Policy Document of JOBAMS

1. Guidelines for the Submission of Research Articles

Submission of a manuscript will be only for genuine work which has not been published before; that it is not under consideration for publication anywhere else; that its publication has been approved by all coauthors, if any, as well as by the responsible authorities – tacitly or explicitly – at the institute where the work has been carried out. The publisher will not be held legally responsible.

 2. Subscription of the Journals

The electronic PDF version of the current and past issues of the JOBAMS published by SMIU Karachi is open to access and free of charge for the readers. JOBAMS is Open Access journal accessible for free on the internet. SMIU guarantee that no university library or individual reader will have to buy a subscription or pay any pay-per-view fees to access articles in the electronic version of the journal. Hence, there is-no revenue neither from the sale of subscriptions to the electronic version of the journal nor from pay-per-view fees.

 3. Committee of the Journal

3.1. Organizing Committee/ Editorial Board of the Journal

• The journal's organizing committee comprises Patron in Chief, Chief Editor, Managing Editor, and three Associate Editors.
• Patron-in-Chief of the Journal is the Vice-Chancellor of the
• Chief Editor is the Dean of the Faculty concerned or Senior Faculty Member
• The Managing Editor is the Chairperson of the Department concerned or a Senior Faculty Member
• Associate editors are the three Faculty members who preferably have a research background.

3.2. Advisory Board of a Journal

• The Editorial Board should preferably comprise on 50% foreign and 50% local members.
• All the foreign members should be Ph.D.
• All the local members should be Ph.D. & at least Associate.
• The consent of all the members should be received duly on the Consent Form of the Journal.
• Any members of the Advisory Board can become a member of the Review Committee.

3.3. Review Committee

• All the members of the Editorial Board can become members of the review committee subject to their consent.
• The review committee members will be at least 20 more PhDs from different universities.

 4. Frequency

The journal publishes two issues in a year, the first issue is published in January, and the second one is published in July each year. Each issue is first published online on the web portal of the journal and then published in print. 

5. Review Process

5.1. Information for Authors

5.1.1. Peer Review Process

Policy regarding the Peer Review Process is as follows:

• All the papers shall be submitted through the official web portal of the concerned journal.
• The editorial board and associate editors initially receive all the submitted research papers.
• If the submissions are not of high significance or not relevant to the journal or have a similarity index of more than 19%, they may not be brought into the phases of evaluation and publication by the
• The corresponding author will be informed why the paper is not sent to the
• Research papers, which are not rejected by the editorial board, will be sent for peer review to two (02)
• If any paper is rejected by one reviewer and accepted by another, the managing editor can evaluate the form or send it to the third reviewer.
• Research papers will not be sent to reviewers who belong to institutions whose affiliation is mentioned by any of the research paper's authors.
• Based on the reviewers’ feedback, a paper will be accepted or
• Acceptance or rejection of the research paper based on reviewers’ feedback will be communicated to the corresponding.
• The average time for the whole process- from submission to acceptance/rejection- is three months. 

5.2. Invitation to Join JOBAMS as Reviewer Database

The researchers with good research experience are encouraged to join the JOBAMS reviewer database by sending the profile document/CV on the journal's web portal or to the editor's email. The Organizing Committee shall send a notification to those whose profiles are approved. 

5.3. Review Invitation

As per the journal’s peer review policy, each paper shall be sent to at least two reviewers. The process shall be,

• The editorial team shall send an invitation to the potential reviewers, based on their expertise and domain of the article, from the database after the successful desk review.
• The potential reviewer may accept or decline the review offer.
• If any potential reviewer identifies any conflict of interest in the article and the reviewer, the reviewer should inform the editorial team.
• In case any potential reviewer declines the offer, the editorial team shall send the paper to another reviewer.
• If the reviewer accepts the offer to review the article, the editorial board shall send the review process details along with deadlines, benefits policy, and blind review article.
• If the Editorial team does not get a response from the reviewer within three days, a first reminder shall be sent, and the second reminder shall be sent after five days.
• If the Editorial team does not respond after two reminders, the reviewer shall be informed that the article is now being sent to another reviewer with a positive note. 

5.4. Review Assessment and feedback

• All the reviewers shall be asked to review the article on scientific soundness, methodological rigor, originality, novelty, structure quality, and language.
• Reviewers also have to check the references, proper citation, and ethical considerations in the source.
• Reviewers shall be asked to provide feedback to identify the article sections that need improvement correctly.
• Reviewers shall be asked to provide recommendations on each of the above criterion.
• Reviewers shall be asked to provide a comprehensive review report.
• Reviewers shall be asked to review the article for the second round as well after the editorial team gets the report back from an author with recommended rectifications. 

5.5. Confidentiality

• All the reviewers shall be required to keep the entire article’s content in complete confidentiality.
• If the reviewers intend to get the review done from someone else, they need to seek prior permission from the editorial team.
• The reviewers must keep their identity confidential and should not reveal it in their feedback/comments. 

5.6. Disclosure and Conflict of Interest

• A reviewer should not, for their research, use unpublished material disclosed in a submitted manuscript without the approval of the editor.
• The data included in the research paper is confidential, and the reviewer shall not be allowed to use it for their study,
• A reviewer must declare any potentially conflicting interests (e.g., personal, financial, intellectual, professional, political, or religious). In such a situation, s/he will be required to follow the journal's policies.
• A reviewer should be honest enough to declare conflicts of interest if the research paper under review is the same as they presently conducted the study.
• If the reviewer feels unqualified to separate their bias, s/he should immediately return the manuscript to the Editor without review and justify the situation.

 6. Originality and Plagiarism Policy

• All the articles must be original in their completeness, including the idea and content.
• The manuscript submitted to the journal should be original, unpublished, and not under consideration elsewhere.
• All the authors must submit a statement that the manuscript submitted is original and has not been accepted or is currently being considered for publication elsewhere.
• Manuscript submitted to the journal will be checked by the editor or associates using anti-plagiarism software.
• Similarity of more than 19% will not be acceptable for publication, and the editorial board will reject the manuscript.
• Any copyrighted content must include prior permission, and any open access material, if used in the article, should be appropriately referred, and cited to its original contributor.
• Plagiarism is not allowed in the article. Plagiarism of any kind shall be informed to the authors, and if found to be a deliberate act, it shall be reported to the organizing committee.
• If the text is reused, it should be in double quotation with proper citation.
• Images should be original in idea, and any adjusted image with the same idea as an image that is already published shall be rejected.
• Fabrication of data, in any way, is not allowed. Fabrication, i-e, including or excluding any data, tool, or method, shall be rejected.

 7. Subscription Details

The journal is an open access journal. The content is easily accessible to all on the web portal.

8. Ethical guidelines

Authors are expected to observe high standards of publication ethics. Falsification or fabrication of data, plagiarism, including duplicate publication of authors’ work without proper citation, misappropriation, publishing the job without the original author’s consent, and publishing others’ work in one’s name is unacceptable and unethical.

Any case of ethical publication misconduct will be treated seriously and dealt with according to HEC guidelines.

 9. Confidentiality / Privacy statement

All submissions will be treated as confidential documents. They will be reviewed by the Editor, Editorial office staff, and assigned peer reviewers; all of them are bound to treat the document as confidential. 

 10. Deadlines for Publication of Journals

Task	January Issue	July Issue
Call for Papers	1st October	1st April
Full paper submission	15th November	15th May
Review of papers by Editorial Board (Department Level)	10th October to 20th November	10th April to 20th May
Withdrawal/ retraction of the paper	12th October to 22nd  November	12th April to 22nd May
Review of papers by externals	15th October to 25th November	15th April to 25th May
Review report sent to authors/Acceptance/Rejection of Articles	1st November to 1st December	1st May to 1st June

Furthermore, the ORIC department shall be responsible for the next two steps:

Task	January Issue	July Issue
Final editing and drafting of research journal	5th December	5th June
To be submitted to ORIC for printing	6th December	6th June
Journal publication	1st January	1st July