The Accounting Review

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The Accounting Review

• Terry Shevlin
• University of Washington
• Some background on TAR
• Some statistics
• Getting published

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1. Some background

• TAR editorial policy
• TAR editorial structure
• Senior Editor Terry Shevlin
• Area Editors
• Lawrence Brown
• Patricia Dechow
• Jane Kennedy
• Marlys Lipe
• Madhav Rajan

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1. Some background

• Submissions electronic
• taruw_at_u.washington.edu
• Submission fee see AAA webite for TAR
• Who acts as editor?
• How are referees assigned?
• Double-blind (actuality referees blind)

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2. Some statistics

• 327 submissions in last calendar year (phew! And
  ? )
• Turnaround time for manuscripts (including
  revisions) on which editorial decisions were made
  in the twelve month period ended February 2004.
  Turnaround time number of days between the date
  that the manuscript was received and the date of
  the editors letter to the author(s)
• Mean 59 days
• Median 59 days

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2. Some statistics submissions
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3. Getting published

• Pick interesting RQ with incremental
  contribution
• Do not pick RQ solely because you have a toolkit
  a method that can be applied to this question.
• Talk to colleagues about your ideas
• Obtain feedback on written drafts best by
  presenting around
• Beware of submitting 50 page thesis document
  thesis is not the same thing as research paper
  for submission

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• Interesting research addresses paradoxical
  issues, challenges conventional wisdom, is
  counter intuitive, reconciles anomalies between
  theory and/or evidence, or has tension (competing
  or alternative research results are credible ex
  ante).
• Solomon tougher than I
• paper causes a substantive revision in the
  readers belief about the issue under study.

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Successful papers

• "Successful papers have indicated early in the
  paper 1. what issue is being addressed, 2. why
  the issue is an important interesting one, and
  3. how the issue is addressed. Many of them have
  indicated whether the incremental contribution of
  a paper was through the use of new data, use of a
  new estimation or research method or a new theory
  as to how real-world facts relate to each other.
  Finally, most successful papers have been
  economically presented and exhibited careful
  exposition that allows the reviewer to focus on
  what is at issue and efficiently make an
  evaluation on the merits of the paper itself.
  
• Kinney, TAR 1990 Editorial

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Reasons for rejection

• Lack of sufficient incremental contribution
• Not an interesting RQ per se
• Or well studied already
• Theory or hypotheses not well developed
• Data/experiment poorly constructed so cannot
  conduct powerful and/or unbiased (reliable)
  results
• Research design inappropriate
• Not well written (on various dimensions)

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Getting the editors letter

• Unconditional probabilities of outcomes on first
  round
• Rejection
• Rejection with door left slightly ajar
• Revision
• Conditional Acceptance
• Acceptance
• Read the letter and referee reports
• Put aside and think about, share with colleagues
  after you have thought about it. Have them help
  you interpret the editors letter.
• Must satisfactorily address all key issues
• Response memos
• Persistence
• Your turnaround time

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Choosing a journal

• What is the RQ?
• What journals published similar papers (check
  your reference list)
• If rejected from journal A, beware immediately
  sending to journal B. Why?
• Do all papers have a home?

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Conclusion

• Research and publishing should be fun
• It is your life!
• Persistence is important at the review and
  resubmission stage.
• Celebrate all successes
• finishing of polished first draft.
• when submit to journal.
• when receive a revise and resubmit.
• when receive an acceptance letter.
• when article appears in print.