What is PCI Organization Studies?
PCI Organization Studies is an international community of scholars recommending scholarly works. Its recommenders, playing the role of associate editors, recommend unpublished articles based on peer reviews to make them complete, reliable and citable articles, without the need for publication in ‘traditional’ journals.
Evaluation and recommendation by PCI Organization Studies are free of charge. When recommenders decide to recommend an article, they write a recommendation text that is published along with all the editorial correspondence (reviews, recommender's decisions, authors’ replies) by PCI Organization Studies. The article itself is not published by PCI Organization Studies; it remains on the server where it was posted by the authors. PCI Organization Studies recommenders can also recommend postprints.
PCI Organization Studies was co-founded by Héloïse Berkowitz and Devi Vijay in 2023 to respond to three urgent needs in the Organization Studies field and science in general.
- A quicker dissemination of scientific content, without compromising on quality. This need arises from papers that are stuck in the review pipelines for years, and mired in academic gatekeeping.
- Provision of feedback on pre-prints and the need for a more transparent and ethical review process. Moreover, preprints that have been peer-reviewed are as scientifically valuable as journal articles.
- Inventing alternatives to the profit-making publishing system relying on unpaid scientific work and barriers to knowledge diffusion. A free publishing system, from submission to reading, can ensure science as a global public good.
PCI Organization Studies intends to respond to these needs by bringing together a community of organizational scholars working across disciplines who can recommend unpublished preprints based on double-blind peer-review to make them complete, reliable and citable articles.
- PCI Organization Studies is free, open access and stimulating: there are no fees associated with the evaluation process, and no charge for access to the comments and recommendations.
- PCI Organization Studies is transparent: reviews and recommendations (for unpublished articles) and recommendations (for published articles) are freely available for consultation. Recommendations are signed by the recommenders. Reviews may also be signed if the reviewers agree to do so
- PCI Organization Studies is pluridisciplinary and supportive of multilingualism: we welcome varied pluridisciplinary approaches, methodologies, topics and empirical settings. While English is the language of submission, we encourage authors to translate the abstract of the recommended articles to their vernacular language to ensure greater dissemination and accessibility.
- PCI Organization Studies is not exclusive: an article may be recommended by different Peer Communities in X (a feature of particular interest for articles relating to multidisciplinary studies), and may even be published in a traditional journal (although this is not the goal of PCI Organization Studies).
Managing board of PCI Organization Studies
Editorial policy
Scope
PCI Organization Studies will evaluate preprints, and to a lesser extent postprints, dealing with all fields of Organization Studies and in particular with work, organizing and organizations.
The organization studies field is pluridisciplinary and explores a range of subjects including work and employment relations, technology, innovation, diversity, entrepreneurship, media, public administration, social movements, inter- and intra-organizational coalitions, conflict and collaborations, and alternative forms of organizing. Increasingly, the field also explores how organizing shapes and is shaped by contemporary social problems such as widening inequalities, social polarization, and the climate crisis. Accordingly, PCI Organization Studies is likely to foster engagement from different disciplines such as (but not limited to):
- Anthropology
- Economics
- Gender studies
- Geography
- History
- Management
- Marketing
- Operations and logistics
- Political sciences
- Public policy
- Sociology
- Urban studies
PCI Organization Studies recommends only preprints of high scientific quality that are methodologically and ethically sound. To this end, PCI Organization Studies:
- Welcomes reproductions of studies.
- Welcomes preprint submissions based on preregistrations (whether or not reviewed).
- Welcomes preprints reporting negative results, provided that the questions addressed and the methodology are sound.
- Does not accept submissions of preprints presenting financial conflicts of interest. Other conflicts of interest must be minimal and declared.
- Ensures that, as far as possible, the recommenders and referees have no conflict of interest with the content or authors of the study being evaluated.
- Encourages data, computer codes and mathematical and statistical analysis scripts to be made available to reviewers and recommenders at the time of submission and to readers after recommendation.
PCI Organization Studies does not guarantee the evaluation or recommendation of all submitted preprints. Only preprints considered interesting by at least one competent recommender (equivalent to an associate editor in a classical journal) will be peer reviewed.
The interest of the preprint, as determined by the recommender, can relate to its context, the scientific question addressed, the methodology, or the results. PCI Organization Studies has a large number of recommenders, ensuring a considerable diversity of interests.
Type of articles
PCI Organization Studies invites manuscripts on a wide range of topics and in different formats
- Research Articles: This is the conventional empirical or conceptual research article. We are open to experiments with writing styles.
- Reviews: Articles that further theoretical insights on organisations
- Commentary: Articles on contemporary developments or tendencies in the organisation studies field.
- Perspectives: Articles that seek to disseminate knowledge or influence policy-makers and practitioners.
- Organisational Letters: Shorter, concise articles on contemporary issues (under 4000 words). They inform readers about ongoing research on a topical issue.
- Method reflections: Articles that critique or reflect on research practices, context, ethical and political imperatives.
- Research Notes: Articles that are extensions of or update previously published research, contain preliminary findings or descriptions of unexpected findings.
Ethics
Peer Community In is a member of and subscribes to the principles of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). In addition:
- Financial conflicts of interest are forbidden, see the PCI code of conduct.
- Authors should declare any potential non-financial conflict of interest.
Recommending Postprints
PCI also recommends “postprints”, which we define as research papers that have already been published in peer-reviewed journals. PCI also considers books to be postprints because, despite not being evaluated by reviewers or editors before being published, they are often treated as such by academics.
As postprints (other than books, see above) have already undergone peer review before publication, an additional PCI peer review is not required for their recommendation. Each postprint recommendation is written by at least two PCI recommenders. Authors cannot submit their own articles or books to a thematic PCI for postprint recommendation. Instead, a postprint recommendation must be initiated by a recommender who has read the postprint and considers it worthy of recommendation. The recommender must then find at least one other co-recommender for completion of the recommendation process.
When a postprint recommendation is published by a thematic PCI, the word “postprint” is printed below the image illustrating the postprint, to differentiate it from preprint recommendations.
The recommendation text is published with a DOI, but is not accompanied by a peer review or editorial decision.
Inclusiveness and equity
PCI is attentive to equity and inclusion at all steps of the process of scientific article evaluation. PCI focuses on bringing more people underrepresented in academia among authors submitting to PCI, and reviewers, recommenders and managing board members working for PCI. Underrepresentation is hereby linked to many factors including career stage, gender and geography.
Specific recommendations are made to reviewers, recommenders and managing board members to increase equity and inclusiveness in each of their tasks.
Tools to increase equity and inclusiveness:
- Possibility to submit articles anonymously
- Transparency in the evaluation of articles
- Managing Board members take into account underrepresentation in academia when appointing new recommenders
- Template messages to recommenders and reviewers include recommendations about equity and inclusiveness
- Possibility to review anonymously
PCI is signatory of the Joint Statement of Principles of the Coalition for Diversity and Inclusion in Scholarly Communication (C4DISC)
