HRMR 

seeks to publish articles with CACHET. That is, to be accepted for publication, a

manuscript submitted to HRMR should have the following qualities:

Conceptual –HRMR does not consider manuscripts that report qualitative or quantitative

studies that test hypotheses or inductively examine ideas[1].

Academically focused – HRMR is a scholarly journal and its target audience is

academics. Manuscripts submitted to HRMR should have implications for
policy/practice, but should not focus on the practice elements of a HRM topic or be
written for a practitioner audience.

Contribute to the academic literature –HRMR seeks manuscripts that will have an

impact, particularly in terms of adding value and novel insights to the literature.
Moreover, in its quest to foster the development of generalizable theory, highly
descriptive papers that focus mainly on context are not appropriate. As a
result, HRMR does not consider papers that deal with a single occupation, company,
industry or country, nor case studies of these entities.

HR focused – HRMR welcomes manuscripts focusing on micro-, macro-, or multi-level

phenomena relating to the function and processes of HRM, as well as topics in allied
fields (e.g. I/O psychology, labor relations, organizational behavior) that influence, or are
influenced by, HR activities. Papers introducing or helping to advance our
understanding of emergent HR topics or issues are also strongly encouraged. The full
range of suitable topics is provided in the journal’s scope
(https://www.journals.elsevier.com/human-resource-management-review).

Engage readers – HRMR articles should be engaging, which requires manuscripts be

well written. For an accepted article to have the desired impact, it must be readable in
terms of clarity of language and writing.

Theory building – HRMR seeks manuscripts that provide new insights aimed at

stimulating future theory development and empirical research. This can take the form of
introducing new concepts or new conceptualizations of constructs and/or new theories,
models, or frameworks to help explain and understand HR-related phenomenon.
Reviews or critical examinations of existing concepts, theories, models, and frameworks
are also welcome, as are quantitative meta-analytical reviews, if they provide a unique
synthesis or other original conceptual contribution. Review papers that only summarize
the literature without offering new insights are not appropriate.

Reviewers’ expertise and judgment are critically needed in evaluating the contribution,
theory development, and quality of the writing through the review process, as
manuscripts are generally desk rejected if they are not conceptual, academic, or HR-
focused. The following questions should be considered:

 Does the manuscript make an original and novel contribution? Manuscripts must

sufficiently advance the academic literature. The contribution should represent
 new insights into a phenomenon, insights that are not obvious, would not be
gained from reading the reviewed literature, and may even be counterintuitive to
the conventional wisdom in the field.
 Does the manuscript provide utility to the academic community? Will scholars
who read the article benefit from the insights provided and be motivated to build
upon those insights? The take-away from an HRMR article should be new
insights that stimulate future theoretical development and empirical research.

A conceptual/theoretical manuscript that makes a sufficient and valuable contribution is

likely to have some or all of the following elements:

 The presentation of a model that explains the relationships between theoretical

constructs that can be summarized in propositions to guide readers wishing to
conduct empirical research.
 An explanation of the logic that explains why the relationships in the model occur,
and the boundary conditions that determine the context where the relationships
will or will not occur.
 The display of a visual model that is illustrated by a boxes and arrows diagram
that shows the expected sign (positive or negative) and direction of causality
between the constructs.
 Offering theoretical logic that critiques a known theory in the literature by
challenging one or more of its underlying assumptions or extending or limiting
boundary conditions of the theory due to changes in the environment since the
time that the theory was originally formulated.

The articulation of a new theory should answer the following questions: What? (the
constructs and factors of interest); How? (how the constructs/factors are related to each
other) Why? (the assumptions that provide a rationale for the theory – taken from a
discipline such as economics, psychology or sociology); Who? Where? When? (the
limiting boundary conditions on the propositions in the theoretical model). Keep in mind,
however, that HRMR welcomes conceptual theorizing (Weick, 1995) as well as new
theories. Models, typologies, frameworks, critical syntheses, etc., are not themselves
theories, but are welcome at HRMR if they provide unique insights and help advance
theory development and facilitate future empirical research.