Ethical Principles and Publication Policy

Journal of Strategic Management Research aims to apply the publication ethics to the highest standards for all publications. It undertakes to comply with the rules and principles laid down by "The Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)". The COPE Code of Conduct for Journal Editors is designed to provide a set of minimum standards to which all COPE members are expected to adhere. The Best Practice Guidelines are more aspirational and were developed in response to requests from editors for guidance about a wide range of increasingly complex ethical issues. For detailed information; https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/file/6, https://publicationethics.org/files/u2/Best_Practice.pdf, https://publicationethics.org/files/Peer%20review%20guidelines.pdf, https://publicationethics.org.
Below, the mandatory Code of Conduct for Journal Editors standards are shown in regular script and with numbered clauses, and the more aspirational Best Practice recommendations are shown in italics in below

1. General duties and responsibilities of editors
1.1. Editors should be accountable for everything published in their journals
This means the editors should
1.2. strive to meet the needs of readers and authors;
1.3. strive to constantly improve their journal;
1.4. have processes in place to assure the quality of the material they publish;
1.5. champion freedom of expression;
1.6. maintain the integrity of the academic record;
1.7. preclude business needs from compromising intellectual and ethical standards;
1.8. always be willing to publish corrections, clarifications, retractions and apologies when needed.
Best practice for editors would include
• actively seeking the views of authors, readers, reviewers and editorial board members about ways of improving their journal’s processes
• encouraging and being aware of research into peer review and publishing and reassessing their journal’s processes in the light of new findings
• working to persuade their publisher to provide appropriate resources, guidance from experts (e.g. designers, lawyers)
• supporting initiatives designed to reduce research and publication misconduct
• supporting initiatives to educate researchers about publication ethics
• assessing the effects of their journal policies on author and reviewer behaviour and revising policies, as required, to encourage responsible behaviour and discourage misconduct
• ensuring that any press releases issued by their journal reflect the message of the reported article and put it into context

2. Relations with readers
2.1. Readers should be informed about who has funded research or other scholarly work and whether the funders had any role in the research and its publication and, if so, what this was.
Best practice for editors would include:
• ensuring that all published reports and reviews of research have been reviewed by suitably qualified reviewers (including statistical review where appropriate)
• ensuring that non-peer-reviewed sections of their journal are clearly identified
• adopting processes that encourage accuracy, completeness and clarity of research reporting including technical
• editing and the use of appropriate guidelines and checklists (e.g. MIAME,1 CONSORT2 )
• considering developing a transparency policy to encourage maximum disclosure about the provenance of non-research articles3
• adopting authorship or contributorship systems that promote good practice (i.e. so that listings accurately reflect who did the work)4 and discourage misconduct (e.g. ghost and guest authors)
• informing readers about steps taken to ensure that submissions from members of the journal’s staff or editorial board receive an objective and unbiased evaluation

3. Relations with authors
3.1. Editors’ decisions to accept or reject a paper for publication should be based on the paper’s importance, originality and clarity, and the study’s validity and its relevance to the remit of the journal.
3.2. Editors should not reverse decisions to accept submissions unless serious problems are identified with the submission.
3.3. New editors should not overturn decisions to publish submissions made by the previous editor unless serious problems are identified.
3.4. A description of peer review processes should be published, and editors should be ready to justify any important deviation from the described processes.
3.5. Journals should have a declared mechanism for authors to appeal against editorial decisions.
3.6. Editors should publish guidance to authors on everything that is expected of them. This guidance should be regularly updated and should refer or link to this code.
3.7. Editors should provide guidance about criteria for authorship and/or who should be listed as a contributor following the standards within the relevant field.
Best practice for editors would include:
• reviewing author instructions regularly and providing links to relevant guidelines (e.g. ICMJE5 , Responsible research publication: international standards for authors6 )
• publishing relevant competing interests for all contributors and publishing corrections if competing interests are revealed after publication
• ensuring that appropriate reviewers are selected for submissions (i.e. individuals who are able to judge the work and are free from disqualifying competing interests)
• respecting requests from authors that an individual should not review their submission, if these are wellreasoned and practicable
• being guided by the COPE flowcharts (http://publicationethics.org/flowcharts) in cases of suspected misconduct or disputed authorship
• publishing details of how they handle cases of suspected misconduct (e.g. with links to the COPE flowcharts)
• publishing submission and acceptance dates for articles

4. Relations with editors
4.1. Editors should provide guidance to reviewers on everything that is expected of them including the need to handle submitted material in confidence. This guidance should be regularly updated and should refer or link to this code.
4.2. Editors should require reviewers to disclose any potential competing interests before agreeing to review a submission.
4.3. Editors should have systems to ensure that peer reviewers’ identities are protected unless they use an open review system that is declared to authors and reviewers.
Best practice for editors would include:
• encouraging reviewers to comment on ethical questions and possible research and publication misconduct raised by submissions (e.g. unethical research design, insufficient detail on patient consent or protection of research subjects (including animals), inappropriate data manipulation and presentation)
• encouraging reviewers to comment on the originality of submissions and to be alert to redundant publication and plagiarism
• considering providing reviewers with tools to detect related publications( e.g. links to cited references and bibliographic searches)
• sending reviewers’ comments to authors in their entirety unless they contain offensive or libellous remarks
• seeking to acknowledge the contribution of reviewers to the journal
• encouraging academic institutions to recognise peer review activities as part of the scholarly process
• monitoring the performance of peer reviewers and taking steps to ensure this is of high standard
• developing and maintaining a database of suitable reviewers and updating this on the basis of reviewer performance
• ceasing to use reviewers who consistently produce discourteous, poor quality or late reviews
• ensuring that the reviewer database reflects the community for their journal and adding new reviewers as needed
• using a wide range of sources (not just personal contacts) to identify potential new reviewers (e.g. author suggestions, bibliographic databases)
• following the COPE flowchart in cases of suspected reviewer misconduct

5. Relations with editorial board members
5.1. Editors should provide new editorial board members with guidelines on everything that is expected of them and should keep existing members updated on new policies and developments.
Best practice for editors would include:
• having policies in place for handling submissions from editorial board members to ensure unbiased reviewidentifying suitably qualified editorial board members who can actively contribute to the development and good management of the journal
• regularly reviewing the composition of the editorial board
• providing clear guidance to editorial board members about their expected functions and duties, which might include:
* acting as ambassadors for the journal
* supporting and promoting the journal
* seeking out the best authors and best work (e.g. from meeting abstracts) and actively encouraging submissions
* reviewing submissions to the journal
* accepting commissions to write editorials, reviews and commentaries on papers in their specialist area
* attending and contributing to editorial board meetings •
• consulting editorial board members periodically (e.g. once a year) to gauge their opinions about the running of the journal, informing them of any changes to journal policies and identifying future challenges.

PUBLICATION POLICY 

• The journal is a refereed and periodical journal published twice a year in March and September.

• Theoretical and empirical, Turkish and English articles and book reviews related to strategic management can be published in the journal.

• The articles sent to the journal should not be in the evaluation process of another journal at the same time, and should not be accepted for publication or published anywhere. The responsibility for this matter belongs to the author / authors of the article. In case of detection of this situation, even if the article is published, it is rejected.

• Articles should be sent to the journal via DERGIPARK. Studies sent directly to the editor or secretariat are not taken into consideration.

• The journal has the right to publish or not to publish articles.

• The articles sent to the journal must be written in accordance with PUBLISHING ETHICS. All responsibility for this matter belongs to the authors.

• The right to publish a manuscript belongs to the journal. Therefore, it is mandatory for the author of the article to fill in the copyright agreement.

• All material and moral responsibility in the submitted article belongs to the author.

• An article published in the journal cannot be published elsewhere without the permission of the journal.