By Philip Cola, PhD, Associate Director, Academic Affairs,
DM Programs
This year, in
addition to myself, three other CWRU DM/PhD alumni participated in the workshop
at Temple. Bart Morrison, DM 02, Larry
Straub, DM 15, and Montressa Washington, PhD 15, all submitted extended
abstracts or draft papers to the workshop.
I am collaborating with Larry on this paper, and a series of other
papers related to workforce development in unstable economic environments. We decided that the opportunity to get
feedback from seasoned EMR editors in person was too good to pass up. Larry and Montressa are also EPS Research
Fellows at Weatherhead. Three of 15 EPS
fellows attended and we hope to grow that number substantially in the future,
as the EMR Journal is a terrific outlet for research fellows to dive back into
their research and move something toward publication with a supportive
editorial team. We also hope to continue
to grow the number of alumni participating in the future and re-engaging them
with their own research agendas.
I was also able
to co-chair, with my friend and colleague Louis Grabowski from GSU, one of the
three feedback panels with the prospective authors. Louis is a graduate of the Executive Doctor
of Business Program at GSU and now he serves as the Director of that program. He and I very much enjoyed reading, editing
and conversing with the authors in our group.
We told them it was time to “join or re-join the conversation the
contemporary conversation about their research”. This idea resonated well with the group, and
although we were critical at times, we tried to provide positive constructive
feedback to move their research agendas forward and to submit to EMR after a
round of edits following the group’s collective feedback. Kalle Lyytinen and Lars Mathiassen (GSU) chaired
the other two feedback panels and a total of 11 papers were submitted and
reviewed. Participating authors came
from Assumption College, Case Western Reserve University, Franklin University,
Georgia State University, Harrisburg University, Henley University, Newman
University, Penn State University, Shenandoah University, and Temple
University. There was much diversity of
topics, approaches and all three EMR genres of writing were included in the
proposed submissions (i.e., empirical, essay, and translation). The wide variety of papers and representation
from many organizations made the day very rewarding.
Again, the goal
of the workshop is to have executive doctoral students and graduates prepare
articles for submission to the EMR Journal.
The journal is a joint venture between EDBAC and Case Western Reserve
University aimed at publishing research from the EDBAC community. Participants learned about the profile of the
journal, received guidance for how to develop submission, and gained experience
about developing and reviewing articles for the journal, as presented by Kalle
and Lars. Louis presented a session on
his personal experience with writing, re-writing and re-writing again one of
the first submissions and empirical publications of EMR.
Temple University
was a terrific host this year and participants left excited for their next
steps with their own research agendas.
Everyone received a good deal of feedback, but more importantly now had
an even more concrete plan as to what to do next in the publication
process. One participant wrote to Kalle
and Lars, “Your strategic insight and vision didn't just create EMR, but
created a foundation for an unforgettable experience for faculty and
researchers alike. I am grateful for the opportunity and look forward to seeing
many publications from those assembled.”
I agree
completely, and additionally, for me personally it was re-invigorating and
refreshing to have so much energy around people’s research interests. We truly did re-join the conversations that
we are all interested in having about our research. Now it is back to revising my current pending
submission to EMR and working on the next one to come later this summer!
