Join us for our next MBH webinar on publishing historical research in top journals in management and business history in June!

We will be joined by Prof Christopher Hartwell, who is investigating how firms do business in autocratic states. His article in the Journal of Management is available open access here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/01492063251359201

Please read the article in advance of the webinar for an in-depth discussion with the author and other participants!

Chris Hartwell on Business under Dictatorship

1 June 2026, 12.00-13:30 British Standard Time

Online, register here.

This interactive event will feature scholars who share their experiences of successfully positioning their historical work for key journals. Participants will have the opportunity to learn more about how to develop approaches and strategies for publishing in top journals and build knowledge and skills around how to position historical research in management and business history journals.

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Borpujari, R. (2025). Adaptive Secrecy in the Making of the Atomic Bomb: Toward a Process View of Secretive Innovation. Organization Science. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2023.17687

It’s a long one. Because this is quite a big article. Enjoy!

Keeping innovations secret

It seems obvious that you want to keep a new product idea secret until it is fully developed. But that presupposes you know exactly what’s required and hold all the resources and knowledge in-house. The reality is that pathbreaking innovations exist in knowledge ecosystems that thrive on the free exchange of ideas. Again, this seems obvious, but that ultimately highlights the paradoxical nature of organizational secrecy in the innovation process.

This is the central theoretical puzzle for Rohin’s study of the Manhattan Project. While he does reflect at the end of the article about the contemporary relevance of these issues for innovations, for example, in the AI industry, or potentially for quantum computing, this piece seems driven more strongly by its theoretical focus.

Not that the historical case of the Manhattan Project is not covered in reasonable detail, but rather, it is more clearly shaped by secondary historical literature. As a well-known, historically significant, widely researched case, it presented a logical choice as an empirical context for secrecy in an innovation context.

For subscribers, we go through the template structure of a US-American management journal (again, as it is the secret sauce of panda kung-fu), the methodological moves and how the theoretical contributions are constructed.

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• Vinokurova, N. (2025). Fitting innovations into existing categories: Evidence from mortgage-backed securities. Strategic Management Journal. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.3732

How mortgage-backed securities became bonds—and what that tells us about category evolution

Natalya Vinokurova’s recent article in the Strategic Management Journal, “Fitting Innovations into Existing Categories: Evidence from Mortgage-Backed Securities,” is a self-consciously historical piece of research that deserves attention from those of us interested in how archival methods can generate theoretical insights for strategy scholarship.

The empirical setting is the acceptance of mortgage-backed securities (MBS) as bonds in the United States between 1970 and 1995. This is not ancient history by any means—it feels quite contemporary—but the process is now complete, which makes it amenable to the kind of retrospective analysis that historical research excels at. And of course, given the role MBS played in the 2008 Financial Crisis, it is a case with considerable real-world significance.

The theoretical puzzle

The opening follows the standard template you see in top journals. Natalya starts with a theoretical puzzle around innovation: much research has focused on how new categories are established, but less attention has been paid to how innovators fit new products into existing categories. This is typically assumed to be straightforward. But is it? How do you effectively secure category membership, and what strategies are employed? These turn out to be genuinely interesting questions.

From this theoretical puzzle, she moves to the empirical case that illustrates it: how did mortgage-backed securities come to be accepted as bonds? The whole introduction is remarkably efficient—barely a page—with each paragraph doing precisely what it needs to do.

The archival approach

The data collection is detailed but also revealing about contemporary archival practice. Most of the research took place online, through databases that many researchers would be familiar with—ProQuest, ABI/INFORM, WorldCat—supplemented by privately held documents obtained through personal interactions. Natalya provides a clear table of archival sources: trade press, academic research, popular press, industry trade manuals, legal statutes and rulings.

Below, for subscribers, further reflections on how she proceeded to position a careful historical source analysis for a management audience not familiar with archival research.

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A new year traditionally comes with new and worthy plans and intentions. Here’s one for OHN:

Every month, I will review an article I have been reading and we’ll start this Friday with Natalya Vinokurova’s historical article in the Strategic Management Journal about how mortgage-backed securities became an established type of bond. It’s a really cool piece that does so many things so well that the top US journals value highly, while also providing a historically rich account and a sophisticated methodological section.

And, surprise, surprise, I will be talking to Natalya in the first of our BAM webinars on publishing historical research in management journals later in January. You should definitely join us, as Natalya is a great presenter and very open and approachable if you have questions about how to position your research.

Upcoming events from the Management and Business History SIG:

Publishing Historical Research in Management Journals 1

20 January 2026

In this BH ONLINE - Workshop, we will talk to Natalya Vinokurova about her recent SMJ article “Fitting innovations into existing categories” and unpack how she negotiated the review process in this top journal for historical research.

Publishing Historical Research in Management Journals 2

3 March 2026

In this ONLINE - Workshop, we speak to Rohin Borpujari about his recent award-winning piece on organizational secrecy in the Manhattan project in Organization Science to better understand how historical research can get published in top journals.