| name | orgstud-topic-selection |
| description | Use when choosing or sharpening the phenomenon and research question for an Organization Studies (OS) manuscript — testing whether it is theoretically generative for OS's European organization-theory audience. Diagnoses fit and scope; it does not build the theory or run analysis. |
Topic Selection (orgstud-topic-selection)
When to trigger
- You have a phenomenon (a merger, a profession, an institutional disruption, a digital practice) but are unsure it can yield an OS-grade theoretical contribution
- The question is interesting empirically but reads as "describing a case" rather than advancing organization theory
- The paper could plausibly go to ASQ, Organization Science, JMS, or AMR and you need to decide which conversation it joins
- A coauthor wants a managerial-implications paper; OS wants a theory paper
What OS actually rewards
OS is a theory-first European journal: the unit of contribution is a move in an ongoing theoretical conversation about organizing, not a clean effect or a managerial fix. The strongest OS topics share three properties. (1) They are theoretically generative — the phenomenon is a window onto a mechanism, process, or tension that organization theory has not yet seen clearly (e.g., how institutional logics are reconciled in practice; how sensemaking breaks down; how power is reproduced through routines). (2) They are processual or relational — OS leans toward how organizing unfolds, becomes, is contested, which is why ethnographic, longitudinal, and historical designs thrive here. (3) They engage social theory — institutional theory, practice theory, Foucauldian power, Bourdieu, narrative/discourse, Weick — as a live interlocutor, not decoration.
A useful litmus test: write the sentence "This paper changes how we think about ____ in organizations." If the blank is a phenomenon ("AI adoption") rather than a theoretical object ("how organizations sustain control when expertise becomes machine-readable"), the topic is not yet OS-shaped.
Choosing the conversation (and the right venue)
| If the paper's core is... | Right home | Why not OS |
|---|
| a clean causal effect of an org practice on an outcome | AMJ / Org Science | OS treats identification as a means to theory, not the contribution |
| a deductive hypothesis test in US sociology-of-orgs tradition | ASQ | OS is European, more process/critical, less variance-template |
| pure theory with no empirical material | AMR | OS publishes empirical and conceptual, but conceptual papers still need a usable new move |
| organizing as process / institution / practice / power, theorized | OS | this is OS's center of gravity |
| a model or design-science artifact | Org Science | OS is sociological/interpretive, not modeling-led |
OS does publish quantitative work, but the bar is the same: the numbers must illuminate an organizational mechanism, and the framing must read as organization theory, not applied econometrics.
From phenomenon to question
- State the phenomenon in one sentence, then the theoretical puzzle it surfaces in a second — the gap or anomaly in existing organization theory.
- Name the conversation you are entering (institutional, process, sensemaking, practice, critical) and one or two anchor works in it.
- Decide whether the question is how/why it unfolds (process → likely qualitative) or whether/under what conditions (variance → quantitative); flag this for
orgstud-methods.
- Identify which OS reader would champion it — and which would desk-reject it as "interesting but not a theoretical contribution."
Checklist
Anti-patterns
- A phenomenon-driven paper ("a study of X") with no theoretical puzzle — the most common OS desk-reject
- Pitching managerial implications as the contribution; OS is not a practitioner outlet
- Borrowing a fashionable construct (resilience, ecosystem) as a label over an under-theorized observation
- Choosing OS to dodge the identification bar of an econ/AMJ venue — OS replaces it with a harder theory bar
- Naming "the literature" generically instead of the specific conversation the paper advances
Output format
【Phenomenon】one sentence
【Theoretical puzzle】the anomaly/gap in organization theory
【Conversation】institutional / process / practice / sensemaking / critical + anchor(s)
【Question form】how-why (process) / whether-how-much (variance)
【Venue check】why OS and not ASQ / Org Science / JMS / AMR
【Next skill】orgstud-theory-development
