One of the main reasons article submissions get desk-rejected by journals is for lack of fit. But what does that actually mean? And how can we figure this out before we submit our work? Well there are several tests you can do to evaluate the fitness of your work to an information systems journal: you can evaluate whether you are writing about a discourse that already takes place in information systems journals. You can check whether your arguments have a hook for information systems academics. You can determine whether you have a digital artefact at the core of your paper because while a digital artefact at the core is not required, having such a focus can be good indicator for fitness. Finally, you can establish whether your research is at least to some extent sociotechnical in orientation.

Look at what Santa dropped when he came down the chimney last night. A bunch of valuable ThisISResearch Best paper Awards! As we do at the end of every year, we look back at the finest information systems scholarship our field has produced this year, and we pick some of our favorite papers that we want to give an award too. Like in previous years, we recognize three different kinds of best papers – a paper that is innovative in its use of research methods, a paper that is a fine example of elegant scholarship, and a paper that is trailblazing in the sense that it starts new conversations in our field.

References

Pujol Priego, L., & Wareham, J. (2023). From Bits to Atoms: White Rabbit at CERN. MIS Quarterly, 47(2), 639-668.

Recker, J., Zeiss, R., & Mueller, M. (2024). iRepair or I Repair? A Dialectical Process Analysis of Control Enactment on the iPhone Repair Aftermarket. MIS Quarterly, 48(1), 321-346.

Seidel, S., Frick, C. J., & vom Brocke, J. (2025). Regulating Emerging Technologies: Prospective Sensemaking through Abstraction and Elaboration. MIS Quarterly, 49, https://doi.org/10.25300/MISQ/2024/18039.

Abbasi, A., Somanchi, S., & Kelley, K. (2025). The Critical Challenge of using Large-scale Digital Experiment Platforms for Scientific Discovery. MIS Quarterly, 49, https://doi.org/10.25300/MISQ/2024/18201.

Lindberg, A., Schecter, A., Berente, N., Hennel, P., & Lyytinen, K. (2024). The Entrainment of Task Allocation and Release Cycles in Open Source Software Development. MIS Quarterly, 48(1), 67-94.

Kitchens, B., Claggett, J. L., & Abbasi, A. (2024). Timely, Granular, and Actionable: Designing a Social Listening Platform for Public Health 3.0. MIS Quarterly, 48(3), 899-930.

Chen, Z., & Chan, J. (2024). Large Language Model in Creative Work: The Role of Collaboration Modality and User Expertise. Management Science, 70(12), 9101-9117.

Matherly, T., & Greenwood, B. N. (2024). No News is Bad News: The Internet, Corruption, and the Decline of the Fourth Estate. MIS Quarterly, 48(2), 699-714.

Morse, L., Teodorescu, M., Awwad, Y., & Kane, G. C. (2022). Do the Ends Justify the Means? Variation in the Distributive and Procedural Fairness of Machine Learning Algorithms. Journal of Business Ethics, 181(4), 1083-1095.

Hansen, S., Berente, N., & Lyytinen, K. (2009). Wikipedia, Critical Social Theory, and the Possibility of Rational Discourse. The Information Society, 25(1), 38-59.

Habermas, J. (1984). Theory of Communicative Action, Volume 1: Reason and the Rationalization of Society. Heinemann.

What do academics have to offer that practitioners do not already have? They have the data academics want. They can analyse it by themselves, sometimes better than academics. They are also not reading our articles. So why would academics bother engaging with them? Why should we even bridge that perceived or existing gap between theory and practice? Because academics need to dip their toes into practice, and they need to mingle with industry to stay relevant. So says Jonny Holmström, director and co-founder of the Swedish Center for Digital Innovation. He has been at the forefront of doing academic research that blends theory and practice, rigor and relevance, and he knows a thing or two about how to do so successfully. His secret? Maximize the gap between academics and practitioners, don’t close it.

References

Holmström, J., Magnusson, J., & Mähring, M. (2021). Orchestrating Digital Innovation: The Case of the Swedish Center for Digital Innovation. Communications of the Association for Information Systems, 48(31), 248-264.

Churchman, C. W. (1972). The Design of Inquiring Systems: Basic Concepts of Systems and Organization. Basic Books.

Latour, B. (2005). Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network Theory. Oxford University Press.

Holmström, J. (2022). From AI to Digital Transformation: The AI Readiness Framework. Business Horizons, 65(3), 329-339.

Recker, J., Bockelmann, T., & Barthel, F. (2024). Growing Online-to-Offline Platform Businesses: How Vytal Became the World-Leading Provider of Smart Reusable Food Packaging. Information Systems Journal, 34(1), 179-200.

Abbasi, A., Somanchi, S., & Kelley, K. (2025). The Critical Challenge of using Large-scale Digital Experiment Platforms for Scientific Discovery. MIS Quarterly, 49, https://doi.org/10.25300/MISQ/2024/18201.

Sandberg, J., Holmström, J., & Lyytinen, K. (2020). Digitization and Phase Transitions in Platform Organizing Logics: Evidence from the Process Automation Industry. MIS Quarterly, 44(1), 129-153.

Werder, K., Seidel, S., Recker, J., Berente, N., Kundert-Gibbs, J., Abboud, N., & Benzeghadi, Y. (2020). Data-Driven, Data-Informed, Data-Augmented: How Ubisoft’s Ghost Recon Wildlands Live Unit Uses Data for Continuous Product Innovation. California Management Review, 62(3), 86-102.

Sting, F. J., Tarakci, M., & Recker, J. (2024). Performance Implications of Digital Disruption in Strategic Competition. MIS Quarterly, 48(3), 1263-1278.

Tarakci, M., Sting, F. J., Recker, J., & Kane, G. C. (2024). Three Questions to Ask About Your Digital Strategy. MIT Sloan Management Review, July, https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/three-questions-to-ask-about-your-digital-strategy/.

Davenport, T. H. (1993). Process Innovation: Reengineering Work Through Information Technology. Harvard Business School Press.

Davenport, T. H. (1998). Putting the Enterprise into the Enterprise System. Harvard Business Review, 76(4), 121-131.

Schecter, A., Wowak, K. D., Berente, N., Ye, H., & Mukherjee, U. (2021). A Behavioral Perspective on Service Center Routing: The Role of Inertia. Journal of Operations Management, 67(8), 964-988.

Sundberg, L., & Holmström, J. (2024). Innovating by Prompting: How to Facilitate Innovation in the Age of Generative AI. Business Horizons, 67(5), 561-570.

Kronblad, C., Essén, A., & Mähring, M. (2024). When Justice is Blind to Algorithms: Multilayered Blackboxing of Algorithmic Decision Making in the Public Sector. MIS Quarterly, 48(4), 1637-1662.