80th Annual Meeting of the Academy of
Management
August 7-11, 2020 | Vancouver, British
Columbia, Canada
Vice President and Program Chair: Herman Aguinis, The George Washington University
Theme: 20/20: Broadening our Sight
The most
pressing challenges in the 21st century are directly or indirectly related
to management and organizations: conflict, discrimination, corruption,
wellbeing, economic opportunity and equality, and climate change. At the
same time, there are important challenges that we are facing in our own
profession such as changing models and innovations for teaching and learning,
increasing pressure to publish in “A” journals, tensions over the MBA market,
and the evolving nature of the university business model. We, members of the
Academy of Management are in a privileged position to produce and disseminate knowledge
to address these challenges.
However,
there are dichotomies that stand in the way of producing actionable knowledge
to address these monumental challenges. In many cases, these are self-imposed dichotomies that have
emerged over time and produced strong professional and personal identities. In
turn, these barriers often prevent us from creating and sharing knowledge that
would create value for individuals, organizations, society, and our own
profession. Examples of these dichotomies are embracing micro or macro theories and research, using qualitative
or quantitative methods, focusing on knowledge
creation or knowledge dissemination, emphasizing
research or teaching, highlighting rigor
or relevance, and so many others that
I am sure you can think of right now.
We often
lament that our work is not as influential compared to that of scholars in
other fields such as economics. We often lament that our field is not as
relevant and, frankly, as helpful as it could be. But, it is unlikely that we
will be able to make impactful contributions to addressing major organizational,
societal, and professional challenges if our scholarship and teaching adopt an
“or” rather than an “and” approach. These self-imposed choices restrict our
sight and create a narrow and often incomplete view of organizational
phenomena. Using the 20/20 vision analogy, which means that we can see things
more clearly, the 2020 theme invites members to break down dichotomies and
broaden the way we “see” management and organizations and our own profession.
By broadening
our sight we can overcome dichotomies and avoid zero-sum propositions. Broadening
our sight creates synergies, increased value-added, and positive results for
individuals, organizations, society, and the field of management and
organizations. To do so, I invite you to provide answers to questions such as: How
can we integrate qualitative/quantitative and micro/macro methodologies,
theories, and domains? How can we have impact on both internal (i.e., other
academics) and external (i.e., practitioners, policy makers) stakeholders? How
can we integrate our research and teaching activities? How can we value
different types of publications that target internal (e.g., other researchers)
and external (i.e., practitioners) stakeholders? How can we find convergence
across different domains to tackle common theoretical and practical problems? How
can we balance scientific rigor with the demands for quick publications? How
can the Academy of Management serve the diverse interest of its global
membership? How can management and organizations build meaningful
collaborations with other fields? How can firms embrace sustainability and
financial performance?
The
Academy of Management aims to “inspire and enable a better world through our
scholarship and teaching about management and organizations.” Thus, as
we prepare for our Annual Meeting in 2020, let’s think outside of the box and
use our capabilities to broaden our vision and see beyond dichotomies. I look
forward to your perspectives and contributions, and to seeing you in Vancouver!