STIE Balikpapan Scientific and Academic Writing Workshop

STIE Balikpapan Scientific and Academic Writing Workshop has been conducted successfully with more than 20 participants. This workshop was held in STIE Balikpapan on September 12, 2019 which focused on scientific writing with facilitated by Dr. Hendrati Dwi Mulyaningsih as Founder of Research Synergy Foundation. This workshop was held to improve the quality and ability of writing papers from STIE Balikpapan lecturers.
Dr. Hendrati explained writing good content and using correct language. RSF also facilitates checking for plagiarism and also the use of proper grammar. In the second session, we already started for scientific technical writing. This writing starts from translate language, check for writing grammar, check for the paper plagiarism, then write the paper according to the appropriate template. The workshop ran smoothly, and participants were very enthusiastic about learning to write papers well.

By this experience, the participants expected to have high motivation in research publication not only because of job requirement as a lecturer but also passionate with the research itself.

Dealing with Paper Rejection (Author’s Perspective)

Submitted articles in high-quality scholarly journals can be rejected for many reasons. A large number of papers get rejected solely on the basis of their writing or without being reviewed any further. Every researcher experiences rejection at all stages of their careers. Studies have shown that around 21% are rejected without review, and approximately 40% of papers are rejected after peer review. In such cases, every authors need to figure out number of options on what to do when their papers are rejected.

  1. Give yourself time and face it with a clear mind and proper analysis
  2. Provide the submission details and learn all the details of reviewer comments
  3. Asking Editor to reconsider with good reasons and arguments
  4. Revise, rewritten and (re)submit to same or another journal that fits your work
  5. Do a series of improvements for your articles
  6. Ask advice to a more experienced researcher who has published more than you
  7. Editors, like all humans, make mistakes
  8. Try again and do some research works

Having a paper rejected can be frustrating and make you unhappy, but you still have a chance to turn this condition into your advantage. Your work is likely not as terrible or flawed as you think it is and editors often make the wrong decision. Enjoy and good luck for publishing your research and get some more experience!

References:

https://www.wiley.com/network/researchers/submission-and-navigating-peer-review/5-options-to-consider-after-article-rejection

http://www.howtowriteanacademicpaper.com/paper-rejection.html

Scientific Writing and Publishing in High Impact Journal Workshop with Dr. Hiram Ting

Research Synergy Institute was organized the workshop entitled “Scientific Writing and Publishing in High Impact Journal Workshop” in September 17, 2019, at Universitas Islam Bandung (Unisba). This event was held in cooperation with Asian Journal of Business Research, MAG Scholar and Universitas Islam Bandung (Unisba). Present as the trainers were Dr. Hiram Ting from from UCSI University, Sarawak, Malaysia, as a Vice President of MAG Scholar and Managing Editors of  Asian Journal of Business Research and Dr. Jacky Cheah from Universiti Putra Malaysia. The workshop was attended by 14 invited lecturers from universities that have been affiliated with RSF. Before attending the workshop, several participants had presented their articles at a conference organized by RSF.

The workshop was officially opened by Dean of UNISBA Master of Management, Prof. Dr. Muhardi, S.E.,M.Si and Research Synergy Foundation Chairman, Dr. Hendrati Dwi Mulyaningsih. The workshop began with a brief explanation from Dr. Hendrati regarding the scientific process commonly carried out by RSF to improve the development of higher education in Indonesia and even to the global scope. The workshop then continued with a very enlightening presentation from Dr. Hiram Ting. There are a number of salient pointes which were emphasized in Dr. Hiram’s presentation: the philosophy of research publication, technical preparations for publishing articles in reputable journals, understanding the reviewing process and how articles get accepted or rejected by a journal. Dr. Hiram also explained about the publish-or-perish as a part of scientific cultures among academicians and how to deal with it. In the midst of the challenges of lecturers to teach and the responsibility of research publication, Dr. Hiram shared his positive experience and some tricks that made him able to contribute many academics achievement, especially through research publication. He said that he always include his students and colleagues regardless of their level of education, to help contribute research ideas or data. The lecturers must create a comfortable and conducive environment in conducting a research. He also stressed the importance of being emotionally intelligent and open-minded person in accepting a constructive criticism from reviewers.

In the next session, his presentation was then continued by his friend who was a young researcher, Dr. Jacky Cheah. Dr. Jacky Cheah was one of the young researchers who has many achievements among Malaysian academics. He shared his experience of how he struggled to make a lot of research and then published it in reputable journals. He also contributes as a reviewer and editor in several reputable journals. Together with Dr. Hiram, Dr. Jacky communicated effectively with all participants and provided their best advice and review in each of their respective papers. They also recommend which journals that are suitable for their research. Both Dr. Hiram and Dr. Jacky, they acknowledged that their research activities are mostly done outside the university. The workshop atmosphere was very intensive and conducive with the recommendations and directions from the workshop trainers. The workshop then ended with a group photo session. By holding the workshop, RSF & RSI hopes that this will become one of the media to create a conducive research ecosystem and support the capacity-building of Indonesia Researchers.

UNISBA Scientific and Academic Writing: Coaching Clinic Series

Applied the APPRECIATIVE INQUIRY approach (POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY FOR CHANGE APPROACH) to the learning process, Research Synergy Institute collaborate with UNISBA to held UNISBA Scientific and Academic Writing Coaching. The approach consists of five stages/phase: Define, Discovery, Dream, Design, and Destiny (Coperider et al.) The program started by:

H-14 workshop day: Participants must submit a draft paper

H-3 workshop day: All participants received four documents from scientific review process consist of Content Review, Language review, similarity score, and journal recommendation.

In the day of the workshop, participants have started the DEFINE and DISCOVERY phase through their content review, language review, similarity score, and journal recommendation result. From the results of the scientific review, participants did DISCOVERY what they had done and which the best part.

By the journal recommendation, participants started the DREAM phase where they CLEARLY known the purpose of the journal to be targeted. By this stage, participants can explore various published articles and analysis comparing the articles that have been made into detailed improvement steps. In this phase, participants experienced the DESIGN PHASE.

These steps give participants a TIME FRAME which is an action plan written by each participant called DESTINY PHASE.

Through this approach, facilitator empowered the lecturers to masterly meet government requirements in scientific writing standards and publications.

This approach was designed by the Research Synergy Institute (Support system of the Research Synergy Foundation) as Innovation and alternative to various scientific writing improvement programs for lecturers.

The 2nd Universitas Terbuka Scientific and Academic Writing Workshop (Bandung)

The 2nd Universitas Terbuka Scientific and Academic Writing Workshop was held in UPBJJ UT, Bandung. This workshop is focused on intensive preparation before paper submission for ICIEP 2019. The workshop was attended by 20 faculty members from Universitas Terbuka and other universities in Bandung. The workshop started with informative speech by Dr. Hendrati Dwi Mulyaningsih about the essential elements for scientific writing and submission requirement. During the workshop, RSI Facilitator provided technical assistance that will help participants make a successful paper submissions. The trainer and facilitator provided a constructive comments for participants’ articles and helped them to finalize their submission in the conference website. They gave participants an opportunity to explore tools and techniques that help them to revise and improve the quality of their research papers. They became familiar with ‘plagiarism tools’, ‘language check’ and ‘citation tools’. By the end of the workshop, all participants manuscripts had been successfully submitted to ICIEP 2019 website. Participants are now waiting for the complete review process and official acceptance letters. Trainer and facilitator also reminded Authors to improve the language quality of their writing by proofreading service given that the publisher has strict editing policies in terms of language. The conference committee of ICIEP 2019 will also select some good quality papers to be published in a reputable journal. The workshop was successfully created an effective learning atmosphere for all participants to develop and disseminate their research project.

The 2nd Universitas Terbuka Scientific and Academic Writing Workshop (Surabaya)

The 2nd Scientific and Academic Writing Workshop was held in Surabaya for Universitas Terbuka collaborating with Research Synergy Foundation on August 16, 2019, which was participated not only lecturers from Universitas Terbuka Surabaya and Malang but also from Institut Teknologi Adhi Tama Surabaya and Universitas Negeri Surabaya.

In this workshop, Dr. Rasmitadila was shared on how to write high-quality academic papers in order to get more attractive. This one day workshop was held intensively by helping all the participant to choose the right words for their academic paper title. And at the end of session the participant also learned how to write the references by using the manager references tool.

The 2nd Universitas Terbuka Scientific & Academic Writing Workshop (Surakarta)

After successfully organized the first scientific & academic writing workshop in Universitas Terbuka, Surakarta, Research Synergy Institute (RSI) continued to hold a second workshop. The workshop was attended by a small group who included 11 UT faculty members. In the second workshop, RSI focused on helping all the participants submit their final paper to the ICIEP 2019 website. At least one week prior to the workshop, participants should send their research paper for purposes of peer review.

Present as the trainer was Dr. Rasmitadila and one facilitator from Research Synergy Institute. Dr. Rasmitadila has published number of research papers in National and Scopus Indexed Journals and acts as RSI Editorial Hub. During the workshop, she advised Authors to do proper research and write an effective research paper. She also provided some notes toward efficiency and conciseness for each participant’s papers.  Based on the trainer’s direction, all participants went directly to summarizing the research findings and arranged the most relevant information in their papers.

After nearly a half-time the workshop ran, participants are directed to follow the technical guidance to conform their papers to the submission guideline of ICIEP. The RSI facilitator explained a step-by-step guidance to be applied by authors and let them fix their papers instantly. In this session, participants became familiar with ‘plagiarism tools’, ‘grammatical check’ and proper ‘referencing style’. As a way of helping participants, trainer and facilitator supported their exercise by guiding them privately. The workshop ended with the participants’ success in submitting their articles on the conference website correctly. The workshop participants claimed that they felt more confident to accomplish their research papers and publish it in international conference or reputable journal. RSI also encouraged the participants by giving a valuable opportunity for 5 best papers to be invited on “Meet the Editor” Workshop. This workshop is designed to guide Authors and facilitate them to publish their papers in Scopus Indexed Journal.

Understanding Why Articles Get Rejected

Rejection of a scientific paper by the journal is the norm in academic publishing. Most reviewers do not want to reject an article unless there are justifiable reasons for doing it. A study by Hall and Wilcox concluded that 62% of the published papers have been rejected at least once. In other words, rejection of your hard-worked paper is sometimes normal and should not be the end of the world. Once you recover from the frustration of rejection, it can be helpful to consider the detailed comments and summary as perceived by the reviewers, as an opportunity and valuable information to improve your research.

We have listed a few number of reasons why a journal decides to reject a paper.

Technical Reasons

The editorial board will undertake some basic checks required by the journal. The Editor-in-Chief has the discretion to reject the manuscript straight off even before sending it to the reviewers for reviewing. The main reason of this rejection is because it fails the technical screening. The technical screening does not judge the scientific content of the article. It includes: the paper contains elements that are suspected to be plagiarized, the article lacks key elements such as a title, list of authors and affiliations, main text, references, figures and tables or the article does not conform to the journal’s Author Guideline.

Out of journal Scope

Each journal has a well-defined aim and scope. You should check and learn the aims and scope carefully before submitting your article. The journal will reject the manuscript that lie outside the stated aims and scope of the journal.

Inaccurate or inconsistent Data Reported

Inappropriate statistical analysis and unreliable data may lead to poor analysis and inaccurate conclusion. Precisely showing the results with application of statistical principles and proper data will increase the probability of acceptance of the manuscript.

Lack of Novelty and Originality

Novelty and originality are a very important aspect of the research. For finding novelty in your area of research, you should carry out an extensive literature review and depend on your in-depth knowledge of the field. The researcher should be able to interpret the research outcome in a valuable way.

Language and Writing Issues

Language quality plays a particularly important role in a scholarly article. Poor language quality will make the referee and readers difficult to understand. It is always a good idea to ask others or use any English Language Editing services to check the language and structure of your paper.

REFERENCES:

https://www.internationalscienceediting.com/reject_without_peer-review/

https://www.wiley.com/network/researchers/submission-and-navigating-peer-review/9-common-reasons-for-rejection

https://www.editage.com/insights/most-common-reasons-for-journal-rejection

 

 

PKN STAN Scientific & Academic Paper-Writing Workshop

PKN STAN Scientific and Academic Paper-Writing Workshop has been conducted successfully with more than 50 participants. The workshop facilitates by Dr. Hendrati Dwi Mulyaningsih and Ani Wahyu Rachmawati from Research Synergy Insitute. In the beginning, Dr. Hendrati told and share her experience in research publication to motivate all the participants. By this experience, the participants expected to have high motivation in research publication not only because of job requirement as a lecturer but also passionate with the research itself.

In the second session, Dr. Hendrati started explained about the content of the research from methodology and so on. Participants also actively involved discussing with their research project towards submitted to International Conference on Public Accounting Sector (ICOPSA 2019). In the third session conducted by Ani Wahyu Rachmawati as facilitator guided all participants to set up the manuscript into good packaging as submission guideline of ICOPSA 2019. The course ran very well consist of translating technic, grammar check, a manual guide to install and operate Endnote application of reference manager recommended by ICOPSA 2019. At the end of the day, all manuscript submitted to ICOPSA 2019 website and continued to be reviewed by ICOPSA Scientific review team.

This workshop has particular aims that all the manuscript should be submitted to ICOPSA 2019 collaboration between Polytechnic State Finance STAN Indonesia and Research Synergy Foundation. The workshop organized by Research Synergy Insitute (RSI) to minimize the gap between author capacity and publisher requirement in ICOPSA 2019 which collaborate with CRC Balkema/ Taylor Francis Group.

See you at the next RSI workshop!

UPN “Veteran” Yogyakarta Scientific & Academic Paper-Writing Workshop

Research Synergy Foundation has conducted a one day workshop collaborate with University of Pembangunan Nasional on 13 August 2019 which focus on elevating  Lecturer and graduate students confidence in writing.

The collaboration will be continued by holding International Conference of Business, Economy, Entrepreneurship and Management (ICBEEM) on October 2019 where the output of this conference is to publish on international level proceeding which indexing by Scopus.

During the first session of the workshop, Dr. Hendrati Dwi Mulyaningsih shares a strategy on how to write high-quality academic papers. Then the session was continued with technical guidance, and the participant was guided to be able to write reference helped by the manager references also how to submit a paper to ICBEEM 2019. In the second session, the Workshop facilitator helps all the participant to check plagiarism of their papers by using the professional plagiarism tools.