BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Business Horizons, an academic journal published by Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business, continues to grow in influence, as evidenced by a recent huge leap in the Impact Factor ratings and rankings, which measure how often academic journal articles are cited by scholars and researchers.
The Journal Impact Factor ratings, part of the Journal Citation Reports published by the global analytics company Clarivate, are one of the most widely used measures of a publication’s impact. They provide quantitative data that readers, editors, and publishers can use to discern the effect that a journal has, compared to similar publications.
The new Impact Factor rating for Business Horizons was 10.562 in 2021, which means it now ranks 20th out of more than 150 business journals. Just a year earlier, the journal received a 6.361 rating and a ranking of 43rd. Five years ago, its rating was 2.588.
The bimonthly Business Horizons is published by the Kelley School in partnership with Elsevier. It began publication as a quarterly in 1956. It is edited by Greg Fisher, the Larry and Barbara Sharpf Professor and an associate professor of entrepreneurship, with support from Managing Editor Lisa Miller and editorial specialists Sarah Goddard-Martin and Phillip Scuderi.
“This jump in impact is a validation of our thesis that there is demand for a peer-reviewed business publication with a strong practical orientation,” Fisher said. “The academic journals in the field of business have become very academic and theoretical, and in so doing, they often overlook the practical aspects of business. Business Horizons does the opposite. We lead with practical insights and perspectives, but we require that these practical insights are generated from a scholarly foundation. This allows us to publish articles that bridge academia and business.”
The Impact Factor ratings are calculated by dividing the number of scholarly items counted in the denominator by all the citations that a journal has accumulated in the numerator. In 2021, Business Horizons articles were cited 8,458 times, up by more than a thousand from 2020, when articles were cited 7,443 times.
“Impact Factors don’t just increase on their own. This is the result of concerted effort on the part of many of the journal’s stakeholders,” said Fisher, adding that the improvement in impact was initiated by previous editors-in-chief, whose necessary changes and advancements included adding blind peer review and establishing a team of associate editors.