Instruction for Reviewers

JBAO seeks to publish articles of quality about a wide variety of areas related to business administration. The goal of the review process is to make sure that every article published by JBAO meets this standard.

Each article submitted to JBAO is subjected to the following review process:

From all of the submitted papers, the editors will select papers that are suitable for inclusion in the journal, based upon their consistency with the journal's stated mission.

For each suitable paper the editors will assign at least two referees to review the paper. The reviewing process is based on the concept of blind review, i.e., the reviewer does not know the identity of the author(s) and vice versa.

After a careful review of the paper, referees will send it back to the editors with comments to the editors, accept/reject/revise recommendations, and suggestions to authors about how to revise the paper.

The editors will make the final decision to accept, reject, accept conditionally, or reject with an invitation to revise and resubmit. The final decision will be based on the recommendations of the reviewers and upon their judgment about the quality of the paper, its alignment with the mission of the journal, and its interest to the journal's audience. The editor will transmit the reviews and the final decision to the author(s).

The acceptance rate goal for the JBAO is 30%.

Reviewer Guidelines

NOTE: The tone of the "Comments" should reflect the philosophy that the reviewer is a colleague to the author who will help the author bring the manuscript to publication. Thus, your responsibility is to assist the author to communicate ideas central to the study by providing specific constructive criticism. If in your judgment a manuscript is poorly researched, poorly written, or poorly documented, write a critique that will uncover the weaknesses but also guide the author toward an acceptable revision or to an understanding of why the paper was not acceptable. Take into consideration that your comments to the author will be read by the Editor and the author(s). Line numbering will be provided to assist you in referring to specific instances to be highlighted in your comments.

After making your comments and evaluating the manuscript as a whole, select one of the options that reflects your evaluation:

Unable to review due to excessive mechanical errors: The manuscript will be returned to author/s for corrections.

Accepted as is:  The manuscript meets all guidelines in its present form to allow it to be published without further revision.

Accepted with minor revisions: This refers to a manuscript that has effectively presented a study that makes a significant contribution to the field of business administration. However, the manuscript needs more attention, such as providing additional documentation, expanding the discussion of the findings, including key related studies, providing additional details for the purposes of replication, or when the revision will be fairly routine, such as a reduction in overall length. This choice indicates that you, as the reviewer, believe the nature of the minor revisions is such that they can be negotiated between Author/s and Editorial Staff without further involvement of reviewers. The manuscript will be returned to the author(s) for revision.

Major revision: This pertains to a situation when more than one section of the manuscript needs attention or when extensive rewriting will be required. Examples of the requirement for major revision include the need to place the study into a broader framework of scholarship, reanalyze the data, submit the data to additional statistical analysis, create a context for the study, or rework data that have been over-interpreted. The manuscript will be returned to the authors for revision.

Probably Rejected: This applies when a manuscript has significant flaws which require immediate attention before it can be considered again for publication.  The author(s) must make these revisions and submit the new manuscript for further review.  Significant changes must be made to the original work which will then be reviewed by the editor prior to sending it for peer review.

Rejected: This applies when a manuscript contains major flaws - such as an excessive number of mechanical errors, when there is little or no hope of successful revision because of a major methodological flaw, when an article is simply inappropriate for JBAO, or when an article has been published elsewhere. The manuscript may be returned, and the author may be notified of the decision to reject.

Thank you for your service to the profession!