Call for papers: Sustainable Human Resource Management in the Age of Digital Transformation (submission deadline: June 1, 2023)
Call for papers: Sustainable Human Systems Management in Post COVID-19 Era (submission deadline: June 15, 2023)
Call for papers: Reinventing, Reimagining, and Reshaping Human Resources Management Systems (submission period: July 1 to December 31, 2023)
-
Aims & Scope
-
Editorial Board
-
Author Guidelines
-
Abstracted/Indexed in
-
Open Access
-
Peer Review
-
Strategic Revival of HSM
-
Extra
Aims & Scope
Human Systems Management (HSM) is an interdisciplinary, international, refereed journal, offering applicable, scientific insight into reinventing business, civil-society and government organizations, through the sustainable development of high-technology processes and structures. Adhering to the highest civic, ethical and moral ideals, the journal promotes the emerging anthropocentric-sociocentric paradigm of societal human systems, rather than the pervasively mechanistic and organismic or medieval corporatism views of humankind’s recent past.
Intentionality and scope
Their management autonomy, capability, culture, mastery, processes, purposefulness, skills, structure and technology often determine which human organizations truly are societal systems, while others are not. HSM seeks to help transform human organizations into true societal systems, free of bureaucratic ills, along two essential, inseparable, yet complementary aspects of modern management:
a) the management of societal human systems: the mastery, science and technology of management, including self management, striving for strategic, business and functional effectiveness, efficiency and productivity, through high quality and high technology, i.e., the capabilities and competences that only truly societal human systems create and use, and
b) the societal human systems management: the enabling of human beings to form creative teams, communities and societies through autonomy, mastery and purposefulness, on both a personal and a collegial level, while catalyzing people’s creative, inventive and innovative potential, as people participate in corporate-, business- and functional-level decisions.
Appreciably large is the gulf between the innovative ideas that world-class societal human systems create and use, and what some conventional business journals offer. The latter often pertain to already refuted practices, while outmoded business-school curricula reinforce this problematic situation.
To reverse this trend, HSM provides scientific education and insight, commensurate to today’s management needs. The journal offers applied scientific methods, which promise to bring success to business, civil-society and government organizations, helping these societal human systems not just to survive, but also to deliver on their purposefulness and hence to prosper.
Editorial Board
Editor-in-Chief
Prof. dr. Nada Trunk Širca, Jean Monnet Chair
International School for Social and Business Studies
Euro-Mediterranean University
University of Primorska
Pot k izviru 4, 6320 Portorož, Slovenia, Slovenia
Founding Editor-in-Chief
Milan Zeleny, Professor Emeritus
Senior Editors
Nicholas C. Georgantzas, PhD, Professor Emeritus
Fordham University
Long Island City, NY, USA
Binshan Lin, PhD
Informatics, management
Louisiana State University Shreveport
Shreveport, LA, USA
Associate Editors
Umair Akram, PhD
Consumer Behavior, HRM
Guanghua School of Management
Peking University
Beijing, China
Valerij Dermol, PhD
HRM, entrepreneurship
International School for Business and Social Studies
Celje, Slovenia
Anca Draghici, PhD
Ergonomics, HRM
Politehnica University of Timisoara
Timisoara, Romania
Adela Lau, PhD
Data analytics, business research
The University of Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Karim Moustaghfir, PhD
HRM, entrepreneurship
Al Akhawayn University
Ifrane, Morocco
Kongkiti Phusavat, PhD
Management, engineering
Kasetsart University
Bangkok, Thailand
Anna Rakowska, PhD
HRM, management
Maria Curie-Sklodowska University
Lublin, Poland
Muddassar Sarfraz, PhD
HRM, Organizational Psychology, Management
School of Management
Zhejiang Shuren University
Hangzhou, China
Ping Wang, PhD
Management, business analytics
James Madison University
Harrisonburg, VA, USA
Statistical Associate Editor
Plamen Vladkov Mirazchiyski, PhD
Educational Research Institute, Slovenia
Ljubljana, Slovenia
Social Media Editor
Serban Miclea, PhD
Faculty of Management in Production and Transportation
Politechnica University Timisoara
Timisoara, Romania
Editorial Board
Zubair Akram, PhD
School of Management and Economics
Beijing Institute of Technology
Beijing, China
Isam Najib AlFuqaha, PhD
Counselling Psychology Department, Faculty of Arts
Philadelphia University Jordan
Amman, Jordan
Katarina Babnik, PhD
University of Ljubljana
Ljubljana, Slovenia
Oğuz Basol, PhD
Kırklareli University
Kırklareli, Turkey
Patrick Chang Boon N. Lee, PhD
Faculty of Business Administration
University of Macau, Taipa, Macao
Tamar Dolidze, PhD
Batumi State Maritime Academy / Pegaso International
Tbilisi, Georgia
Zahid Hussain, PhD
School of International Trade and Economics
University of International Business and Economics
Beijing, China
Monika Jakubiak, PhD
Maria Curie-Sklodowska University
Lublin, Poland
Susana A. de Juana-Espinosa, PhD
Business Organization Department
Universidad de Alicante
Alicante, Spain
Catalina Lomos, PhD
Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research
Esch-Belval, Luxembourg
Luigia Melillo, PhD
Pegaso International/Unipegaso
Malta, Italy
Desmond W. Ng, PhD
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX, USA
Miguel R. Olivas-Luján, PhD
Clarion University of Pennsylvania
Clarion, PA, USA
Haruthai Numprasertchai, PhD
Kasetsart University
Bangkok, Thailand
Vivek Patkar, PhD
Marathi Vidnyan Parishad
Mumbai, India
Yixin Qiu, PhD
J.E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics
National University of Ireland
Galway, Ireland
Boaz Ronen, PhD (Professor Emeritus)
Coller School of Management
Tel Aviv University
Tel Aviv, Israel
Mojca Rožman, PhD
International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA)
Hamburg, Germany
Citlalli Sánchez-Alvarez, PhD
Autonomous University of Baja California
Métrica Educativa A.C.
Tijuana, Mexico
Andrés Sandoval-Hernandez, PhD
University of Bath
Bath, United Kingdom
Olesea Sirbu
Academy of Economic Studies
Chișinău, Moldova
Aleš Trunk, PhD
International School for Business and Social Studies
Portorož, Slovenia
Ali Türkyilmaz, PhD
Department of Innovation, Management, and Marketing
University of Stavanger
Stavanger, Norway
Bistra Vassileva, PhD
University of Economics
Varna, Bulgaria
Shouyang Wang, PhD
Institute of Systems Science
Chinese Academy of Sciences
Beijing, China
Garry Wei-Han Tan, PhD
UCSI University
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Chunjiang Yang, PhD
School of Economics and Management
Yanshan University
Qinhuangdao, China
Author Guidelines
SUBMISSION OF MANUSCRIPT
By submitting an article to this journal, every author agrees to the Author Copyright Agreement, the IOS Press Privacy Policy and the IOS Press Ethics Policy.
HSM seeks high-quality contributions in terms of originality, readability and relevance to both research and practice. In judging the manuscripts fit for publication, the journal Editors adhere to the highest standards of intellectual and personal integrity and follow COPE’s Principles of Transparency and Best Practice in Scholarly Publishing. HSM publishes the following article types:
- Original Research Article: article reporting on empirical research (up to 8000 words including references). This type of article should contain structured abstract and an author contributions statement.
- Original Review Article: review or state-of-the-art summary article (up to 8000 words including references). This type of article should contain an author contributions statement.
- Case Report: case study, case report, or other description of a case (up to 4500 words including references). This type of article should contain structured abstract and an author contributions statement.
- Book Review: review or analysis of one or more new printed or online books relevant to the HSM community (up to 2000 words).
- Article Commentary: a work commenting on an already published article in HSM (up to 2000 words). This type of publication should add to the previously published article by either complementing its findings or offering an opposing opinion on a controversial article.
- Short Communication: concise articles aiming to rapidly report new findings or ideas (up to 2000 words).
The journal also welcomes and mostly accepts academic advertisements and employment opportunity announcements (please contact editorial@iospress.nl for such requests).
All submitted manuscripts are subjected to initial appraisal by the Editor in Chief or the assigned Associated Editor and, if found suitable for further consideration, to rigorous peer review. Mathematical formalism and proofs, quantifications and tables of empirical data are admitted only if they add to or are part of the main contribution of the submitted manuscript. Raw data should be available to the editor upon submission as supplementary material to the manuscript.
Authors are requested to submit their manuscript electronically to the journal’s Editorial Management System (www.editorialmanager.com/hsm). The manuscript should be uploaded as one file with tables and figures included. The submitted files must be editable (e.g. MS word). Please use the journal’s manuscript template.
Revised submissions should include a point-by-point response to reviewers' comments, and have revisions highlighted.
Important notes:
- The journal does not accept submissions from authors using nondescript, anonymous, email addresses (yahoo.com, gmail.com, 163.com, rediffmail.com, etc.). Institutional email addresses are highly preferred
- All authors must be included in the title page AND in the submission
Please be sure to read carefully the section “Preparation of Manuscripts” below, and to include the following files:
- Title page including author details
- Authors’ bionotes (maximum 100 words per author)
- Manuscript
Publication fee
HSM does not charge a publication fee.
PREPARATION OF MANUSCRIPTS
Organization of the paper and style of presentation
Manuscripts must be written in English. Authors whose native language is not English are advised to consult a professional English language editing service or a native English speaker prior to submission.
Manuscripts should be prepared with wide margins and double spacing throughout, including the abstract, footnotes and references. Every page of the manuscript, including the title page, references, tables, etc., should be numbered. However, in the text no reference should be made to page numbers; if necessary, one may refer to sections. SI units should be used, i.e., the units based on the metre, kilogramme, second, etc.Try to avoid the excessive use of italics and bold face.
Title page
The title page should provide the following information:
- Title (should be clear, descriptive, and have up to 150 characters including spaces)
- Name(s) of author(s) without abbreviation; please indicate who is the corresponding author. Note that no authors will be added or removed post submission, unless the journal editor and all co-authors are informed and are in agreement to this change
- Full affiliation(s): institution, city, country, link to the official website
- Present address of author(s), if different from affiliation
- Complete address of the corresponding author, including tel. no., fax no., professional e-mail address and ORCID ID
- Acknowledgements
- Author contributions
Acknowledgments
This section should contain all acknowledgments, including any funding source to the research.
If there are no acknowledgments or funding, then please state "The authors have no acknowledgments".
Author contributions
For every author, his or her contribution to the manuscript needs to be provided using the following categories:
CONCEPTION:
METHODOLOGY:
DATA COLLECTION:
INTERPRETATION OR ANALYSIS OF DATA:
PREPARATION OF THE MANUSCRIPT:
REVISION FOR IMPORTANT INTELLECTUAL CONTENT:
SUPERVISION:
Please read the IOS Press authorship policy for further information.
Authors’ bionotes
Please provide a short biography (maximum of 100 words per author), as well as a passport-type photograph for each author in a single file.
Manuscript
Manuscripts should be organized in the following order:
- Abstract
- Keywords
- Body of text (divided by subheadings)
- References
- Tables
- Figure captions
- Figures
Headings and subheadings should be numbered and typed on a separate line, without indentation.
Abstract
The abstract should be clear, descriptive, self-explanatory and not longer than 200 words, it should also be suitable for publication in abstracting services. The abstract for research papers should follow the "structured abstract" format. Section labels should be in bold uppercase letters followed by a colon, and each section will begin on a new line.
BACKGROUND:
OBJECTIVE:
METHODS:
RESULTS:
CONCLUSIONS:
Supplementary data
If there is an online dataset associated with the paper, you are welcome to provide information about where the data supporting the results or analyses presented in the paper can be found. Where applicable, this should include the hyperlink, DOI, or other identifier associated with the dataset(s).
References
The journal follows the Vancouver style for citations and references. Place citations as numbers in square brackets in the text. All publications cited in the text must be presented in a list of references in order of appearance in the text. Only articles published or accepted for publication should be listed in the reference list. Submitted articles can be listed in the text as (author(s), unpublished data). All authors should be listed in the reference list. Please include DOI numbers when known. Examples of references in the Vancouver style:
[1] Rose ME, Huerbin MB, Melick J, Marion DW, Palmer AM, Schiding JK, Kochanek PM, Graham SH. Regulation of interstitial excitatory amino acid concentrations after cortical contusion injury. Brain Res. 2002; 935(12): 406-416. DOI: 10.1016/S0006-8993(02)02471-X
[2] Murray PR, Rosenthal KS, Kobayashi GS, Pfaller MA. Medical microbiology. 4th ed. St. Louis: Mosby; 2002.
[3] Berkow R, Fletcher AJ, editors. The Merck manual of diagnosis and therapy. 16th ed. Rahway (NJ): Merck Research Laboratories; 1992.
[4] Meltzer PS, Kallioniemi A, Trent JM. Chromosome alterations in human solid tumors. In: Vogelstein B, Kinzler KW, editors. The genetic basis of human cancer. New York: McGrawHill; 2002. p. 93113.
[5] Canadian Cancer Society. Canadian Cancer Society [Internet]. Available from: http://www.cancer.ca/. [Accessed 5 August 2021].
Footnotes
Footnotes should only be used if absolutely essential. In most cases it is possible to incorporate the information in the text.
If used, they should be numbered in the text, indicated by superscript numbers and kept as short as possible.
Tables
Number as Table 1, Table 2 etc., and refer to all of them in the text. Each table should be provided on a separate page of the manuscript. Tables should not be included in the text. Each table should have a brief and self-explanatory title.
Column headings should be brief, but sufficiently explanatory. Standard abbreviations of units of measurement should be added between parentheses.
Vertical lines should not be used to separate columns. Leave some extra space between the columns instead.
Any explanations essential to the understanding of the table should be given in footnotes at the bottom of the table.
Figures
Number figures as Fig. 1, Fig. 2, etc., and refer to all of them in the text. Each figure should be provided on a separate sheet. Figures should not be included in the text.
Color figures can be included in the print version, provided the cost of their reproduction is paid for by the author. The online version has no extra charges for color figures.
For the file formats of the figures please take the following into account:
- Line art should be have a minimum resolution of 600 dpi, save as EPS or TIFF
- Grayscales (including photos) should have a minimum resolution of 300 dpi (no lettering), or 500 dpi (when there is lettering); save as tiff
- Do not save figures as JPEG, this format may lose information in the process
- Do not use figures taken from the Internet, the resolution will be too low for printing
- Do not use color in your figures if they are to be printed in black & white, as this will reduce the print quality (note that in software often the default is color, you should change the settings)
- For figures that should be printed in color, please send a CMYK encoded EPS or TIFF
Figures should be designed with the format of the page of the journal in mind. They should be of such a size as to allow a reduction of 50%.
On maps and other figures where a scale is needed, use bar scales rather than numerical ones, i.e., do not use scales of the type 1:10,000. This avoids problems if the figures need to be reduced.
Each figure should have a self-explanatory caption. The captions to all figures should be typed on a separate sheet of the manuscript.
Photographs are only acceptable if they have good contrast and intensity.
COPYRIGHT
Copyright of your article
Authors submitting a manuscript do so on the understanding that they have read and agreed to the terms of the IOS Press Author Copyright Agreement.
Article sharing
Authors of journal articles are permitted to self-archive and share their work through institutional repositories, personal websites, and preprint servers. Authors have the right to use excerpts of their article in other works written by the authors themselves, provided that the original work is properly cited. The consent for sharing an article, in whole or in part, depends on the version of the article that is shared, where it is shared, and the copyright license under which the article is published. Please refer to the IOS Press Article Sharing Policy for further information.
Quoting from other publications
Authors, when quoting from someone else's work or when considering reproducing figures or tables from a book or journal article, should make sure that they are not infringing a copyright. Although in general authors may quote from other published works, permission should be obtained from the holder of the copyright if there will be substantial extracts or reproduction of tables, plates, or other figures. If the copyright holder is not the author of the quoted or reproduced material, it is recommended that the permission of the author should also be sought. Material in unpublished letters and manuscripts is also protected and must not be published unless permission has been obtained. Submission of a paper will be interpreted as a statement that the author has obtained all the necessary permission. A suitable acknowledgement of any borrowed material must always be made.
PROOFS
After the article is accepted, the corresponding author will receive a PDF proof and is asked to check this proof carefully (the publisher will execute a cursory check only). Corrections other than printer's errors, however, should be avoided. Costs arising from such corrections will be charged to the authors.
PURCHASES
How to order reprints, a PDF file, journals, or IOS Press books
The corresponding author of a contribution to the journal will receive a complimentary PDF Author’s Copy of the article, unless otherwise stated. This PDF copy is watermarked and for personal use only. A free PDF copy will not be provided for conference proceedings and abstract issues. An order form for a PDF file without watermark, reprints or additional journal copies will be provided along with the PDF proof.
If you wish to order reprints of an earlier published article, please contact the publisher for a quotation using the contact form.
An author is entitled to 25% discount on IOS Press books. See Author's discount (25%) on all IOS Press book publications.
KUDOS
Authors of published articles (non-prepress, final articles) will be contacted by Kudos. Kudos is a service that helps researchers maximize the impact and visibility of their research. It allows authors to enrich their articles with lay metadata, add links to related materials and promote their articles through the Kudos system to a wider public. Authors will receive no more than three emails: one invitation and a maximum of two reminders to register for the service and link the published article to their profile. Using and registering for Kudos remains entirely optional. For more information, please have a look at our authors section.
HOW TO PROMOTE YOUR WORK
Would you like some pointers on how to help your research achieve a wider reach and greater impact? Please consult our Promotional Toolkit for Authors for tips.
Please visit the IOS Press Authors page for further information.
Abstracted/Indexed in

Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC) Journal Quality List
Business Source Complete
Cabell's Guide or Directory
Compendex
CSA Illumina
DBLP Bibliography Server
EBSCO Databases
Educational Research Abstracts
Emerald Management Reviews
Ergonomics Abstracts
Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) initiative
Human Resources Abstracts
IBR
IBZ
Inspec IET
International Abstracts in Operations Research
PsycINFO
Scopus
Sociological Abstracts
Ulrich's Periodicals Directory
UMI Serials Acquisitions
Web of Science: Emerging Sources Citation Index
Open Access
By default, articles published in Human Systems Management are available only to institutions and individuals with access rights. However, the journal offers all authors the option to purchase open access publication for their article as part of the IOS Press Open Library. This means that the final published version will be freely available to anyone worldwide, indefinitely, under a Creative Commons license and without the need to purchase access to the article. This is also referred to as “gold” open access.
Gold open access pricing
Authors who choose gold open access publication will be subject to an article publication charge of € 1500 / US$ 1500 for publication under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license or € 2150 / US$ 2150 for publication under the CC BY 4.0 license. Pricing is exclusive of possible taxes. After an article is accepted for publication, the corresponding author will be informed regarding the open access option during the production stages, and will have the opportunity to purchase open access for their article. It could be that the open access fee of an article is waived completely due an institutional agreement IOS Press has with the corresponding authors' institution. Please check the institutional agreements page for details.
Green open access
Authors who do not make use of the gold open access option may still make their article freely available using self-archiving, also referred to as green open access. Authors may make their final accepted manuscript available for free download from their personal or institutional website or institutional archive. This model is free for the author.
Peer Review Policy
Human Systems Management is a peer-reviewed journal. Articles submitted to the journal undergo a single blind peer review process. This means that the identity of the authors is known to the reviewers but the identity of the reviewers is not communicated to the authors. Please visit our reviewer guidelines for further information about how to conduct a review.
After automatic plagiarism screening through iThenticate, all submitted manuscripts are subjected to initial appraisal by the Editor-in-Chief or the assigned Associated Editor and, if found suitable for further consideration, to rigorous peer review by independent, anonymous expert referees. Reasons to reject a paper in the pre-screening process could for example be because the work does not fall within the aims and scope, the writing is of poor quality, the instructions to authors were not followed or the presented work is not novel.
Papers deemed suitable to be reviewed will be assigned to a handling editor (who might be the Editor-in-Chief or an Associate Editor). The handling editor will then invite reviewers to comment on the work. As a standard policy, decisions are based on at least two reviews. The Editor-in-Chief strives to ensure a typical turnaround time of 3 months.
Reviewers are asked to judge a paper on at least:
- Significance to field
- Relevance to journal
- Methodology
- Data analysis
- Literature review
- Writing style/clarity
Based on the received reviews the handling editor will propose to the Editor-in-Chief a recommendation:
- Accept
- Minor revisions required
- Major revisions required
- Reject
They mean the following:
- The manuscript is suitable for publication and only requires minor polishing; thus, no further reviews are requested.
- The authors are required to make moderate changes to their manuscript. The manuscript becomes acceptable for publication if the changes proposed by the reviewers and editors are successfully addressed. The revised manuscript will be examined by the Editor in Chief and possibly sent back to all (or a selection of) reviewers for a second round of reviews. Authors are requested to provide a letter to the reviewers detailing the improvements made for the resubmission.
- The manuscript cannot be accepted for publication in its current form. However, a major revision which addresses all issues raised by the reviewers may be acceptable for publication. The revised manuscript will undergo a full second round of review. Authors are requested to provide a letter to the reviewers detailing the improvements made for the resubmission.
- The manuscript is rejected as it is deemed to be out of scope, not relevant, or not meeting the journal’s quality standards in terms of significance, novelty, and/or presentation.
Authors are notified by the Editor-in-Chief, whose decision is final.
In-house submissions are subjected to the peer review process described above. Co-authors who are also members of the Editorial Board are not involved in any way with the peer review process of articles of their (co-)authorship.
Strategic Revival of HSM
The following papers are published within the Strategic Revival of HSM program (all are free to read until June 30, 2022):
40 years of Human Systems Management (editorial) – Širca, Nada Trunk
Entering the age of accelerated change: In search of equilibrium (editorial) – Prof. Milan Zeleny
Human systems management: A retrospective of 40 years – Shahzad, Imran Ahmed | Farrukh, Muhammad | Wu, Yihua | Trunk, Nada
The comparison study on employees’ adoption of public and enterprise social networks – Qi, Jiayin | Wu, Lianren | Xiong, Miaomiao | Hu, Shuaibo
The roots of evolutionary economics: Crisis, transformation and metamorphosis – Prof. Milan Zeleny
So far and yet so near: The emerging characteristics, forms and configurations of organizational proximity in the context of digitalization – Peng, Hongxia
Emotional labor: A comprehensive literature review – Yang, Chunjiang | Chen, Aobo
Does higher education properly prepare graduates for the growing artificial intelligence market? Gaps’ identification using text mining – Benhayoun, Lamiae | Lang, Daniel
Virtual migration of higher education institutions in times of crisis: Major challenges and critical success factors – Shatat, Ahmad Saleh | Shatat, Abdallah Saleh
Ready for the future? Employability skills and competencies in the twenty-first century: The view of international experts – Rakowska, Anna | de Juana-Espinosa, Susana
Editorial to Human Systems Management volume 40 issue 6 – Zeleny, Milan | Trunk Širca, Nada
The evolutionary circular and human centered city: Towards an ecological and humanistic “re-generation” of the current city governance – Girard, Luigi Fusco
From training to learning: Transition of a workplace for industry 4.0 – Rassameethes, Bordin | Phusavat, Kongkiti | Pastuszak, Zbigniew | Hidayanto, Achmad Nizar | Majava, Jukka
Exploring the relationship between corporate social responsibility actions and employee retention: A human resource management perspective – Boutmaghzoute, Hajar | Moustaghfir, Karim
Newsletter: Be sure to sign up to the HSM newsletter to receive alerts of new issues and other journal news. Sign up via this link: ios.tinyc.co/HSM-signup.
Latest Newsletter: Check out the latest newsletter here.
Social Media – Follow Human Systems Management on LinkedIn to be part of the conversation!
Sustainable Development Goals
The content of this journal relates to SDG:













Visit the SDG page for more information.
Supporting Diversity and Inclusion
This journal supports IOS Press' actions relating to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and commits to the Diversity and Inclusion Statement.
More information will be available in due course. Check the SDGs page for updates.