The internationalisation of operations management research

Abstract

Operations management (OM) is a relatively new field of business, having become recognised as a standalone discipline in the mid 1980s. With this in mind, this study analyses the origins, geographical regions, countries, and institutions, of OM research in 11 top level academic journals from 1985 through 2010. Since the field is rather new and is still being developed, an analysis of current and past research constituents offers a unique opportunity to assess how research and education in OM has spread across the globe. We identify those geographic regions and countries that encourage and support OM research and education from the academic institutions within their boundaries. Further, through the research contributions of affiliated authors and PhD graduates, we identify those institutions within each country that are the leaders in terms of OM research and education efforts. We consider the research of faculty affiliated with each institution as well as the research of each institution’s PhD graduates. We find that the early development of the field was centred in the US and UK but, in recent years, much of the research is being published by authors and institutions from many other geographic regions and countries.