Academic Writing

Mathukutty M. Monippally is Professor of Communication, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, India. Earlier, he was with the Central Institute of English and Foreign Languages (now The English and Foreign Languages University), Hyderabad. He received his PhD from the University of Manchester, UK, in 1983.His books for managers include The Craft of Business Letter Writing and Business Communication Strategies. He is a coauthor of Effective Communication for Sales Executives and Business and Technical Writing in English.Apart from teaching courses such as ‘Written Analysis and Communication,’ ‘Spoken Business Communication,’ ‘Management Communication’ and ‘Persuasive Communication’ at IIM Ahmedabad, he also conducts workshops on different aspects of communication for middle and senior managers. His research interests are in bad news delivery, leadership communication and persuasive communication. He has published papers and management cases in national and international journals.Badrinarayan Shankar Pawar was Professor, Organisational Behavior and Human Resources, at the Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode. He has taught at various institutes including Oklahoma State University (mostly as a teaching associate during his PhD studies), City University of Hong Kong (1997–2001), Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, India (2001–2005), and XLRI School of Business and Human Resources (2007–2008).He has taught various subjects including human resource management, organizational behavior-related subjects, business research methods, research methods, and advanced research methods.Dr Pawar received his PhD from Oklahoma State University in 1996. He also received the membership of Phi Kappa Phi in recognition of his academic performance in the PhD program.His coauthored/solo academic works include papers published in Academy of Management Review, Long Range Planning, Leadership and Organization Development Journal, Journal of Business Ethics, Best Papers Proceedings of the Academy of Management, a chapter in Handbook of Organizational Citizenship Behavior (2005, Nova Science Publishers, Inc.), and paper presentations at the Academy of Management. He has also served as the guest editor for a special issue of Journal of Organizational Change Management on Transformational Leadership (2004, Volume 17[2]). His recent work on the topic of workplace spirituality includes one paper published in the Leadership and Organization Development Journal in 2008 and another paper published in Journal of Business Ethics in 2009.His areas of research interests include organizational citizenship behavior, transformational leadership, and workplace spirituality.

Using a lucid conversational style, the authors talk of the challenges that most writers face and offer a systematic approach to overcome it. Broadly divided in three parts, the book covers all the essentials that go in the generation of academic papers….Throughout the text, the authors have used extracts from student assignments, making it more readable and comprehensible from the student’s perspective. The elaborate analysis that follows each extract helps the reader master the skill of reviewing not only others’ works but also their own writing. While all the three parts of the book are interconnected, each unit can be read and assimilated as independent unit. Additional resources provided in Appendix 2 are a valuable add-on. This small, crisp book can be recommended for everyone who wants to master the skill of writing well. It is a ‘must read’ for all management students and researchers for whom project reports and term papers from part of the academic curriculum.

• PrefaceIntroductionPART ONE: THE RESEARCH PROCESS AND THE ROLE OF ACADEMIC WRITING Academic Writing and Research ProcessStructure and Contents of a Research PaperPART TWO: THE ANATOMY OF ACADEMIC WRITINGGood Academic WritingMastering the ParagraphThe Writing ProcessPART THREE: ACKNOWLEDGING ACADEMIC DEBTSUsing and Citing Sources of IdeasAppendix 1: Brief Descriptions of Some of the Research Terms Used in Chapter 2Appendix 2: Resources for Honing Academic WritingReferencesIndex