Academy of Management Journal Workflow (amj-workflow)

Overview

This is the router. It does not replace any specialized skill; it tells you which amj- skill to use right now* for your AMJ manuscript.

Default assumption: unless the user says otherwise, treat the target as AMJ — the premier empirical management journal published by the Academy of Management (AOM), founded in 1958 and published bimonthly (Feb/Apr/Jun/Aug/Oct/Dec). AMJ's stated mission is "to publish empirical research that tests, extends, or builds management theory and contributes to management practice." It explicitly welcomes all empirical methods — qualitative, quantitative, field, laboratory, meta-analytic, and mixed — and judges every manuscript on three criteria: a strong empirical contribution, a meaningful theoretical contribution, and practical relevance. The non-negotiable bar: a strong empirical study that also makes a clear theoretical contribution. Reviewers and the action editor will ask "what new theory do we learn?" as insistently as "is the method sound?" Both must pass.

Editorial team changes: Gary A. Ballinger (University of Virginia, McIntire) is the incoming Editor-in-Chief whose team began receiving submissions on 1 July 2025; verify the current masthead at journals.aom.org/journal/amj. Impact factor and acceptance rate fluctuate (2023 JCR IF ≈ 9.5) — treat any figure as approximate and confirm on the official page.

When to trigger

• "What should I do next?" with a half-built AMJ manuscript
• You have a dataset and a result but no clear theoretical story
• A reviewer/editor pushes on "theoretical contribution" and you are unsure which stage is the real bottleneck
• You received an AMJ decision letter (R&R or reject-and-resubmit) and need to switch into response mode
• You keep bouncing between theory, method, and writing without a plan

Routing table

Current symptom	Next skill
Idea is vague; not sure it is theory-driven or AMJ-fit	amj-topic-selection
Hypotheses are descriptive; no clear theoretical mechanism	amj-theory-development
Front end reads as gap-spotting; canonical theory not engaged	amj-literature-positioning
Design may not match the question (level, source, timing, causality)	amj-methods
Have data; unsure about measurement validity, CMB, endogeneity, models	amj-data-analysis
Results exist but the "so what for theory" is thin	amj-contribution-framing
Tables/figures cluttered, off house style, or not self-explanatory	amj-tables-figures
Prose is jargon-heavy, passive, or buries the argument	amj-writing-style
Ready to submit; need the ScholarOne preflight	amj-submission
Want to understand how AMJ review/decisions work before/after submit	amj-review-process
Received an R&R; need to plan and draft the response	amj-rebuttal

Default order

1. amj-topic-selection — lock a theory-driven question with AMJ fit
2. amj-theory-development — build the mechanism and derive hypotheses a priori
3. amj-literature-positioning — engage canonical theory; state the conversation you join
4. amj-methods — match design to the question (level, source, timing, causal logic)
5. amj-data-analysis — measurement validity, CMB, endogeneity, the right estimator
6. amj-contribution-framing — turn results into an explicit theoretical contribution
7. amj-tables-figures — finalize main exhibits in AOM house style
8. amj-writing-style — full-manuscript prose polish (Front-loaded argument, active voice)
9. amj-submission — ScholarOne preflight (anonymization, format, files)
10. amj-review-process — set expectations for the developmental, multi-round process
11. amj-rebuttal — after an R&R, plan revisions then draft the response letter

amj-tables-figures and amj-writing-style are late-stage polish. Do not invoke them while the theoretical contribution or identification is still unsettled — you will polish an argument you may still have to rebuild.

Stage card

Fill this in before asking "what next?" — route to the first gate still marked no.

# AMJ manuscript stage card
manuscript: <working title>
gates:
  theory_driven_question_locked: no    # amj-topic-selection
  mechanism_and_a_priori_hypotheses: no # amj-theory-development
  conversation_engaged_not_gap_spotted: no # amj-literature-positioning
  design_matches_question: no          # amj-methods
  measurement_cmb_endogeneity: no      # amj-data-analysis
  theoretical_contribution_explicit: no # amj-contribution-framing
  exhibits_aom_house_style: no         # amj-tables-figures
  prose_front_loaded_active: no        # amj-writing-style
  scholarone_preflight_done: no        # amj-submission
decision_letter_in_hand: no            # yes -> amj-review-process, then amj-rebuttal
route_to: <first gate above still "no">

Decision shortcuts

• "I have a finding but no theory story" → amj-topic-selection then amj-theory-development
• "My intro says 'no one has studied X'" (gap-spotting) → amj-literature-positioning
• "Hypotheses are just 'A relates to B'" → amj-theory-development
• "Single-source, single-wave, self-report" → amj-data-analysis (common-method bias)
• "Archival design, treatment may be endogenous" → amj-methods then amj-data-analysis
• "Reviewer says contribution is incremental" → amj-contribution-framing
• "Submitting tomorrow" → amj-submission
• "Got an R&R with 3 reviewers" → amj-review-process then amj-rebuttal

Difference vs. AMR / ASQ / SMJ stacks

• AMJ: empirical contribution that also advances theory — data and theory weighted equally. AOM journal; 40-page main-body limit; ScholarOne at mc.manuscriptcentral.com/AMJ.
• AMR (theory-only): a sister AOM journal with no data — the contribution is a novel, internally consistent theory, typically ~25-30 double-spaced pages excluding references. Use an AMR stack.
• ASQ: Cornell/SAGE journal (not AOM); empirical or theoretical, prizes deep contextual/qualitative work and bold framing.
• SMJ: Strategic Management Society / Wiley journal (not AOM); strategy-focused, performance and competitive-advantage questions, often archival.

If your paper has no original data and is purely conceptual, AMJ is the wrong venue — target AMR.

Anti-patterns

• Do not skip amj-theory-development and jump to analysis — AMJ rejects atheoretical "gap-spotting."
• Do not let amj-tables-figures beautify exhibits before the model and contribution are settled.
• Do not let amj-rebuttal draft a response letter before you have actually revised the manuscript.
• Do not treat amj-writing-style as a substitute for a real theoretical contribution — polish cannot rescue thin theory.