area of research, now is the ideal time for the launch of JIBR to serve as an outlet for publishing state-of-the-art academic research on doing business in India and on Indian businesses abroad in a sector that is critical to the global economy.

The JIBR will emerge as a leading specialist reference resource of academic information and analysis on Indian business. It will highlight cutting edge research, new concepts and theories, fresh practical ideas and initiatives that can be readily applied to understand business strategies of Indian companies, both in and outside of India, as well as the business strategies of foreign firms operating within India. The journal will publish research pertaining to all functional aspects of business, such as marketing, finance, accounting, management information systems, human resource management, organizational behaviour, public systems, strategic management and services. The journal will aim for papers that adopt the perspective of Indian business both in and outside India, as well as that of global business with respect to India. Papers that are not directly related to Indian business but which have clear implications for Indian business are also welcome. The journal will have a strong interdisciplinary, international, and eclectic orientation. We aim to publish articles that build new understanding of Indian business while simultaneously making significant contributions to the theoretical advancement of the discipline. All articles appearing in the journal will be double-blind refereed to ensure academic rigor and practical relevance.

We will welcome submissions offering insights on any of the critical issues in Indian business. All papers will be required to have a strong business perspective and will need to make a distinct contribution to the emerging area of Indian business. A wide variety of topics will be suitable for this journal and might include (but is not limited to) the key research areas mentioned later.

Empirical studies, conceptual papers, meta-analysis, literature reviews, case studies, quantitative and qualitative studies, pedagogical innovations, practitioner perspectives, and book reviews are all welcome. Papers can adopt a historical perspective, a current perspective or a future perspective. This journal will be an innovative practice reference that will supply economic planners, corporate management, and non-profit organizations with insights, techniques and strategies to gain competitiveness and formulate effective strategies. The journal will seek contributions from practitioners as well as academics in the field, reporting on the latest strategies, new thinking and initiatives being applied.

The journal is intended for scholars in the fields of management, marketing, strategy, finance, accounting, human resource management, organizational behavior and economics. It will be a useful resource for students in business departments, taking a course on Indian business, Asian business or emerging economy business at undergraduate or graduate level (Bruton and Lau, 2008). It will also benefit practitioners including corporate managers, government representatives, trade associations and non-profit organizations who would like to keep abreast of the latest research on Indian business.

The journal aspires to publish the highest quality research related to the broadest range of topics in Indian business. Papers should include original work, be clearly and accurately presented, and be as concise as is compatible with treating the subject adequately. They should relate to some aspect of business, economics, or management, and address issues concerning Indian business. Papers need to make some theoretical contributions and have some practical implications. Finally, the research should have some general implications beyond the narrow research context. In a seminal paper, Armstrong (1982) identified six criteria for evaluation of manuscripts: objectivity, replicability, importance, competence, intelligibility, and efficiency. In a subsequent article, Armstrong (2003) proposed four criteria that are useful in identifying whether research findings are important: replication, validity, usefulness, and surprise. Taking cue from these ideas, we have developed a set of 15 criteria that reviewers of JIBR are asked to use to evaluate each paper: importance of the topic; originality of work; literature review and references; problem formulation; theoretical/conceptual framework; research design and methodology; data analysis; results obtained and implications; legitimacy of conclusions; practical significance; clarity of presentation, organization and writing style; relevance to pharmaceutical and healthcare industries; relevance to marketing and management; overall contribution of the paper; and likelihood of passing the “test of time”. Reviewers are encouraged to vote on one of the five categories: reject, not worth revising or re-writing; major revisions needed; minor revisions needed; routine editing required; and accept as is.

As Co-Editors of JIBR, we will focus on making the journal international and multi-disciplinary. First, the journal is truly international in scope, with authors, editorial board members, reviewers, and readers from around the world. This issue features papers from scholars based in the USA and India. Second, this journal has a multi-disciplinary orientation. We are open to distinct research traditions and different approaches to scientific enquiry as long as they address the business and management domains relevant to Indian business. The inaugural issue includes a variety of approaches and perspectives such as transaction cost economics by Raj Aggarwal, quantitative approaches adopted by Rajesh Raj and Alok Chkarbarti and qualitative approaches adopted by Jagdish Sheth as well as Madhukar Angur. In addition to publishing original empirical and theoretical research articles, we would like to introduce other interesting varieties of articles in the journal. For example, we intend to publish one case study in each issue. This will be of great interest to instructors who are teaching courses in these areas and are always looking for good case studies. We would also like to publish practitioner perspective articles, i.e. papers authored or co-authored by practitioners whose thoughts reflect latest trends and developments in the industry. Occasional interviews with leading practitioners would also be a welcome feature. We would also look forward to receiving rapid communications or commentaries (succinct manuscripts summarizing experimental results of exceptional importance or urgency), brief reports (instructive scientific or industry reports), letters to the editor, review articles (summarizing major theoretical developments and/or innovations), rostrum articles (opinion articles about subjects of particular interest or debate), and instructors corner (articles about subjects of particular interest to instructors). We hope that these features will raise the visibility of the journal to a wider audience and generate greater interest in the journal.

Faculty evaluations of research quality often use the accessibility of journal content as a surrogate measure. JIBR is published by Emerald Group Publishing, which is the world’s leading publisher of management journals and databases. The journal forms part of the Emerald Management Xtra 150 database. This means that articles published in this journal have the potential to be viewed by more than 1,600 institutions and 15 million users worldwide. All these indicators point to a promising start to the creation of a premier journal in this niche area.

All scholars interested and/or working in the area of Indian business have a stake in the future of the journal. In that spirit, we urge you, the reader, to take active interest in the journal. A journal is only as good as the quality of its manuscripts and reviews. We strongly urge all scholars and practitioners with an interest in Indian business to submit your best research ideas, volunteer to review papers, provide constructive criticism and thoughts, and spread the word about the journal to your colleagues and students. We will focus on continuously improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the review process by getting manuscripts rigorously reviewed by excellent reviewers in a timely fashion.

The inaugural issue contains the following six articles.

In the lead article titled “The call center couple: India’s new middle class”, Jagdish Sheth, renowned scholar and astute observer of consumer behavior, focuses on the demographic shifts taking place in India’s urban centers. Jagdish Sheth provides insights into the emerging middle class through the experiences of the “call center couples” and highlights its impact on family structures, markets and workplace.

In the second paper titled “Economic development, business strategy, and corporate restructuring in India”, Raj Aggarwal utilized the theory of transactions cost economics for analyzing the changing structure of Indian industry. His findings show that declining transactions costs and technology adoption will result in restructuring and specialization among several large Indian conglomerates and lead to rising volumes of mergers and acquisitions.

Alok Chakrabarti and Pradip K. Bhaumik, in their paper “Internationalization of technology development in India” analyzed patents granted over a decade and half during 1992-2007 and develop a classification schema to identify three distinct stages of technology development in India. The study also analysed the evolving role of key players in research and technology development which include government organizations and multi-national corporations.

Rajesh Raj and Mihir Mahapatra focus on the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in their paper “Growth and productivity performance of small manufacturing enterprises (SMEs): insights from major states in India”. They used the growth accounting approach to analyze data from the National Sample Survey Organization of the Government of India to study the growth and productivity of SMEs during 1978-2001.

In his paper, “India’s economic growth and market potential: benchmarked against China”, G.K Kalyanaram conducts a comparative study on growth and development in both India and China, identifying important benchmarks where the variance between both countries is observable. Interestingly, this study shows that while China and India have adopted two different models of growth, India’s model is likely to be more sustainable.

Finally, in an introspective piece titled “Are we ignoring the early warning signs in our corporate governance system? Corporate governance system – revisited” Madhukar Angur urges regulators, managers and investors to look out for “early warning signs” to gauge corporate health and identify lacuna in corporate governance systems to prevent corporate scams.

We hope there is much here in this inaugural issue that will inform, challenge and delight. Read on and enjoy!

Avinandan Mukherjee, G. ShaineshCo-Editors