Journal of Engineering & Construction Management

Guide for Authors

Key Notes

Originality of research:

The article must be a new, original and the result of the author/authors' research. The author is not allowed to submit an article that in whole or in part, has been presented in domestic, foreign journals or scientific assemblies to the Journal of Engineering and Construction Management.

Findings report:

The authors are committed to report their findings completely and to be particularly careful in presenting the findings and their interpretation.
The article should contain enough details and references so that other researchers can access the same data set to repeat the research.
If the article is derived from research projects or dissertations, the title of the research project or dissertation should be included on the first page.

The role of authors:

After submitting the article, it is not possible to delete, add or change the order of the authors' names.
The corresponding author is ultimately responsible for the content of the entire submitted article, but all authors are responsible for the content and responsible for the results and ideas presented in the articles.
Authorship credit and points should be distributed in proportion to the amount of participation in different sections. Authors must take responsibility and credit for the work.
The default of the journal is that the corresponding author has sent a copy or draft of the article to all co-authors and collaborators and obtained their consent to submit the article to the journal and publish it.

Plagiarism:

The corresponding author must ensure that all the mentioned materials are the result of his research and his colleagues whose names are included in the article, and preserve the origin and authenticity of each of the data sets used.

Reviewing and correcting the article:

If an author notices an important mistake or carelessness in his work, he is obliged to inform the editor of the publication quickly and cooperate in the process of reviewing and correcting the article.

How to send and necessary files to present the article

Respected authors can submit their manuscripts online by registering on the journal website (http://jecm.ir).
During the registration of an article in the electronic database, the following 4 files must be submitted. The acceptable format of these files is provided in the relevant link.

1) Authors profile file (authors profile file format)
2) The main file of the article without the details of the authors (main file format of the article)
3) Authors' commitment form (authors' commitment form format)
4) Conflict of interest form (conflict of interest form)
5) EndNote/ Mendeley resource file

Components of the article submission file

Title of the article, details of the authors, abstract and keywords, based on the desired format of the journal, should be presented in both Persian and English languages.

1)The title of the article

The title should be short and clear. You can remove words like study, review and time from it. It is necessary to write the title of the article as a phrase, not a sentence. Also, avoid using abbreviations in the title.

2) Profile of authors

Academic position, name of the department or faculty or research center, name of the university, name of the city, name of the country should be mentioned in Farsi and English.
The information contained in the authors' profile and the information entered in the system must be the same and the names of all authors must be entered in the system.
In the articles extracted from theses, the supervisor is the main author (responsible author) and the order of the authors' names is: student, first supervisor, second supervisor and advisor(s).
The name of the corresponding author should be marked with *.
It is mandatory to enter the full address of the corresponding author and his/her e-mail address.
Based on the format of the journal, it is preferable to insert the ORCID code of the corresponding author after his/her email address (to create this code, refer to the ORCID code preparation guide file).

3) Abstract

The abstract should be at least 150 and at most 250 words
The abstract should include the purpose, methods, findings and results

4) Keywords

Keywords should be between 3 and 5 words.

5) Introduction

In this section, a brief explanation of the following should be provided:

The necessity and reason for conducting research and stating the problem
A review of past relevant research
Justification of the present study
Objectives and perspective of the present study

6) Literature Review

Research background or literature review or review of previous studies is a part of the article in which the status of the researches conducted in a research field is presented and the approaches that have been considered in that field, are reviewed.

The purpose of including the background section of the research is:

Establishing a logical connection between the information of previous researches and the research problem.
Finding a theoretical or empirical framework for the research problem.
Familiarity with research methods used in past researches.

To achieve these goals, it is necessary to pay attention to the following points:

Selection of information sources related to the research problem.
Presenting content from general to detailed (general and specific)
Avoiding to express things separately and without relation to each other.
Arrange content in an organized manner, along with logical trends.
Presenting the results of previous studies and criticizing them.

7) Research method and tools

In this section, sufficient explanations in the field of how to generate and analyze data and the methods and tools used in the research should be mentioned based on the following:

Research implementation method (type of study, complete system specifications, research environment, society and sample under study, sampling method and allocation of samples)
Data collection methods and tools: collection tools, how to compile and design the tool, validity and reliability of the tool.
Data analysis method: statistical methods and software used, statistical tests used and their application.

8) Research findings

The findings of the research should be expressed in the form of text, tables, graphs, images and maps with complete explanations.
The content presented in the text, tables and charts, images and maps should not be repeated.
Tables and graphs should be presented in a completely clear and correct manner from a statistical point of view.

9) Discussion and results

The results should be clear and accurate, and the statistical analyzes should be reported in a brief and explanatory manner and limited to the minimum table.
In case of using the software, the main outputs of the software should be presented in the form of photos for compatibility. In the "discussion" and data analysis section, the importance of the results is expressed and discussed. In this part, one should refrain from restating the results and proceed to a logical discussion and explanation of the results. Except for possible comparisons, references are not usually used in this section.

In this section, the following points are emphasized:
Mention the main findings of the research
Describing the research findings and comparing them with previous research
Possible reasons for confirming or rejecting the findings of others
Strengths and weaknesses of the study
Description of unexpected findings
Application of findings

10) Conclusion

Interpreting the quantitative results and explaining their implications, presenting the main findings of the research, confronting and comparing the research results with the findings of related researches, practical suggestions, future research suggestions and research limitations in the conclusion section are presented respectively. This section should display the fulfillment of the goals of the article.

11) Acknowledge and appreciation (optional)

In this section, the author/authors can mention and appreciate the people, centers, or institutions that have been influential in conducting the study, or in the preparation of the article, or cooperated.
Not mentioning acknowledge and appreciation means that the authors do not intend to acknowledge and appreciate the audience.

12) Ethical approval (optional)

If the article has ethical approval, the code approved by the ethics committee of the university should be inserted in this section. For example, state that: "This article has ethical approval number ....... from university ..... with program number ....... "
Not mentioning ethical approval means that the article does not have ethical approval.

13) Conflict of interest (optional)

Authors should disclose all affiliations that may be considered a potential conflict of interest. In this section, the authors must state any conflict of interest that has influenced the outcome of the research or the interpretation of the findings.
A potential conflict of interest could include receiving payment for the article, or obtaining stock or equity that may be gained or lost through the publication of the article.
When submitting an article to the journal, the corresponding author has the opportunity to suggest a possible reviewer for the article. Authors must avoid any possible conflict of interest or its manifestation in the selection of editors and reviewers. This type of conflict of interest does not apply only to the corresponding author, but also to the co-authors of the article.
Examples of possible conflicts of interest include:

One of the authors is in the same institution or organization as the named editor or reviewer;
One of the authors was a member of the thesis committee, editor or referee or vice versa;
One of the authors and the editor or reviewer are currently co-authors on another paper or have been co-authors on the same paper for the past two years.

Authors should not introduce people and brand names who they know have read the previous version of the article and made their suggestions; Because such knowledge automatically violates the secret evaluation process of the article.
If there is no conflict of interest in an article according to the authors; The following sentence should be added at the end of the article: "The authors have no conflicts of interest."
Not mentioning the conflict of interest means that the article has no conflict of interest.

14) Contribution of authors (optional)

In this section, the contribution and duty of each author in the preparation of the article is expressed as a percentage. Or it should be mentioned that: "All the authors contributed equally in writing the article."
Not mentioning the contributions of the authors means that all the authors contributed equally to the writing of the article.

15) Financial support (optional)

In case of financial support by a specific organization, it should be mentioned at the end of the title page. If financial support is not used, it should be clearly mentioned that: "This research has not received any financial support."
Failure to mention financial support means that this research did not receive any financial support.

16) List of symbols and abbreviations

The list of symbols and abbreviations, if any, is provided based on the guidelines mentioned in the original format file of the article

17) References

It is recommended to refer to Persian references and especially related articles published in the Journal of Engineering and Construction Management (JECM).
Only references should be mentioned at the end of the article that are also used in the text, so it should be avoided to mention similar and less important references.
A maximum of 30 references should be introduced for research articles.
Citations should preferably be related to the last 10 years.
To write references, use the desired style of JECM (IEEE Style) in EndNote or Mendeley referencing software.
All references must be written in English. It is necessary to insert the Persian language references in their English equivalent form and use the phrase (In Persian) at the end of them and inside the parentheses.
The references should be numbered in the order of use in the numbering text and their specifications according to the examples provided from number one in parentheses.

18) Footnote

Latin words and explanations that are avoided in the text are inserted in the footnotes respectively.

Orders for setting up and drawing tables, images and equations

Articles in this collection can only have images, tables, and equations, and titles such as figures, maps, photographs, diagrams, etc., are all known as images.
Tables and images should be limited in number, of appropriate quality, with numbers, clear, descriptive and short titles, and appropriate references in the text.
The titles of the tables should be written above them and the titles of images (charts, pictures and maps) should be written below them.
Tables should never be sent as photos. Table numbers and decimals must also be typed in Farsi.
If using digital images, use high quality images. The images should be clear enough that the findings mentioned in the title or text of the article can be seen, and color images should be used when necessary.
Avoid repeating the results both in the form of tables and in the form of images.
For writing equations, use math type equation insertion software and never insert equations and tables in image format. It should be noted that the file of this software can be downloaded from here.

Guide to changing the name of the authors

The policy of this collection in adding, removing and changing the names of authors for accepted articles is as follows:

Before the online publication of the accepted articles, requests to change or move or delete or add the names of people should be sent to the editor of the journal in an official letter only by the corresponding author. The following must be explained in this official request.

The reason for deletion or addition or change in the order of authors should be mentioned.
An official written confirmation from the author or authors involved in this change must be sent to the attachment, which shows the consent of all the authors involved in this field, whether it is deleted or added or moved.

Requests that are not sent by the corresponding author will be referred by the journal to the corresponding author, who must act according to the above instructions. It should be noted that the publication of the article in such cases remains suspended until the result is fully determined. Making changes after publication is subject to the approval of the editor and following the procedures of the publication.

Article Publication Charges (APC)

Authors are not charged for publishing the article.