Editorial
| Author | Richard Kerley,Chris Carr |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8551.00208 |
| Date | 01 December 2001 |
| Published date | 01 December 2001 |
Although the name of this journal is the British
Journal of Management, it is increasingly clear that
the interests of management researchers and
scholars are not confined by the boundaries of
national geography. Our purpose in choosing the
theme ‘Managing across Boundaries’ for the 2000
British Academy of Management (BAM) confer-
ence was to encourage management researchers
to explore the extent to which there are other
‘boundaries’ that are significant in the study of
organizations.
More than 480 papers were submitted for
presentation at the conference, held in Edinburgh,
10–13 September 2000. These papers were sub-
mitted to a BAM conference with the largest ever
number of different subject streams, 29, including
an additional range of 16 cross-stream and inter-
stream workshops. The new streams introduced
for this conference reflect emergent academic
interests in, for example, the Creative and Cultural
Industries, E-Business and Educational Manage-
ment, indicative of the fact that the BAM confer-
ence is becoming an increasingly important forum
for management researchers interested in a wide
range of fields.
The nature of the call for papers was successful
in attracting a diverse range papers that addressed
themes, functions and topics drawn from many
industry sectors and many different countries. In
their different ways, the papers published in this
Conference Issue of the BJM reflect that diversity
both of theme, topic and the research sites dis-
cussed and analysed.
Dawson gives us a particular timely reminder
that in the retail sector, crossing boundaries is
not a new phenomenon. There were travelling
traders at medieval fairs and by the middle of the
19th century large scale store investments and
developments by foreign retails firms in Britain.
As he observes:
‘International sourcing and international oper-
ations are not new features of retailing.’ [p.253]
The paper by French is based upon empirical
work in Australia, deriving data from large firms
in the trading sector. It examines a phenomenon
as marked in the UK as in Australia, and, for that
matter, as marked in the public sector as the
private – the underrepresentation of women in
management. It is an extremely pertinent example
of the extent to which common management
challenges both cross the geographic boundaries
of place and those of culture, but may also reflect
continuing boundaries of social assumptions
related to gender.
In their very different ways the papers by
Michie & Sheehan-Quinn and Feng Li relate to
the manner in which boundaries within firms and
industries are being stretched and, in some cases,
breached. The use by the first two authors of large
data sets of publicly compiled company informa-
tion and company specific data collected by ques-
tionnaire are used to persuasively demonstrate the
complexities of any linkages between firm HR
practice and firm performance. Feng Li analyses
change in an industry where long established
assumptions about the boundaries of time, place
and habitual customer loyalty are crumbling, and
causing considerable disruption among long
established players.
We are confident that this selection of papers
from the Edinburgh Conference illustrates the dif-
ferent ways in which the boundaries of the work-
ing world and the experience of management
researchers within it are developing and changing.
Richard Kerley and Chris Carr
The University of Edinburgh Management School
November 2001
British Journal of Management, Vol. 12, 251 (2001)
Editorial
© 2001 British Academy of Management.
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