The Journal of Management and Organization is celebrating its 30th birthday, so as part of this celebration, it is important to consider the past achievements of the management field and to highlight future directions. To do this, well-known Editors and academics were asked a number of questions regarding management research and practice in order to assess the current state of the field. Each person responded to the questions in their own way based on their experience and knowledge. This helps to condense why the management field is integral to overall business studies and its distinctiveness in terms of uniqueness.

The first question focused on understanding why management research and practice are important in society. As the Journal of Management and Organization essentially focuses on researching the role of management in business contexts, it is useful to take a societal perspective. This provides a better understanding of the stakeholders involved in management processes, including managers, employees, families, the community, policy providers, and others in the community.

The second question asks what is the most influential management article published and why. This is useful in harnessing opinions about the scholarship that has influenced people the most. Different viewpoints are provided in terms of the published work that matters most to people. This provides interesting information about management articles in terms of their value to academia and society.

The third question focuses on what lessons people have learnt about management research. Often, this question is overlooked, but it does provide important insight into how research influences people’s ideas and practices. This means thinking about suggestions and feedback from published work.

The fourth question is about future management research and practice topics. As there is much turmoil in society, it is critical to step back and think. This means taking a moment to think about the future from various standpoints. The answers to this question will provide useful information that can help other management researchers with their future work.

The fifth question is an open-ended question that provides the management academics with space to state their feelings about other management issues. This means making comments or suggestions that may have previously not been thought about before. This is useful in considering different management issues and topics.

Each of the questions and answers is presented below.

1. 1. Why is management research and practice important in society?

Management research helps organizations function effectively and deal with the issues they face resulting from societal trends and grand challenges. For example, through management research, leaders learn new techniques for motivating different generations of employees and fostering employee well-being. When organizations manage employees more effectively, organizational performance improves and supports economic development.

Daniel Palacios

Tui McKeown

First is the standard (or official?) view that it is because they improve organizational efficiency, innovation, and performance, which then provides benefits via economic growth and creates jobs.

Second is the more intangible (and I suspect, more important) roles both play in providing us with predictability and stability. The structured approaches we teach, research, and practice provide us to see ourselves as operating within a system or framework that allows us to understand things like market demand, manage human resources, and navigate the external environment – all while also looking to the future and seeing the need for and the drivers of change. The fact that these frameworks are dynamic and that they can actually radically transform over time is a key contribution provided by management researchers (and testimony to our eclectic nature, covering everything from history to IR and ops management!).

Beatriz Casais

Catherine Prentice

Management research plays an important role in enhancing organizational efficiency and improving decision-making. For leaders, it offers data-driven insights to optimize resources, streamline operations, and boost productivity, which ultimately contributes to job creation and innovation. For employees, management research may foster employee engagement, commitment, productivity, and well-being. For the community, it aligns business practices with broader social values, addressing pressing societal issues such as diversity, inclusion, climate change, and sustainability.

José Manuel Núñez Sánchez

Management research and practice are essential to society because they drive organizational value creation, foster innovation, and provide solutions in this complex social and economic scenario. In my opinion, effective management not only enhances organizational outcomes but should also boost the well-being and happiness of employees and stakeholders, including their families.

Emphasizing employee well-being leads to greater engagement, productivity, and resilience, which benefits society as a whole. Furthermore, management practices that prioritize ethics and sustainability set high standards for responsible action and can ensure long-term competitive advantages. I am convinced that management research and practice are crucial because they help generate wealth and well-being for all stakeholders: employees, shareholders, customers, suppliers, the local community, and society.

Francisco Liñán

All human activities need to be managed, and therefore, Management is very relevant not only in Business but in all aspects of society. Understanding how teams (mainly businesses, but all teams) are best organized, led, or motivated is essential to improving the functioning of all human activities.

Pauline Stanton

My research focus is on the management of people. It is people who make or break the success of policies, strategies, and innovations through their attitudes and behaviours, actions, and practices. Understanding why people think the way they do and what underpins behaviours and actions is essential to identifying solutions to the big challenges facing society. Management research can identify problems and ask questions that can cast light on underlying attitudes and behaviours. We can draw on our theories as a lens through which to view phenomena and present different perspectives that can help solve these problems.

Huong Le

Management research plays an essential role in improving people’s lives and strengthening communities because it shapes how work is designed, how people are led, and how organizations support well-being. As work becomes more digital, dynamic, and boundaryless, management research provides crucial insights for building decent, meaningful, and psychologically healthy workplaces (Arora & Garg, Reference Arora and Garg2025). Evidence shows that well-designed work, supportive leadership, and effective HRM systems enhance autonomy, purpose, and human flourishing, while also helping organizations adapt to hybrid work, automation, and demographic change (Parker & Grote, Reference Parker and Grote2022). In this sense, management research contributes directly to improving the quality of life for individuals and the broader community.

Equally important, management research advances fairness, equality, and social inclusion by highlighting the experiences of diverse and often marginalized worker groups. Studies on gender, migration, disability, and intersectionality in the age of artificial intelligence (AI) demonstrate how organizational systems can unintentionally create barriers and how evidence-based HRM practices can remove them (Zhu & Le, Reference Zhu and Le2025). Research on managerial discretion also shows how leaders’ decisions shape opportunities and constraints within new roles, influencing equity in organizational life (Sandhu & Kulik, Reference Sandhu and Kulik2019). By identifying inequities and offering strategies for inclusion, management research helps inform public policy, guide organizational reform, and strengthen community cohesion. It provides an essential bridge between organizational practice and societal well-being, ensuring that the future of work is more just, accessible, and humane (Randel, Reference Randel2025).

Mosa Aseri

In my opinion, management research is the primary engine for societal progress as it is the tool that transforms resources into added value. This applies to several fields such as public healthcare, private institutions, or the non-profit sector. These sectors face a fundamental challenge, which is how to organize human effort to achieve complex goals. Here comes the role of research to move beyond reliance on intuition and tradition, and to provide Evidence-Based Frameworks to solve fundamental problems such as productivity stagnation and organizational inertia. Without the rigor of management research, practice relies on guesswork; however, with its presence, we can build organizations that are flexible, effective, and capable of withstanding changes.

Sara Walton

Management research and practice matter because work and organizations constitute some of the fundamental building blocks of contemporary society, shaping economic opportunity, social well-being, and collective futures. Rigorous research that examines organizational dynamics, decision-making, and emerging challenges, e.g., climate change, helps us understand how institutions can evolve in ways that support resilience, equity, and sustainability. Therefore, management scholarship plays a critical role in informing practices and policies that enable organizations and the communities connected to them to flourish now and into the future.

1. 2. What is the most influential management article published and why?

Alex Newman

For me, it is probably Amy Edmondson’s (Reference Edmondson1999) article titled ‘Psychological Safety and Learning Behavior in Work Teams’. This article has led to a focus on how to create psychologically safe work environments where people feel happy to share their thoughts and concerns.

Daniel Palacios

Tui McKeown

At the macro level, it is probably actually a book – Peter Drucker’s 1954 book, Management. It really is the seminal work that laid the foundation for modern management theory and influenced the practice of management.

Beatriz Casais

While numerous articles have shaped management practice in the last three decades, Evolving to a New Dominant Logic for Marketing (Vargo & Lusch, Reference Vargo and Lusch2004) stands out as a paradigm-shifting work in the fields of Marketing and Strategy. The authors challenged the traditional view by introducing Service-Dominant (S-D) Logic, positing that goods are merely distribution mechanisms for service provision. This framework fundamentally altered strategic thinking, shifting the focus from inherent product features to customer-centric outcomes and integrated service ecosystems. Central to this logic is ‘Value Co-Creation’, which suggests that value is not delivered by the firm but created jointly with the customer. As a result, intangible resources – specifically knowledge and relationships – have supplanted tangible goods as the true drivers of competitive advantage. Ultimately, this framework serves as the blueprint for management in the digital economy, where digital platforms and data act as the primary enablers for scalable value co-creation and personalized service ecosystems.

Catherine Prentice

While the management literature generally asserts that job satisfaction and rewards either drive employee performance or contribute to burnout, I challenge this perspective by examining the reverse relationship in my studies: ‘Reverse Relationship Between Reward, Knowledge Sharing and Performance’ published in Knowledge Management Research & Practice, and ‘Revisiting the Job Performance–Burnout Relationship’ (Prentice and Thaichon). My findings indicate that employees who perform well are typically more satisfied with their jobs, less likely to experience burnout, and that job satisfaction and performance together function as intrinsic rewards.

José Manuel Núñez Sánchez

I have found it very difficult to choose one paper, but, from my point of view, ‘Stakeholder Theory, Value, and Firm Performance’ by Harrison and Wicks (Reference Harrison and Wicks2013) is widely regarded as a landmark paper in management because it fundamentally shifts the understanding of value creation in organizations. Rather than focusing solely on financial outcomes or shareholder returns, the authors propose a comprehensive four-factor model that expands the concept of value to include tangible benefits, organizational justice, affiliation and identity, and perceived opportunity costs. This holistic framework places the well-being and happiness of all stakeholder groups, employees, customers, suppliers, shareholders, and broader communities at the centre of managerial focus, marking a significant break from conventional approaches that prioritize shareholders above all.

The firm’s performance is best understood as the result of systemic relationships among stakeholders. Companies that actively pursue the well-being of all stakeholder groups, considering both objective and subjective measures of value, foster loyalty, trust, and innovation. These intangible assets create self-reinforcing cycles of cooperation and commitment, which, in turn, lead to sustainable competitive advantage.

Practically, the implication is that managers must develop strategies and feedback systems that recognize and enhance stakeholder well-being, happiness, and shared identity. By embracing fairness, engaging stakeholder voices, and treating well-being as a strategic goal, organizations can drive superior performance that is resilient and difficult to replicate. In short, managing for stakeholder well-being is not just ethically sound, it is central to enduring corporate success in today’s complex environment.

Francisco Liñán

In my opinion, it is this: Shane, S., & Venkataraman, S. (2000). The promise of entrepreneurship as a field of research. Academy of Management Review, 25(1), 217–226.

Their definition of entrepreneurship as the nexus between the individual and the opportunity remains the most widely accepted in the discipline. This has served to frame research and has substantially helped advance the field.

Pauline Stanton

There are so many influential management articles and so many influential management scholars. I like articles that challenge orthodoxy, articles that focus on making a difference and articles that give new and deep insight into key issues.

Huong Le

One of the most influential articles in management research is Wrzesniewski and Dutton’s (Reference Wrzesniewski and Dutton2001) ‘Crafting a Job: Revisioning Employees as Active Crafters of Their Work’. This work reshaped the way scholars and practitioners think about employees. It showed that individuals can actively modify aspects of their jobs rather than simply responding to predetermined job designs. The idea of job crafting offered a powerful explanation for why workers experience different levels of motivation, engagement, and meaning even when performing identical roles. Their framework continues to influence research on proactivity, meaningful work, well-being, job design, and leadership.

This article is especially relevant today. As organizations navigate hybrid work, demographic shifts, and increased workforce diversity, job crafting offers a human-centred lens for understanding how employees, including migrants, women, and those in constrained roles, exercise agency to build meaningful careers. It also speaks to current debates on the intersection between humans and technology, where AI reshapes tasks, discretion, and perceptions of agency (Vanneste & Puranam, Reference Vanneste and Puranam2024; Varma, Dawkins & Chaudhuri, Reference Varma, Dawkins and Chaudhuri2023). The job crafting framework now informs research on temporal work trajectories, inclusive job design, adaptation to technology-mediated work, and the evolving nature of leader–employee relationships. Very few articles have had such enduring conceptual and practical impact.

Mosa Aseri

If I had to choose just one paper, it would be James March’s (Reference March1991) ‘Exploration and Exploitation in Organizational Learning’. This paper resonates with me because it addresses a tension that every manager feels personally. The constant pull between perfecting what you already do (exploitation) versus taking risks on something new (exploration). The author warns about the competency trap, the risk of becoming so efficient at the status quo that you actually lose the ability to adapt. To me, this is not just theory, this paper describes to us exactly why established market leaders fail. In today’s fast-paced environment, his insights on balancing efficiency with innovation are perhaps more urgent now than when they were written.

Sara Walton

I find it difficult to provide a single definitive answer to what the most influential management article is, but a number of articles are recognized as foundational in their fields because they have shaped decades of theory, research, and practice. I will focus on the sustainability field and outline some seminal articles in this space.

I find that many contributions in sustainability and management research have been shaped by several foundational articles that continue to inform contemporary scholarship and practice. I often refer to the Academy of Management Journal Special Issue on Ecologically Sustainable Organizations (1995), particularly the articles by Gladwin, Kennelly, and Krause, and by Shrivastava, as they established a conceptual turning point in recognizing organizations as embedded within biophysical systems rather than separate from them. These papers articulated early theoretical framings of ecological sustainability, critiqued dominant managerial paradigms, and advanced alternative logics for organizational action – work that remains central to sustainability teaching and research today. In the broader strategy field, Michael E. Porter’s foundational contributions – Competitive Advantage (1985) and his earlier work on industry structure (‘How Competitive Forces Shape Strategy’, HBR, 1979) – are widely acknowledged. Importantly, Porter also extended his thinking into the environmental domain with ‘Green and Competitive Ending the Stalemate’ (HBR, 1995), a piece that was ground-breaking in arguing that environmental responsibility should not be viewed solely as a moral or compliance-driven obligation but as a potential source of competitive advantage. Together, these publications have shaped the earlier landscape of sustainability and management, and still operate to anchor debates about organizational strategy, ecological limits, and the integration of environmental considerations into organizational theory and research.

1. 3. What lessons have you learnt about management research?

I have learnt the importance of engaging with organizations to understand the issues and phenomenon that are important to them. We need to ensure our research is relevant to those in the real world and not just for academic audiences.

Daniel Palacios

Tui McKeown

The positive bit noted in the answer to Q. 1, where management research can really explore and expose – say what needs to be said!! My favourite paper (as distinct from the question above as to the most important) is a 1994 one by Dick Dunsing & Ken Matejka called ‘Overcoming the BOHICA effect’, and to me at least, that management research can have – our research can push boundaries, can be naughty and can be fun!

There is also a downside that sounds a bit cynical, I guess, but important as I also see it as part of our growth as researchers. We are an area, I would like to say discipline but we are really too eclectic in reality to make that claim, that is very, very good at rebadging and repacking old wine in new bottles. The push to only publish in top-tier journals and thus, to only do specific types of research means we are really in danger of losing our critical edge. Rather than open and even quite heated (but still respectful of course), debates, we seem to be becoming bland …and therefore also in real danger of being replaced by AI.

Beatriz Casais

I have observed that management research often suffers from the ‘Ivory Tower’ syndrome. Although we produce sophisticated solutions to complex problems, this knowledge often remains confined to academic silos due to a persistent lack of effective communication and partnerships with local stakeholders. When scholars fail to translate their findings into actionable language, the research essentially loses its societal value. A seminal work, ‘Triple Helix, Quadruple Helix, and Quintuple Helix and Strategic Alliances for Knowledge Production and Innovation’ by Carayannis and Campbell (Reference Carayannis and Campbell2010), provides the theoretical framework for addressing this communication gap. This framework argues that if management researchers want to drive sustainability or economic growth, they must engage with the community to solve local problems, rather than just writing about them. Therefore, the future of management research lies in engaged scholarship, prioritizing applied projects that ensure our scientific impact translates into tangible improvements in the quality of life and economic resilience of our local society.

Catherine Prentice

Challenge conventional ideals and traditional practices to keep pace with environmental and technological advancements.

José Manuel Núñez Sánchez

One of the key lessons I have learnt about management research is the transformative role it can play in not only improving organizations but also contributing to broader societal well-being. Research that engages directly with real-world settings through field studies, case analysis, and active collaboration with practitioners yields insights that are not only theoretically sound but also highly relevant and applicable. This emphasis ensures that academic work goes beyond abstract models and generates practical recommendations that managers can actually implement.

A central takeaway is the necessity for management research to prioritize outcomes that have social value: enhancing employee satisfaction, promoting stakeholder well-being, and fostering ethical leadership. By centring the needs and happiness of all stakeholders, management research can help shape organizations that are healthier, more responsible, and more resilient. These findings empower managers to move beyond traditional profit-centric metrics to include dimensions such as organizational justice, inclusivity, and purpose.

Interdisciplinary research is also crucial. In this sense, integrating perspectives from psychology, economics, sociology, and ethics provides a richer understanding of management challenges and solutions. Furthermore, management research must stay dynamic and adaptive, addressing emerging issues like digital transformation, remote work, global crises, and sustainability. For managers, this means maintaining an openness to new knowledge while seeking concrete, actionable insights. Ultimately, impactful management research is one that bridges theory and practice, creating organizations that generate value for all stakeholders and deliver meaningful contributions to society as a whole.

Francisco Liñán

It is impossible to fully understand all processes and phenomena in the field. In turn, new events, new situations, and new processes appear continuously together with their corresponding research questions. Advancing the field involves building on answers to previous research questions to reply to the new questions being posed.

Pauline Stanton

For me, I have learnt about the importance of working closely with practitioners, understanding how they think and how they view the world. I have also learnt about the importance of context, whether that is industry context, country context, or cultural context. I have learnt to be curious, to ask questions respectfully, and to listen and learn. I know the importance of the spirit of enquiry, which asks what, why, and how?

Huong Le

A central lesson I have learnt is that management research must remain human-centred, especially as organizations face rapid technological change. As AI and data-driven tools increasingly shape decisions, management scholarship has a responsibility to ensure that technology enhances dignity, well-being, and meaningful work rather than replacing or diminishing human contribution (Krakowski, Haftor, Luger, Pashkevich & Raisch, Reference Krakowski, Haftor, Luger, Pashkevich and Raisch2025). Research consistently shows that people thrive when work affords autonomy, purpose, and opportunities to contribute (Parker & Grote, Reference Parker and Grote2022). At the same time, research on AI and people management warns that emerging technologies raise ethical challenges, including fairness, transparency, and accountability (Varma et al., Reference Varma, Dawkins and Chaudhuri2023). This underscores the importance of developing theories that protect the human experience of work.

Another important lesson is that management research matters because it creates social impact. Studies reveal that organizational practices affect different worker groups in distinct ways, including migrants, women, people with disabilities, and those in precarious work arrangements. Research helps organizations and policymakers recognize structural inequalities, understand how managerial discretion influences opportunities (Sandhu & Kulik, Reference Sandhu and Kulik2019), and design more inclusive systems. The most valuable contributions come from research that acknowledges lived experiences, addresses inequity, and supports sustainable and inclusive work. Ultimately, management research is most effective when it improves both organizational functioning and the lives of the people within it.

Sara Walton

I am a bit of a mission around journals at the moment. Academic journals play a pivotal role in shaping the identity and direction of an academic discipline. Beyond serving as repositories of knowledge, they act as forums where debates are advanced, boundaries of legitimate scholarship are drawn, and where new intellectual agendas can be set. As such, journals act can act as custodians of disciplinary standards but also agents with the capacity to foreground pressing societal concerns and stimulate critical reflection.

In this sense, JMO has an important role to play in engaging with the kinds of conversations emerging at our conferences, providing a platform through which these issues can be rigorously examined, debated, and integrated into the ongoing development of our field.

Important future issues from my perspective focus on system change due to climate change. These two interconnected issues will drive significant change in society, and as management scholars, we need to think about managing in a complex, ever-changing world. This is a challenge, but can be seen as an opportunity to build a more resilient and flourishing society.

1. 4. What are the most important future management research and practice topics?

Daniel Palacios

One of the most important future management topics is how employees engage with new technologies in their work, such as AI and machine learning. Future research should also look at how leaders manage AI and address issues related to AI, such as bias and hallucinations. Another important research topic is the consideration of how best to manage hybrid work environments and support the well-being of employees in a world where employees work remotely more often than in the past.

Tui McKeown

As per the above, rather than looking for the next ‘shiny new thing’, going back to the traditional strength we have in being so eclectic – that we look at the important issues, such as AI, but in a way that explicitly shows multiple perspectives and options.

The ‘humanness’ or essential humanity of management seems a key, unspoken theme we will need to address across all of the diverse areas management researches and covers as practice.

The fact that our management areas can and do contradict each other sometimes (HRM vs. IR, Ops management vs. people management, etc.), needs more explicit recognition, debate, and research!

Beatriz Casais

Management research is pivoting from a strict focus on operational efficiency towards ethical and societal resilience. Emerging priorities include transcending the technical efficiency of AI to rigorously examine the ethics of algorithmic management and identify models for higher fairness in society. Concurrently, the agenda calls for expanded research into circular economy frameworks and the implementation of ‘citizen-centric’ public management, by targeting specific citizen pain points with a better understanding of user experience and a participatory approach.

Catherine Prentice

Future management research should embrace multiple perspectives and develop practices that are future-proof to address the dynamic challenges of a rapidly evolving global environment.

José Manuel Núñez Sánchez

Future research should focus on sustainability, responsible leadership, and the comprehensive well-being of all stakeholders, especially employees and their families. Ethics, diversity, inclusion, and the challenges and opportunities created by digitalization are central. Fostering happiness and satisfaction among organizational members is a critical aspect of responsible management, as it drives both performance and positive social outcomes. Addressing mental health, resilience, and adaptability is increasingly important, and the continued use of real organizational case studies will drive further innovation and the development of relevant, replicable solutions.

Management research should always emphasize its real-world impact, applying findings to enhance organizational ethics, sustainability, and care for stakeholders. Organizations should treat the promotion of happiness and well-being as a core responsibility. Ultimately, management must embrace a holistic and purpose-driven vision that prioritizes people, environmental stewardship, and sustainable prosperity. Researchers must remain committed to advancing knowledge that not only supports organizations but also contributes positively to society as a whole.

Francisco Liñán

First and foremost, the influence and impact of AI. And secondly, the social and environmental elements are both opportunities and restrictions to entrepreneurship and management practices.

Pauline Stanton

I am delighted to see the range of research topics being presented at ANZAM 2025 and the passion of a new generation of management scholars. At Personnel Review over the last 2 or 3 years, there has been a growth in the number of papers on the impact of technological change on employment and employment relationships. We are also seeing a greater contribution of new voices from different cultural contexts and a greater understanding of identity. I feel that we need to celebrate our diversity and our commitment to evidenced based knowledge from a global perspective. Leadership continues to be a key research area, as does sustainability and ethics.

Huong Le

The human and technology interface: AI, algorithmic management, and digital HR technologies will continue reshaping decision-making and performance evaluation. Future research must ensure that these innovations promote fairness, autonomy, and well-being for workers across different backgrounds and abilities. Research on trust, perceived agency, and ethical use of AI offers critical foundations for this direction (Vanneste & Puranam, Reference Vanneste and Puranam2024; Varma et al., Reference Varma, Dawkins and Chaudhuri2023).

Workforce diversity, migration, and inclusion in the age of AI: Global skill shortages, mobility patterns, and demographic change demand deeper engagement with diverse workforce segments. Future research should examine migrant careers, intersectional disadvantage, inclusive job design, and HR systems that support talent across cultures and contexts in the age of Generative AI (Zhu & Le, Reference Zhu and Le2025).

New forms of work and workforce ecosystems: Hybrid work, regional labour challenges, the expansion of gig work, and multi-employer collaborations challenge traditional HRM assumptions. Topics such as childcare access, relocation support, community-level labour shortages, and sustainable workforce development will be increasingly important (Le, Amarakoon, McKay, Veres & Fujimoto, Reference Le, Amarakoon, McKay, Veres and Fujimoto2025).

Mosa Aseri

In my belief, the AI revolution that we are living in today makes it imperative for us to search for the alignment between humans and technology. Today, we are living in a period where the role of the manager is transforming from monitoring outputs to designing systems where humans and machines integrate. We want to deepen the research into the concept of ‘Algorithmic Management’ as an organizational dynamic for institutions, and not just as an efficiency tool. It is important that we research the impact of the AI environment and the data era we are living in on the employees’ autonomy, creativity, and psychological safety. Consequently, I believe that the future of management practice lies in utilizing technology to enhance human capabilities (Augmentation) rather than replacing them.

1. 5. +any other comments you want to make regarding management research and practice

Management research is at the forefront of overall business research and one of the most popular areas of study. There are many sub-areas of management, so it is a really exciting and evolving field of interest that is interrelated with practice.

Tui McKeown

Beatriz Casais

Management research and practice currently face a critical challenge in addressing complex societal problems, specifically the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This requires a fundamental shift from profit-centric to purpose-driven organizational models. A marketing management mindset is essential in this pivot, as it forces managers to look outward, designing sustainable business models and public services that strategically align organizational success with positive social change and long-term systemic impact.

Catherine Prentice

Management research should continue to integrate interdisciplinary approaches while examining technological disruption, ethical governance, adaptive leadership, and workforce resilience. It is essential to strike a balance between technological advancement and organizational adaptability to ensure sustainable and future-ready practices.

José Manuel Núñez Sánchez

I think that utilizing real-world case studies provides practical lessons and bridges the gap between theory and effective practice. To further strengthen this connection, it is essential to foster continuous, two-way knowledge transfer between academic research and managerial practice. On the one hand, researchers should actively engage with organizations, translating theoretical insights into actionable strategies. On the other hand, practitioners should share experiences and challenges from the field, informing and inspiring new lines of inquiry. This collaborative approach ensures that research remains relevant and impactful, while organizations benefit from cutting-edge knowledge tailored to their evolving needs.

Francisco Liñán

Entrepreneurship is, to me, an essential and central element within the management discipline. The inherent interconnection is obvious in ‘intrapreneurship’, but it also relates to human resources (entrepreneurial competences), strategy, innovation management, etc.

Pauline Stanton

Management research is often criticized for lack of measurable impact compared to scientific research. I think that it is important for management researchers to challenge these assumptions by identifying ways in which our research does create impact on organizations and society. We are uniquely positioned to draw on our expertise to capture a range of perspectives that can lead to solutions to address real-world problems. We should be proud of what we do and reclaim this space.

Huong Le

Management research is entering a period of significant change. Organizations are now embedded in complex social, technological, environmental, and community ecosystems. This shift requires management scholars to reconsider what effective management means in more diverse, digitized, and uncertain environments. As AI and platform-based work expand, researchers must ensure technological efficiency does not undermine human well-being and fairness, while reducing bias or discrimination (Kekez, Lauwaert & Redep, Reference Kekez, Lauwaert and Redep2025).

To remain relevant, management research should:

• • focus more strongly on marginalized and under-researched worker groups, including migrants, gig workers, casual employees, and those in precarious roles;

• • narrow the gap between theory and practice to support ethical and responsible organizational decision-making;

• • promote sustainable and green HRM approaches that integrate environmental responsibility with human well-being; and

• • provide practical, evidence-based guidance for organizations and policymakers navigating rapid changes in how work is designed and delivered.

In summary, the future of management research depends on its ability to address real workforce challenges using rigorous methods, human-centred values, and innovative thinking that supports organizational performance and societal well-being.

Mosa Aseri