Determinants of Operations Management Faculty Salary: Is Publishing in “A” Journals the “Bottom Line”?

This study investigates the determinants of salary for operations management scholars. Is it as some opine that the only thing that matters is the publication count in “A” journals? How do the full range of activities: research, teaching, service, and administration, affect salary? The present research seeks to shed light on these questions and is predicated on a data set that consists of the research, teaching, and service outcomes, along with salary, for a full census of operations management faculty at 22 public universities (227 faculty) for base, 9-month salary and a subset of 15 universities (150 faculty) for total annual compensation. The results demonstrate partial support for the hypotheses that only “A” publications are financially rewarded, with publications in Production and Operations Management having the highest correlation with salary. The salary reward for publishing in “A” journals is unaffected by number of coauthors. Publications in other academic journals, top-tier practitioner journals, and top journals in sister-fields, and measures of impact, such as citations, H-index, and research awards provide no additional explanatory value of salary. Likewise, service and teaching awards do not add explanatory value. Female Full Professors are paid roughly $23,000 less in base salary than their male counterparts. Non-publishing factors that significantly contribute to salary include changing university affiliations (only for Associate and Full Professors), taking on administrative duties, as well as certain qualitative measures such as achieving Fellow status at the Production and Operations Management Society.