Towards a Methodology for Developing Evidence-Informed Management Knowledge by Means of Systematic Review
TL;DR: In this article, the authors evaluate the process of systematic review used in the medical sciences to produce a reliable knowledge stock and enhanced practice by developing context-sensitive research and highlight the challenges in developing an appropriate methodology.
Abstract: Undertaking a review of the literature is an important part of any research project. The researcher both maps and assesses the relevant intellectual territory in order to specify a research question which will further develop the knowledge hase. However, traditional 'narrative' reviews frequently lack thoroughness, and in many cases are not undertaken as genuine pieces of investigatory science. Consequently they can lack a means for making sense of what the collection of studies is saying. These reviews can he hiased by the researcher and often lack rigour. Furthermore, the use of reviews of the available evidence to provide insights and guidance for intervention into operational needs of practitioners and policymakers has largely been of secondary importance. For practitioners, making sense of a mass of often-contrad ictory evidence has hecome progressively harder. The quality of evidence underpinning decision-making and action has heen questioned, for inadequate or incomplete evidence seriously impedes policy formulation and implementation. In exploring ways in which evidence-informed management reviews might be achieved, the authors evaluate the process of systematic review used in the medical sciences. Over the last fifteen years, medical science has attempted to improve the review process hy synthesizing research in a systematic, transparent, and reproducihie manner with the twin aims of enhancing the knowledge hase and informing policymaking and practice. This paper evaluates the extent to which the process of systematic review can be applied to the management field in order to produce a reliable knowledge stock and enhanced practice by developing context-sensitive research. The paper highlights the challenges in developing an appropriate methodology.
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TL;DR: This paper endeavor to present an overview of the bibliometric methodology, with a particular focus on its different techniques, while offering step-by-step guidelines that can be relied upon to rigorously perform bibliomet analysis with confidence.
1,756 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a taxonomy of pertinent application domains, namely, natural resources and energy, transport and mobility, buildings, living, government, and economy and people, is presented.
1,620 citations
Imperial College London1, Copenhagen Business School2, University of Gothenburg3, Royal Institute of Technology4, Polytechnic University of Valencia5, University of Bologna6, Collegio Carlo Alberto7, University of Turin8, University of Cambridge9, University of Kassel10, University of Strasbourg11, University of Bordeaux12
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a systematic review of research on academic scientists' involvement in collaborative research, contract research, consulting and informal relationships for university-industry knowledge transfer, which they refer as academic engagement.
1,470 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a method of engaged scholarship is proposed to address the knowledge gap between theory and practice, arguing that engaged scholarship not only enhances the relevance of research for practice but also contributes significantly to advancing research knowledge in a given domain.
Abstract: We examine three related ways in which the gap between theory and practice has been framed. One approach views it as a knowledge transfer problem, a second argues that theory and practice represent distinct kinds of knowledge, and a third incorporates a strategy of arbitrage--leading to the view that the gap is a knowledge production problem. We propose a method of engaged scholarship for addressing the knowledge production problem, arguing that engaged scholarship not only enhances the relevance of research for practice but also contributes significantly to advancing research knowledge in a given domain.
1,427 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a systematic review of the sustainable supply chain management literature in the principal Logistics and Supply Chain Management journals, across a 20-year time frame, is presented.
Abstract: Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to conduct a systematic review of the sustainable supply chain management (SSCM) literature in the principal logistics and supply chain management journals, across a 20‐year time frame.Design/methodology/approach – The authors use a systematic literature review methodology. This methodology allows for the minimization of researcher bias and the maximization of reliability and replicability. The study's empirical validity is further enhanced by demonstrating high levels of inter‐coder reliability across families of codes.Findings – The field of SSCM has evolved from a perspective and investigation of standalone research in social and environmental areas; through a corporate social responsibility perspective; to the beginnings of the convergence of perspectives of sustainability as the triple bottom line and the emergence of SSCM as a theoretical framework. While the SSCM research has become more theoretically rich and methodologically rigorous, there are numerous oppo...
1,311 citations
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Book•
01 Jan 1994
TL;DR: The authors argued that the ways in which knowledge is produced are undergoing fundamental changes at the end of the twentieth century and that these changes mark a distinct shift into a new mode of knowledge production which is replacing or reforming established institutions, disciplines, practices and policies.
Abstract: In this provocative and broad-ranging work, a distinguished team of authors argues that the ways in which knowledge scientific, social and cultural is produced are undergoing fundamental changes at the end of the twentieth century. They claim that these changes mark a distinct shift into a new mode of knowledge production which is replacing or reforming established institutions, disciplines, practices and policies. Identifying a range of features of the new moder of knowledge production reflexivity, transdisciplinarity, heterogeneity the authors show the connections between these features and the changing role of knowledge in social relations. While the knowledge produced by research and development in science and technology (both public and industrial) is accorded central concern, the authors also outline the changing dimensions of social scientific and humanities knowledge and the relations between the production of knowledge and its dissemination through education. Placing science policy and scientific knowledge in its broader context within contemporary societies, this book will be essential reading for all those concerned with the changing nature of knowledge, with the social study of science, with educational systems, and with the relations between R&D and social, economic and technological development.
7,486 citations
TL;DR: The meta-analysis of research as discussed by the authors is an important feature of the research and evaluation enterprise, and it has been widely used in the field of computer science and computer engineering, especially in the context of education.
Abstract: M y subject is data analysis at three levels. Primary analysis is the original analysis of data in a research study. It is what one typically imagines as the application of statistical methods. Secondary analysis is the re-analysis of data for the purpose of answering the original research question with better statistical techniques, or answering new questions with old data. Secondary analysis is an important feature of the research and evaluation enterprise. Tom Cook (1974) at Northwestern University has written about its purposes and methods. Some of our best methodologists have pursued secondary analyses in such grand style that its importance has eclipsed that of the primary analysis. We can cite with pride some state of the art documents: the MostellerMoynihan secondary analysis of the Coleman study; the Campbell-Erlebacher analysis of the Ohio-Westinghouse Headstart evaluation; and the Elashoff-Snow secondary analysis of Pygmalion in the Classroom, to name three. About all that can effectively be done to insure that secondary analyses of important studies are carried out is to see that the data from the original studies are preserved and that secondary analyses are funded. The preservation of original data could improve. Last month, one of our graduate students, Karl White, spent 15 hours and made 30 phone calls attempting to obtain from the government a copy of the data tapes for the Coleman study only to learn in the end that they had been irretrievably filed in unmarked tape cannisters with some 2,000 other unmarked data tapes. Tom Cook remarked in an Annual Meeting symposium on secondary analysis that you can get the data if you have chutzpah or if you're socio metrically well-connected. The whole business is too important to be treated so casually. On the other extreme, one can point with satisfaction to the ready availability to any researcher of the data tapes from Project TALENT or the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Others are advancing the practice of secondary analysis. My major interest currently is in what we have come to call—not for want of a less pretentious name—the meta-analysis of research. The term is a bit grand, but it is precise, and apt, and in the spirit of "metamathematics," "meta-psychology," and "meta-evaluation." Meta-analysis refers to the analysis of analyses. I use it to refer to the statistical analysis of a large collection of analysis results from individual studies for the purpose of integrating the findings. It connotes a rigorous alternative to the casual, narrative discussions of research studies which typify our attempts to make sense of the rapidly expanding research literature. The need for the meta-analysis of research is clear. The literature on dozens of topics in education is growing at an astounding rate. In five years time, researchers can produce literally hundreds of studies on IQ and creativity, or impulsive vs. reflective cognitive styles, or any other topic.
4,509 citations
Book•
01 Jan 2001
TL;DR: This book discusses the evolution of Science and Society, the transformation of Knowledge Institutions, and the role of Universities in Knowledge Production.
Abstract: Preface. Chapter 1: The Transformation of Society. Chapter 2: Beyond Modernity -- Breaching the Frontiers. Chapter 3: The Co--Evolution of Science and Society. Chapter 4: The Context Speaks Back. Chapter 5: The Transformation of Knowledge Institutions. Chapter 6: The Role of Universities in Knowledge Production. Chapter 7: How does Contextualization Happen?. Chapter 8: Weakly Contextualized Knowledge. Chapter 9: Strongly Contextualized Knowledge. Chapter 10: Contextualization in the Middle Range. Chapter 11: From Reliable Knowledge to Socially Robust Knowledge. Chapter 12: The Epistemological Core?. Chapter 13: Science Moves to the Agora. Chapter 14: Socially Distributed Expertise. Chapter 15: Re--Visioning Science. Chapter 16: Re--Thinking Science is not Science Re--Thought. References. Index
3,513 citations
TL;DR: Two views of how qualitative methods might be judged are outlined and it is argued that qualitative research can be assessed according to two broad criteria: validity and relevance.
Abstract: This is the first in a series of three articles
In the past decade, qualitative methods have become more commonplace in areas such as health services research and health technology assessment, and there has been a corresponding rise in the reporting of qualitative research studies in medical and related journals.1 Interest in these methods and their wider exposure in health research has led to necessary scrutiny of qualitative research. Researchers from other traditions are increasingly concerned to understand qualitative methods and, most importantly, to examine the claims researchers make about the findings obtained from these methods.
The status of all forms of research depends on the quality of the methods used. In qualitative research, concern about assessing quality has manifested itself recently in the proliferation of guidelines for doing and judging qualitative work.2–5 Users and funders of research have had an important role in developing these guidelines as they become increasingly familiar with qualitative methods, but require some means of assessing their quality and of distinguishing “good” and “poor” quality research. However, the issue of “quality” in qualitative research is part of a much larger and contested debate about the nature of the knowledge produced by qualitative research, whether its quality can legitimately be judged, and, if so, how. This paper cannot do full justice to this wider epistemological debate. Rather it outlines two views of how qualitative methods might be judged and argues that qualitative research can be assessed according to two broad criteria: validity and relevance.
#### Summary points
Qualitative methods are now widely used and increasingly accepted in health research, but quality in qualitative research is a mystery to many health services researchers
There is considerable debate over the nature of the knowledge produced by such methods and how such research should be judged
Antirealists argue …
3,075 citations
Book•
28 Dec 2001TL;DR: In this article, the authors discuss academic disciplines overlaps, boundaries and specialisms aspects of community life patterns of communication academic careers and the wider context implications for theory and practice in the context of communication.
Abstract: Points of departure academic disciplines overlaps, boundaries and specialisms aspects of community life patterns of communication academic careers the wider context implications for theory and practice. Appendix: research issues.
2,981 citations