IS Faculty Research Productivity: Influential Factors and Implications

Why are some faculty members more productive than others in academic research? We constructed a number of hypotheses about faculty research productivity based on the life-cycle model of academic research and previous studies. Tests were conducted using data collected via a national survey of information systems (IS) faculty. The results show that while there are only two significant factors contributing positively to the research productivity— the time allocated to research activity and the existence of IS doctoral programs—many other factors appear to have significant adverse effect on research productivity, such as the number of years on faculty, the teaching load when exceeding 11 hours weekly, and non-IS, non-academic employment experience. The results also suggest that some of the commonly proposed influential factors, such as tenure status, academic rank, school type, as well as IS-related employment experience, have no significant effect at all. The implications of these findings and the limitations of the study are also discussed.