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Revisiting the rigor–relevance relationship: An institutional logics perspective
Author(s) -
Paterson Ted A.,
Harms P. D.,
Tuggle Christopher S.
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
human resource management
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.888
H-Index - 94
eISSN - 1099-050X
pISSN - 0090-4848
DOI - 10.1002/hrm.21911
Subject(s) - relevance (law) , perspective (graphical) , rigour , legitimacy , empirical research , psychology , sociology , public relations , political science , epistemology , computer science , philosophy , artificial intelligence , politics , law
The question of whether academic research should emphasize scientific rigor, practical relevance, or both simultaneously has been hotly debated in HRM research and other related disciplines for much of the past century. That said, empirical investigations of whether these values are mutually exclusive or compatible are surprisingly rare. Moreover, the perspective of the end consumers of research—practitioners—as to what research is relevant has been almost completely ignored. In the present study, we adopt an institutional logics perspective to assess the perceived relevance of common management research findings with two samples of 298 and 143 practicing managers, respectively. Further, we examine whether objective indicators of rigor and manager‐rated relevance impact academic legitimacy. The results indicate a positive relationship between rigor and relevance. Interestingly, practitioner ratings of relevance were stronger predictors of academic legitimacy than methodological rigor. Finally, research findings that deal with leadership topics are rated as most relevant to practitioners, whereas job characteristics, demographics, and human resource practices are seen as the least relevant to managers. The contributions of this study and implications for future research conclude the article.