To make a difference in the world, management scholars who work on sustainability need to reach out and communicate their insights to broader audiences. The outreach award honors researchers who have done this particularly well. Importantly, the award is based on outreach activities for a single, published paper. This is done deliberately to level the playing field: academics of all levels are doing great work and may be recipients of this award.

Award winner(s) will receive a $500 prize and a plaque at the annual Academy of Management meeting. Their research insights and outreach strategy will be featured in the newsletter of the Network for Business Sustainability (NBS) and in a short video interview on the Outreach Award website. In addition, the finalists will be invited to talk about their outreach activities at the SIM-ONE junior faculty consortium.

The outreach activities must be based on a single paper published (or accepted for publication) within the last five years in a peer reviewed journal (please note that some high-profile journals, such as the Stanford Social Innovation Review, are not peer reviewed). For the 2027 award, the paper must have been published (or accepted for publication) between 2022 and 2026. The paper must focus on issues of interest to the ONE and SIM divisions, but the applicants do not need to be a member of these divisions.

Applications can come from individuals or co-author teams. All applicants must be co-authors on the paper on which the outreach activities are based. However, applications do not need to include all co-authors if some have done most or all of the outreach activities. Being a co-author on the paper on which the outreach activities are based is thus a necessary but not sufficient condition for being part of the application. To apply for the award, you will need to submit: (1) the published research paper that the outreach activities are based on; (2) 500-word summary of the outreach activities; and (3) if applicable, evidence of outreach activities in the form of supporting documents or links to online content.

Given that authors may expand their outreach activities over time, authors can re-apply with the same paper up to three times as long as the paper was published in the five years prior to the deadline (for example, for a paper published in 2022, someone could apply, say, in 2024, 2025, and 2027).

The winner will be determined in a two-step selection process. In the first step, the pre-selection jury will narrow down all submissions to the 5-7 best submissions. In the second step, these 5-7 submissions will be evaluated by a jury of senior ONE and SIM scholars who will select the winner and potentially a runner-up.

Outreach activities will be judged based on three criteria: broadcasting, relevance, and effectiveness. Broadcasting refers to how effectively researchers have translated their academic insights so that that are meaningful for a non-academic audience. Relevance is the alignment between the outreach message (i.e. the topic or insight that is communicated) with the audience (i.e. who needs to know this). Effectiveness is how well researchers have chosen and utilized communication channels to reach their target audience.