Journal of Management Studies ••:•• 2020

doi:10.1111/joms.12843

Will your Study Make the World A Better Place?

Gideon D. Markmana,b,c
a
Colorado State University; bAudencia Business School; cGent University

ABSTRACT This Point-­Counterpoint (PCP) on the Responsible Research in Business and

Management (RRBM) movement features three essays on the roles of science and scholars in
addressing problems that are significant to both business and society. This introduction discusses three
areas that seem to hinder the RRBM movement. The first is that the movement seeks to ‘own
the responsible research domain’. A second is that using societal impact to adjudicate whether
a single study is ‘responsible’ or ‘irresponsible’ can be irresponsible. A final hindrance are some
unintended consequences of overstressing societal impact. Despite these concerns, the three
essays bring tremendous clarity and hope to scholars who want their studies to make the world a
better place.
Keywords: irresponsible research, make the world a better place, responsible research in
business and management

INTRODUCTION
The Journal of Management Studies’ (JMS) PCP sections feature scholarly debates, disagree-
ments, and dialogues about important challenges that individuals, organizations, com-
munities, or society face. The three essays in this issue share concerns about our ability to
publish research that is more useful to society, and though they are critical at times, even
alarming, they also deliver a hopeful message. The Point, by Tsui and McKiernan, rep-
resents the Responsible Research in the Business and Management (RRBM) movement.
The Point illustrates the principles of responsible research; emphasizes the interplay be-
tween scientific freedom and responsibility; and it suggests a set of norm-­guided actions
to strengthen our research ecosystem. The first Counterpoint, by Aguinis et al. (2022),
warns that management scholars face a perfect storm of irresponsible research caused by some

Address for reprints: Gideon D. Markman, Professor of Strategy, Entrepreneurship & Sustainable Enterprise;
College of Business, Colorado State University, 218 Rockwell Hall, Fort Collins, CO 80523-­1275, USA
(gideon.markman@colostate.edu).
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which per-
mits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

© 2022 The Author. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
2 G. D. Markman

eight factors –­all of which are self-­inflicted; created by choices we made, or allowed
others to make for us. Being solution-­oriented, this Counterpoint advances four recom-
mendations to face, quell, or avoid irresponsible research by narrowing what they label the
research-­research gap (i.e., when we do not practice what our research recommends). The
second Counterpoint, by Siegel (2022), is also sympathetic to the RRBM movement, but
is concerned that it overemphasizes social issues, at the expense of deflecting attention
away from more conventional, yet important managerial issues. Siegel also notes that if
the goal of the RRBM movement is to guide the behaviour of organizations and society,
then other disciplines might be better suited to do so (e.g., economics and public policy).
At a broader level, JMS commissioned this PCP to expand wisdom in the RRBM
space, and to inspire scholars to use their studies to advance management science as a
core modality to make the world a better place.

BACKGROUND: THE WIDER CONTEXT

As the RRBM movement acknowledges, calls for management scholars to produce more
impactful research by addressing problems that distress people, businesses, society, and
even the environment are not at all new (Forscher, 1963; Hambrick, 1994; Tushman and
O’Reilly, 2007). Such appeals resonate with many, and indeed, one would struggle to find
scholars who advocate research on topics that are meaningless and irrelevant, or worse
on how to make business and society worse. Indeed, bona fide scholarly research contrib-
utes to science and is guided by its value added to society (Douglas, 2014). I’d add that
the job of science is to ameliorate the world, and that when scholars advance science,
for example by developing knowledge and theories that reveal, explain, and predict the
consequences of choices and action, they better the world. Moreover, we have an innate
need for purpose, meaning, and to affect our milieu, so it is safe to assume that many
scholars hope and try to pursue consequential research topics that advance science and
better the world (Leotti et al., 2010; Stillman et al., 2009). And for completeness, basic re-
search might seek to better science and knowledge more than it does to better the world.
At the same time, however, appeals for management scholars to tackle problems that
matter to society persist, thus confirming that our research is neither as societally impact-
ful nor responsible as it can or should be, hence the birth of the RRBM movement and its
raison d’être. Also, quite a bit of scholarly research, including articles that were rigorously
vetted and then published in top journals, continue to fill gaps in the literature rather than
address substantive problems, and as a result, generate little new knowledge and/or are
impractical to management, business, and society (Glick et al., 2007; Hoffman, 2017).
Urging scholars to produce rigorous research with societal consequences tends to get an
even stronger umph and is morally more justifiable when research funding is subsidized
by taxpayers and when the public trust in science is eroding.
To recap, our research should make the world a better place, and according to the
RRBM movement, doing so requires scholars to use scientific principles to address problems
significant to both business and society. Though the three essays in this issue are clear and per-
suasive, certain tenets that the RRBM movement advocates might undermine its impact,
so the rest of this introduction explains these concerns. Readers are invited to judge if
the three essays provide arguments to alleviate these concerns.
© 2022 The Author. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
 Will your Study Make the World A Better Place? 3

WHAT UNDERMINES THE IMPACT OF THE RRBM MOVEMENT?

The RRBM movement is young and still in its formative years, but it carries an important
message that resonates with many, so it enjoys a strong momentum. Despite its resonance
and growth, and in the spirit of JMS Point-­Counterpoint, I discuss three areas where the
movement may be facing headwinds. The first and probably the most contested area is
an optical issue, namely that the RRBM movement seeks to ‘own the responsible research
domain’. A second interference is a unit-­of-­analysis issue. Because scientific research is cu-
mulative, and knowledge becomes reliable only through the accumulation and integration
of scores of studies (a.k.a. a body of knowledge), using societal impact to adjudicate whether
a single study is ‘responsible’ or ‘irresponsible’ can be irresponsible. A final hindrance re-
lates to the law of unintended consequences. Though the movement brings well-­needed
attention to the adverse effect of our mechanistic focus on theory or gap spotting in this or
that literature, it rarely acknowledges some of the unintended consequences of overstress-
ing societal impact. The following sections describe each of these obstacles.

The (Mis)Appropriation of the Term Responsible Research

For ease, the RRBM movement defines responsible research as any scientific work that produces
credible knowledge with direct or indirect usefulness for addressing problems significant to both business
and society (Co-­founders of RRBM, 2017, revised 2020). Focusing on the outcomes first, it
is reasonable to assume that management scholars understand and support research that
(i) produces credible knowledge; (ii) has direct or indirect usefulness; and/or (iii) addresses
problem of significance to both business and society. Less understood, however, is why
the RRBM movement –­unlike all other management domains or subfields –­prefaces
research with the adjective responsible. Consider a group of scientists who conduct gain-­of-­
function research (GOFR[1]) on various pathogens in a secured lab. These scientists might
claim that their experiments align with the RRBM movement because by studying how
to increase the transmissibility and/or virulence of pathogens, they’ll improve societal
preparedness and understanding of disease-­causing agents and/or how to prevent pan-
demics. Many in the RRBM movement and beyond, however, negate this view, explain-
ing that despite stringent biosafety measures and potential usefulness of GOFR, such
studies also carry substantial risk to society and are often laced with moral and ethical
violations that make them irresponsible. As Tsui and McKiernan eloquently explain,
scientific freedom is not free; it obliges scholars to be responsible, thus the need for the
‘responsible research’ terminology.
These are clarifying but unsatisfactory explanations about the responsible-­research cou-
pling, and chief among them is that acting responsibly is a scientific norm; a standard;
a prerequisite for conducting scholarly research. The universal truth that scientific re-
search and responsibility are inseparable is also reflected in Figures 1, 2, and 3 in Tsui and
McKiernan’s Point –­the figures are not RRBM-­specific, but instead applicable to and
an integral part of virtually any scientific study. My reading is that Tsui and McKiernan
treat the scientific process with such awe to remind us that some elements of irrespon-
sible research persist (e.g., HARKing, P-­hacking, confirmation bias, few null-­hypothesis
and replication studies, etc.), and to make the world a better place, we must first abide
by the principles and laws of science. Still, if scientific research requires responsibility by

© 2022 The Author. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
4 G. D. Markman

definition and by norm –­i.e., it can only become scientific by a bona fide responsible
treatment of data, subjects, knowledge, facts, and usefulness of outcomes –­why does the
RRBM movement seize the term responsible?
While appropriating the responsible research sphere might construe the work of other
scholars as less responsible or even irresponsible unless it too was prefaced by the term
responsible, this is not the only concern. Using the academic vernacular of antecedent
predictors and dependent variables, let us unbundle scholarly work into processes and
outcomes. Under such framing, the process of scholarly research must entail the highest
level of transparency, thoughtfulness, discipline, rigour, honesty, impartiality, and yes, re-
sponsibility too, or its outcome will not be trustworthy, impactful, meaningful, and useful
(to name a few). It is peculiar, therefore, that the RRBM movement opted to emphasize
responsibility, and not transparency, thoughtfulness, discipline, rigour, honesty, or impar-
tiality. To offer another illustration, we do not give prominence to the terms responsible
medicine, responsible accounting, or responsible engineering. Like in scholarship, these vocations
too are susceptible to irresponsible action, but we do not affix the term responsible to
them as a reminder to act responsibly. The point, of course, is not that the term responsible
is wrong. The norm is that scientific work –­from processes to outcomes –­always requires
responsibility. The point is instead to elevate attention to the fact that scholarly research is
inseparable from responsible engagement; just as it is inextricable from thoughtfulness
or rigour. Privileging responsibility over no less vital elements related to academic free-
dom and scientific research (e.g., thoughtful, meaningful, insightful, truthful, ethical, etc.)
seem to harm the RRBM movement and especially those whose main objective is to
contribute to theory or methods.

Can Societal Impact Adjudicate between ‘Responsible’ and ‘Irresponsible’

Research?
A second interference that the RRBM movement faces is the focus on individual studies, but
scholarly research is disjecta membra or scattered fragments and disjointed insights that become
trustworthy only as a body of coherent and reliable knowledge. At the time of their publication, sin-
gle studies may appear to make marginal contributions, however, their benefits to societal
issues and business could emerge as a collective, only after they were amalgamated with
other studies. Decades before the RRBM movement was created, Forscher (1963) warned
scholars not to become ‘brick-­makers’ –­the tendency to generate small pieces of knowledge
without considering how or whether they contribute to a wider context (Hoffman, 2017).
This is a valid warning that is consistent with the RRBM movement –­scholars should adopt
a wide-­angle view so their research can have wider utility. This analogy is a tad misplaced,
however, as in reality scholars spend a lot of time and thoughts on framing their studies and
on carefully placing their contributions in a broader topical context, so scholars act as both
brick makers and setters. Just as making and laying bricks or designing and building airplanes
or therapeutics for that matter, scholarly research involves skills, discipline, and creativity;
these professions command a wider-­angle view of the broader context in which, respectively,
bricks, airplanes, medicine, and research are created and used. And just like brick making
and setting, scholarly studies are rarely useful in isolation; instead, they stand to generate
more substantive societal utility after they contribute to prior studies.

© 2022 The Author. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
 Will your Study Make the World A Better Place? 5

In fairness, the RRBM movement recognizes that scholarly impact can take time and be
cumulative (hence their attention to ‘direct or indirect usefulness’). But just as knowledge is not al-
ways truth, the challenge is that societally unimpactful research can still be and should be help-
ful to science. Designing studies that make the world a better place is certainly a desired goal,
but the pressure to deliver societal impact could distort the function of basic research, and a
deeper challenge is that using societal impact to adjudicate ‘responsible’ from ‘irresponsible
research’ can be problematic. For example, the Golden Fleece Award used to draw attention to
some of the most irresponsible government research spending,[2] and in 1975, it ‘honoured’
federally funded research that investigated why rats, monkeys, and humans clench their
jaws. For decades that study typified the research-­practice gap for it was societally irrelevant,
but today the quantification of emotional behaviour (e.g., jaw clenching is one antecedent of
aggression), contributes to applied and basic research on hostility induced by confinements
to small spaces, such as spacecrafts and submarines.[3]
Sadly, the reverse –­deeming research as societally useful when it is not –­creates a
similar dilemma (Pierce and Aguinis, 2015). Many scientific theories, methods, and find-
ings that are debunked today were tout as having unequivocal real-­life applications and
some were published in reputable peer-­reviewed journals. Notable examples include the
misconception that mass is destroyed in nuclear reactions; the field of phrenology is now
called pseudoscience; and the Fleishmann-­Pon’s nuclear fusion at room temperature is
seen as pathological science. Interestingly, though the ‘discovery’ of cold nuclear fusion
did not contribute to society (i.e., it failed to produce abundant energy), it seems to fuel
interest in the field of nuclear research.
To recap, encouraging scholars, as the RRBM movement does, to study important prob-
lems that individuals, organizations, communities, and society face is certainly a worthwhile
imperative. However, the movement should acknowledge a bit better that because research
is cumulative and single studies might take time to reveal their utility, societal impact should
not be a main or only body to adjudicate between ‘responsible’ and ‘irresponsible’ research.

Unintended Consequences of Societal Usefulness

The Point (Tsui and McKiernan) and Counterpoints (Aguinis et al., and Siegel) express valid
concerns about research that lacks societal impact. For completeness, I should acknowl-
edge that scientific freedom must be guided by accountability and responsibility; we have a
research-­practice gap problem; and we must define impact more broadly, reduce barriers
to ideas from outside the orbits of journals and editors, and use our scholarly skills to study
problems that matter to business and society. One way to assist with these objectives –­that is
not mentioned by either the Point or Counterpoints –­is for journals to add a ‘practical impli-
cations’ section (Bartunek and Rynes, 2010). My hope is that genuine practical implications
sections would align with the Pasteur’s Quadrant, as Siegel described in his Counterpoint.
Given the strong consensus around the imperative of studying problems that matter to
business and society, I draw attention to a final concern that the RRBM movement, in-
deed all of us, might want to consider. The concern is about the law of unintended con-
sequences –­i.e., that if each study has to prove societal benefits, it could create myopic,
short-­term scholarship, and even turn scholars into activists. There are several scenarios
that deserve some consideration.

© 2022 The Author. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
6 G. D. Markman

If scholars use little lies[4] to publish societally-­irrelevant manuscripts that few read
and fewer cite, and their disinterestedness is ‘illusional’ (Tsui and McKiernan, 2022),
imagine the adverse consequences that might trickle into published studies when the
primary goal is societal usefulness, such as climate change, disadvantaged minorities,
or racial discrimination. Tsui and McKiernan warn that scientific research is suscep-
tible to scholars’ value intrusion, so the concern here is a simultaneous uptick in the
intrusion of social or political agenda into research, including advocacy studies, and
an erosion of standards related to scientific principles; would this not further erode
the public trust in the objectivity of academic research? Naturally, developing studies
to unearth the truth about injustice (e.g., biases, prejudice, discrimination, corrup-
tion, etc.) is part of the scientific inquiry, and indeed, such research tends to have
societal relevance. The concern, however, is about studies that afford prominence
to social issues or political causes at the expense of scientific principles, and even
if replication studies will eventually refute biased research and amend misinformed
policies (due to selective reporting), the collateral damage to society and academia
will be high.
The overarching issue is this: The RRBM movement is, quite rightly, calling for
scholarly work to address societal issues, as that is part of our academic responsibil-
ity. However, it seems that in their effort to influence social issues and bring greater
meaning to our work, some scholars seem to inadvertently tilt their responsibility
towards societal issues at the expense of their scientific duty. Science and activism
are binary oppositions, and there is nothing wrong in either asking difficult research
questions about social issues or developing studies to explain and predict injustice, but
publications in management journals should remain scientific and apolitical. Indeed,
that’s exactly why Tsui and McKiernan devoted considerable attention to the various
interactions between academic freedom and scientific responsibility. They explain,
for example, that ‘scientists should minimize negligence, avoid recklessness, practice
competent science, estimate the consequences of the error to consumers of knowl-
edge, and be accountable to the society’. Tsui and McKiernan recognize that scholars
might have underemphasized their scientific responsibility, and called for disinterest-
edness, but what’s missing are explicit rejection of and stern warnings against scien-
tists who bring their activism into scholarly journals.

CONCLUSION
There are many ways to make the world a better place. There are also many professions,
and despite their distinct roles and responsibilities, each of them makes the world a better
place. We can agree that management scholars should make the world a better place,
but when they publish their empirical and conceptual studies in academic journals, they
must abide by scientific principles. Scholars whose research prioritizes societal causes
ahead of scientific principles advance neither society nor science; their studies do not
make the world a better place. And, in fairness, the framers of RRBM call scholars to act
responsibly by emphasizing both rigour and relevance.

© 2022 The Author. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
 Will your Study Make the World A Better Place? 7

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I thank Anne Tsui, Peter McKiernan, Herman Aguinis, and Don Siegel for providing valuable feedback on
earlier drafts of this introduction.

NOTES
[1]  Gain of function research (GOFR) seeks to genetically alter bacterium, virus, or other microorganism
to enhance the biological functions of gene products, including pathogenesis, transmissibility, or the
types of hosts that a microorganism can infect.
[2]   https://en.wikip​edia.org/wiki/Golden_Fleece_Award
[3]  In 1956, when Wilson Greatbatch installed the wrong resistor into a circuit board, he accidentally paved
the way for pacemakers to become small enough to be implantable (prior to his ‘accident’, pacemakers
were too big).
[4]  Schwab and Starbuck (2017) and Tsui and McKiernan (in this issue) define little lies as unethical re-
search practices such as p-­hacking (the development of theory to fit a study’s significant effects) or
HARKing (the remaking of hypotheses based on obtained results; Bedeian et al., 2010).

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© 2022 The Author. Journal of Management Studies published by Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.