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The purpose of this paper is to provide a basic list of items that many standard empirical papers need and to highlight some common and fixable problems, as well as some corresponding suggestions and solutions such that authors can turn good research into good papers that have an improved chance of publication.

This paper is a conceptual study on publishing, though it draws heavily on two of the authors' experience as editors of major management journals and their past work on paper organization and research design. A number of helpful resources for authors have also been provided from the academic literature – both journals and books – so that this paper can be a helpful resource to authors in organizing and preparing their work to submit to an appropriate journal.

This paper's findings are listed as follows. First, prospective authors will gain a much clearer understanding of whether a journal is an appropriate outlet for their work by reading the journal's aims and scope. Second, a good Introduction is a crucial element of a paper and must contain key basic information such as the research question (or thesis statement), a mini‐literature review that situates the paper in past work, a quick summary of results, and the paper's contributions. Third, in the Literature Review or Theory section, it is important to review the development of the more relevant literature in the chosen topic, the key empirical or case findings, and why the focal paper seeks to enter the field at this time. Fourth, in the Method section, authors should try to provide as much helpful descriptive data as space permits. Fifth, in the Results section, authors should present the results for each hypotheses one by one, but limit the discussion in that section to the results and some brief explanation. Additionally, the Discussion section should have four parts including the contributions, limitations of the research, future research, and any other unusual findings. Finally, many papers suffer from formatting problems or do not fit the aims and scope of the target journal. Authors should be careful to check on these issues before submission.

This paper is complementary to works on methods and research design in that it helps authors with the important step of organizing their papers to turn good research into good manuscripts with a better chance of publication.

I enclose a letter |published below. Ed.| written in reply to an article in your journal “Libraries and Education in Black South Africa”.

The purpose of this paper is to gain a deeper understanding of the attributes of effective complaint management in business‐to‐business relationships, and to reveal the underlying benefits that buying organizations are looking for when complaining.

A semi‐standardized qualitative technique called laddering was applied successfully to an online environment with 22 representatives of companies in the manufacturing industry participating.

The resulting hierarchical value map displays 13 attributes which exemplify the complaint resolution management expectations. A total of 14 constructs represent consequences of such resolution activities, while four constructs can be interpreted as values. Take “Quick action” is the most important of the expected attributes and behaviours of complaint resolution management. Four consequences seem to dominate the assessment: Financial benefits, Prevention of future problems, Solution, and Effective resolution handling. “Maintain supplier relationships” appears as a dominant value in the perceptions of respondents, with half of them mentioning this as an end.

Owing to the exploratory nature of the study in general and the scope and size of its sample in particular, the findings are tentative in nature. The study involved a group of representatives of large UK manufacturing companies with complaint handling responsibilities and so the results cannot be generalised.

The findings enrich the existing limited stock of knowledge on complaint management in business relationships by developing a deeper understanding of the attributes that complaining customer companies desire from suppliers, as well as the underlying business logic (i.e. values) for these expectations. The quality of the results also suggests that the laddering questionnaire technique can be transferred effectively to an online environment.

This study explores why consumers view ambush marketing as an ethical marketing approach.

A qualitative study was devised to investigate what ambush marketing means to those consumers who find it ethical or are not annoyed by it. Data were collected via focus groups.

Three main themes emerged from the data analyses. The most dominant theme was Machiavellianism. Favorable evaluations of ambush marketing lean on a Machiavellistic understanding. The second was the Robin Hood effect, which is observed when the ambusher is a smaller or local brand. In the third theme, ambush attacks are considered as charismatic or enjoyable action, in what is termed dark charisma.

Findings of the current study suggest considerable implications both for businesses that deal with sponsorship and for organizing committees.

The extant literature on consumers' attitudes toward ambush marketing mostly focuses on ethical issues and/or the effectiveness of ambush marketing (i.e. harm to official sponsors), using qualitative techniques. However, the literature is devoid of studies exploring consumers' perception on ambush marketing, and more specifically, explanations of what is ethical and unethical from consumers' point of view. To best of the author's knowledge, it is the first study that seeks an explanation about consumers' positive evaluation of ambush marketing.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the need for consensus on a model that encapsulates the relationship between the manager and the effective operational performance of leisure facilities. This is particularly relevant for Australian local government sports and leisure centres.

On‐site and postal questionnaires from 140 managers, 71 peers, and 277 staff were collected and analysed to develop an empirical model of the relationship between Australian sports and leisure centre managers and the performance of their operations.

This study proposes an initial path model of eight predictive variables, including the managerial qualities of the manager and their relationship with the operational performance of their centre.

The proposed model provides a new basis for reviews and changes to current practice in the development of managers, and of professional practice in this context.

Unlike copious studies of managers, this study includes empirical testing of a model that links the relationship between the manager and an organisation's performance; this is relatively rare in the literature.

While academics and practitioners increasingly recognize the impacts of gamification on customer experience (CX), its role in the customer journey remains undeveloped. This article aims to identify how gamification can leverage each customer journey stage, integrate the findings into a conceptual model and propose future research opportunities.

Since CX and customer journey are interrelated concepts, the authors rely on CX research to identify research themes that provide insights to propose the conceptual model. A systematic review of 154 articles on the interplay between gamification and CX research published from 2013 to 2022 was performed and analyzed by thematic content analysis. The authors interpreted the results according to the service customer journey stages and the taxonomy of digital engagement practices.

This article identified five main thematic categories that shape the conceptual model (design, customer journey stages, customer, technology and context). Gamification design can support customer value creation at any customer journey stage. While gamification can leverage brand engagement at the pre-service stage by enhancing customer motivation and information search, it can leverage service and brand engagement at the core and post-service stages by enhancing customer participation and brand relationships. Moreover, customer-, technology- and context-related factors influence the gamified service experience in the customer journey.

This article contributes to a conceptual integration between gamification and customer journey. Additionally, it provides opportunities for future research from a customer journey perspective.

Accounting history has a long tradition, but in recent years it has expanded its interests and approaches. Early literature of accounting history that sought to glorify the practice of accounting and the status of accountants has been supplemented first by a more utilitarian approach viewing the past as a “database” for enhancing understanding of contemporary practice and for identifying past accounting solutions that might be relevant to current problems, and then by a more critical approach, which seeks to understand accounting’s past through the perspective of a range of social and political theories. A tension has developed between those historians whose first loyalty is to the archive and those who look primarily to theory to inform their historical investigations. As accounting history matures, open debate between practitioners of different modes of history making can only be beneficial, not only to the development of the discipline, but also towards our own self‐understandings as accountants, including the impact we have on organizational and social functioning. Suggests that accounting history without a firm archival base is likely to lose direction, but that our notion of what constitutes the archive, and our ways of communicating, explicating and interpreting the archive, should not be taken as fixed. To illustrate this, examines a number of approaches to the writing of accounting history where recent research has begun to demonstrate a critical and interpretive tendency, and suggests directions in which this research might develop as accounting and its history enters the twenty‐first century.

The direct selling industry is experiencing phenomenal growth in Malaysia. The Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism Ministry projects that there will be a 20 percent increase in volume of direct sales growth to RM5.5 billion in 2010, RM6.2 billion in 2011 and RM7 billion in 2012. The Direct Selling Act 1993 has been reinforced to accord protection to potential consumers. With the real wages in Malaysia decreasing and increasing unemployment especially among fresh graduates there may be a greater incentive to explore multilevel marketing (MLM) to supplement their income and maintain their desired modern lifestyle. However, the perception of MLM has in the past been tainted by unscrupulous pyramid and Ponzi schemes which aims at quick profits and are not sustainable. This paper aims to investigate the influence of perception of MLM companies and agent attributes on the willingness to undertake MLM as a career among youth.

The sample of this study comprised 218 students pursuing business and management degrees at a private higher education institution in Klang Valley, Malaysia. Methodologically, this study developed statistically valid and reliable scales for all the constructs of this study namely perception of attributes of MLM companies (general, schemes and service) an agents (general and trust) as well as willingness to undertake MLM as a career option.

The findings indicate that all MLM company and agent attributes have a significant influence on the willingness to undertake MLM as a career option except MLM schemes. General agent attributes displayed a significant negative influence.

MLM companies need to make their schemes more understandable and transparent to solidify the legitimacy and sustainability as the employer of choice.

The paper shows that MLM remains a viable career option for youth and they need to be equipped with adequate training in personal selling, entrepreneurship and soft skills. MLM companies can tap and nurture this pool of young talent to meet their human resource needs for future growth of this industry in Malaysia.

The purpose of this paper is to look at the adoption of double entry bookkeeping at the Royal Treasury, Portugal, on its establishment in 1761 and the factors contributing to this development. The Royal Treasury was the first central government organization in Portugal to adopt double entry bookkeeping and was a crucial first step in the institutionalisation of the technique in Portuguese public administration.

Set firmly in the archive, this paper adopts new institutional sociology (NIS) to inform the findings of the local, time‐specific accounting policy and practice at the Portuguese Royal Treasury.

Embedded within the broader European context, this study identifies the key pressures exerted upon the Royal Treasury on its formation in 1761, which resulted in major accounting change within Portuguese central government from that date. The study provides further evidence of the importance of the state in the institutionalization of accounting practices by means of coercive pressures and highlights for Portugal the importance of individual actors who, as powerful change agents, made key decisions that influenced accounting change.

This study examines a major instance of accounting change in European central government and broadens the application of NIS in accounting history research to a different country – Portugal – and to a different time – the eighteenth century. It also serves to illuminate the difficulties of collecting pertinent evidence pertaining to this long‐dated time period in identifying certain forms of institutional pressures.