Purpose

This study aims to explore the intellectual connections of mission statement research to identify the influential domains of source knowledge and emergent areas of research for future studies.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors deployed bibliometric methods, namely, citation, co-citation and network analysis. The authors collected data from the Scopus and Web of Science databases and analyzed the connections of the most influential articles.

Findings

The authors identified four knowledge domains that informed the mission statements literature: guidance on mission statement development, the value of mission statements, mission statements and organizational issues, mission statement content and communication. And the authors spotted four opportunities for knowledge advancement based on theoretical frameworks, performance measures, content and context.

Practical implications

Practitioners should think beyond the immediate benefits of mission statements, such as performance and legitimacy improvement. Instead, they should focus on long-term benefits, information advantages and democratizing the development phase of mission statements.

Originality/value

Mission statements have attracted scholarly attention over the past 40 years. Despite the formation of a considerable body of knowledge, intellectual connections of mission statement research have been largely neglected. Previous studies had a narrow focus or insufficient coverage of the literature. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first full-scale bibliometric study on the intellectual connections of the mission statements literature.

中文翻译：

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使命宣言奖学金中的智力联系：未来的研究议程

目的

本研究旨在探索使命宣言研究的智力联系，以确定源知识的影响领域和未来研究的新兴研究领域。

设计/方法论/途径

作者采用了文献计量方法，即引文、共引和网络分析。作者从 Scopus 和 Web of Science 数据库收集数据，并分析了最有影响力的文章之间的联系。

发现

作者确定了为使命宣言文献提供信息的四个知识领域：使命宣言制定指南、使命宣言的价值、使命宣言和组织问题、使命宣言内容和沟通。作者根据理论框架、绩效衡量、内容和背景发现了四个知识进步的机会。

实际影响

从业者应该超越使命宣言的直接利益，例如绩效和合法性的提高。相反，他们应该关注长期利益、信息优势以及使命宣言制定阶段的民主化。

原创性/价值

过去 40 年来，使命宣言引起了学术界的关注。尽管形成了大量的知识体系，但使命宣言研究的智力联系在很大程度上被忽视了。先前的研究焦点狭窄或文献覆盖范围不足。据作者所知，这是第一个关于使命陈述文献知识联系的全面文献计量研究。