Published by Elsevier in collaboration with APICS, Educational & Research Foundation

IMPORTANT NOTE:

All submissions are double blind. The online submission system will ask you for a cover letter and will show this cover letter when you are asked to accept the submitted document as a PDF file. The cover letter is for the Editors' use only - the system DOES NOT send this letter out to reviewers or Associate Editors.

Mission

The mission of the Journal of Operations Management (JOM) is to publish original, high quality, operations management (OM) empirical research that will have a significant impact on OM theory and practice. Regular articles accepted for publication in the JOM must have clear implications for operations managers based on one or more of a variety of rigorous research methodologies. The JOM also publishes notes dealing with technical and methodological issues as well as insightful meta-analyses of the OM literature, comments on past articles, studies concerning the OM field itself, and other such matters relevant to OM. Manuscripts accepted for publication meet the following criteria:

1) A strong theoretical basis which relates the research to theories within or outside of the OM domain.

2) Research rigor applied through the scientific theory-building approach,

3) Managerial relevance.

The editors will also give strong preference to research which addresses cross-functional and cross-enterprise decision-making.

Policies

The JOM's distinctive emphasis is on the management of operations. Accordingly, the aim of the JOM is to enhance the field of operations management and develop generalizable theories, typically through the identification, analysis, and resolution of real OM problems. JOM's primary audience includes researchers interested in advancing the field as well as educators and practitioners who wish to keep abreast of the state of the art in OM research. The JOM seeks research that can help the audience develop a better conceptual base for understanding OM. The focus of articles for the JOM should be on the managerial situation and related theory being studied rather than the solution techniques being developed or used. Highest priority is thus given to studies that are anchored in the real world and build, extend or test generalizable theories or frameworks of managerial significance. Most often such studies result from either identifying an actual, new managerial situation for which existing theory is inadequate -- thereby resulting in an addition to theory -- or else testing multiple existing theories against actual managerial situations to determine their relevance - thereby enhancing theory through subtraction.

Presentation

Papers that address particular managerial problems should be framed in terms of a real-world management situation (e.g., J. Heineke, 1995, "Strategic operations management decisions and professional performance of U.S. HMOs", Journal of Operations Management, vol. 13, no. 4, pp. 255-272). The description of the problem and its context should appear in the introductory section of the paper.

The editors welcome a variety of empirically driven methodologies including and not limited to experiments, case and field studies, ethnographic studies, archival studies, surveys, simulation, and mathematical modeling. Importantly, the research methodology should be appropriate given the problem under study and the objectives of the research. If the study uses simulation or mathematical models to address the situation, the model structure and parameter values should reflect the managerial situation as closely as possible (e.g., K.J. Klassen and T.R. Rohleder, 1996, "Scheduling outpatient appointments in a dynamic environment", Journal of Operations Management, vol. 14, no. 2, pp. 83-101). Complex mathematics of solution techniques should be presented in an appendix. The literature review, other considerations of the solution approach, constraining factors, inapplicability of existing approaches, generalizability of the problem, utility of the solution approach, and implementation / actual outcome aspects would constitute the main sections of the paper. Papers demonstrating real-world validation of the approach selected and its results are especially desirable.

Process

Submissions to the editorial office are first evaluated by the Editors-in-Chief for their appropriateness to the mission and objectives of JOM. If deemed appropriate, the paper is then sent out for review using a double blind process. The first review of every manuscript is performed by three anonymous referees. The paper and reviewers? comments are then evaluated by a member of the Associate Editor Board. After considering the reviewers? and Associate Editor?s recommendations, the Editors-in-Chief accept the paper, reject it, or request that the authors revise the paper. Revised papers are then sent back to the Associate Editor for an evaluation of the its acceptability. After considering the Associate Editor's evaluation, the Editors-in-Chief again accept the paper, reject it, or recommend another revision. The second revision is then evaluated by the Editors-in-Chief for a final resolution, possibly in consultation with the Associate Editor. Additional revisions are handled in the same way, though every effort is made to minimize the number of revision cycles. The editorial office strives to be as responsive as possible, providing timely turnarounds for submitted papers.

Preparation of manuscripts

Manuscripts should be written in English. Text should be double-spaced on one side of the paper with a wide margin. Authors must provide an email address where all correspondence regarding the paper will be sent. Any corrections to the manuscript should be made in the text, not in the margins.

Footnotes

The use of page footnotes should be kept to a minimum.

References

All references cited in the text should be presented in a list of references following the text. Authors should carefully check submitted manuscripts to ensure that the spelling of the author's names and dates are exactly the same in the text as in the reference list. A reference citation in the text should provide the author's name (without initial) and year of publication. If reference is made in the text to publications written by more than two authors, all authors should be listed the first time that the reference is cited. Subsequent citations should list the name of the first author, followed by "et al.". The list of references should be arranged alphabetically on authors' names and chronologically per author. If, for a given author, the references contain both single-authored and multi-authored publications, the following order should be used: (i) publications of the single author, arranged according to publication dates, (ii) publications of the same author with one co-author, (iii) publications of the author with more than one co-author. Use the following system for arranging references:

For periodicals: Guerroro, H.H., 1985. The effect of various production strategies on product structures with commonality. Journal of Operations Management 5 (4), 395-410

For books: Bauman, H.C., 1970. Total cost and profit. In: Jelen, F.C. (Ed) ,Cost and Optimization Engineering, McGraw-Hill, New York, pp. 373-384

For proceedings: Hughes, H.G.D., 1974, The construction cost code and its relation to project management. Third International Cost Engineering Symposium, paper D8, London

In case of publications in any other language than English, the original title is to be retained. However, the titles of publications in non-Latin alphabets should be transliterated, and notations such as "(in Russian)" or "(in Greek, with English abstract)" should be added.

Formulae

Formulae should be typewritten, if possible. Subscripts and superscripts should be set off clearly. Greek letters and other non-Latin or hand-written symbols should be explained in the margin where they are first used. Take special care to clearly show the difference between zero (0) and the letter O, and between one (1) and the letter I. Give the meaning of all symbols immediately after the equation in which they are first used. Equations should be numbered serially on the right hand side and in parentheses. Only equations explicitly referred to in the text need in general be numbered. The use of S.I. units is encouraged. Money units may be in any principal currency.

Tables

Tables should be numbered according to their sequence in the text. The text should include references to all tables. Tables should be included on separate pages, added to the manuscript. Each table should have a brief and self-explanatory title. Column headings should be brief, but sufficiently explanatory.

Figures

All illustrations are to be considered as figures, and each should be numbered in sequence with Arabic numerals. Original finished artwork of all illustrations should be supplied. Each figure should have a caption and these should be listed on a separate sheet. Care should be taken that lettering on the original is large enough to be legible after reduction. Each figure should be identified. The approximate place of a figure in the text should be indicated in the margin. Color illustrations cannot usually be included, unless paid for by the author(s).

Keywords

For a list of keywords please click here

Processing of the manuscript, including reviews and notification of changes will occur via the electronic submission system.

Processing

All contributions are refereed. Copyediting of manuscripts is performed by Elsevier staff. The authors are asked to check the page proofs for typographical errors and to answer queries from the desk editor. Authors are requested to return the proofs without delay, to ensure uninterrupted processing. In the proof-stage, the publisher will not accept new material unless permission from the editor has been obtained for the addition of a "note added in proof". Authors may be charged for extensive corrections in the proof-stage. Upon acceptance of an article, the author(s) will be asked to transfer copyright of the article to the publisher. The transfer will ensure the widest possible dissemination of information. The corresponding author, at no cost, will be provided with a PDF file of the article via e-mail. The PDF file is a watermarked version of the published article and includes a cover sheet with the journal cover image and a disclaimer outlining the terms and conditions of use.