The inconspicuous zone 2 items in the management-concerns diagram construction (of the ALRA)

The inconspicuous zone 2 items in the management-concerns diagram construction (of the ALRA):

From the experience of exploring with my MBA students to construct management-concerns diagrams, it dawns on me that management-concerns items related to Zone 2 (organizational capabilities) of the Agile Literature Review Approach (ALRA) are often inconspicuous to many students. What often happens is as follows;

Researcher A: tell me one key management-concern that you could think of for your project case study of your Department of ABC Ltd?

Student-as-participant B: Consumers of XXX products are getting more price-conscious?

Researcher A: In this case, what are the impacts to your organization? [the so-what questioning tactic]

Student-as-participant B: I could see that it affects (i) the profitability and sales performance of our business and (ii) the morale of our salespeople who earn less sales commission.

Researcher A: Could you tell me what are the factors that lead to your consumers being more price-conscious?

Student-as-participant B: This is due to the poor economy that we now have, .... etc..

Researcher A: Next, could you tell me what your company, notably your Dept., has been thinking and working on to address this management concern of consumers getting more price-conscious?

Student-as-participant B: Our company has been thinking of how to attract new market segments with customers who are willing to buy our premium products (with higher profit margin)..... etc..

When these management-concerns items are reviewed, I could remind the students that there are items related to zone 1 (environmental drivers) (e.g. about the poor economy), items related to zone 3a (outcomes-related) (e.g. on sales performance) and items related to zone 3b (solutions-related). What is missing are zone 2 items (organization capabilities). [One of the possible reasons: certain participants could find it somewhat jittery to include research efforts related to evaluating an organizational capability topic, which is a kind of self-reflective evaluation exercise at the individual, departmental and organizational levels.] Thus, there is a need to come up with a few zone 2 items for the construction of a useful management-concerns diagram for dissertation project study purpose. This is not difficult to do so. The following are some hints:

1. The zone 2 items are most likely related to the Department the student focuses on in his/her research project investigation (e.g. due to the fact that the student is the department head of ABC Ltd.

2. Zones 3a and zone 3b items also hint at what zone 2 items are relevant in the construction of the management-concerns diagram, e.g. low staff morale of the sales team suggests that a useful zone 2 item to evaluate is the salesforce management competence of ABC Ltd.

3. When prompted by the researcher about what organizational capabilities items could be considered in the research investigation, given the management-concerns items identified so far, the participant will usually be able to come up with 1 to 2 zone items to include in the management-concerns diagram.

4. The researcher, based on his/her intellectual knowledge as related to the interview discussion, could also suggest a few zone 2 items for the participants to consider to include in the management-concerns diagram.

From the classroom practice on the construction of management-concerns diagrams with my students, I find that a useful management-concerns diagram draft could be produced in about 1 hour. It is useful in the sense that the diagram will have 2-3 zone 1 items, 1-2 zone 2 items, 2-3 zone 3a items and, finally, 1-2 zone 3b items.

I must also admit that my handwriting is quite lousy but the the ideas underlying the management-concerns diagram are clear. The wordings of the diagram items can be refined subsequently.

e-resources on how to formulate research findings: study materials

 e-resources on how to formulate research findings: study materials:

It comes to my attention that some students have difficulties to formulate researching findings. This activity is vital for the execution of chain of evidence. There are several reasons for that (including chain of evidence design quality problems). Some useful e-materials are provided for my research students to study:

1. Reporting and discussing your findings.

2. How to write results and discussions (video).

3. How to write a dissertation results section (video).

Reflect on the ideas from these e-learning materials and see how these ideas could help you to formulate research findings and discussion findings for your chain of evidence execution task.

For ALRA dissertation report writing, the formulation of research finding (RF) statements and discussion finding (DF) statements is very much influenced by the commitments underlying the theoretical framework level-1c, particularly in the form of the chain of evidence design. These commitments establish the focus and priority for the construction of the RF and DF statements. Note that these RF/DF statements are made in dissertation report chapters 4 and 5, and subsequently referred to chapter 6: conclusions and recommendations.

When identifying and labelling findings, both for research findings and discussion findings, you probably need to: 

(1) consolidate a few minute findings that reveal a shared ontological and epistemological point associated with a common research objective as one research finding/ discussion finding: and,

(2) label the significant piece of findings as research findings or discussion findings, leaving the minute findings without finding labels (i.e. research finding 1, research finding 2, discussion finding 1, and discussion finding 2, etc.).

(3) come up with a terse label for each finding, e.g. discussion finding 3 (on customers being more price-sensitive), discussion finding 4 (on managers' preference for transactional leadership style).

Doing so enables the establishment of a clearly focused chain of evidence that can be comprehended by readers; it is thus better able to draw readers' attention on the prime considerations related to the management-concerns, research objectives and formulated recommendations of the dissertation project.

About word count allowed for the MBA dissertation report: my view

 About word count allowed for the MBA dissertation report: my view

Previously, the recommended word count figure is 15,000 words. Then some students from previous intakes complained to the university and requested to lower the recommended word count figure to 12,000 words.

Now some MBA students tell me that their dissertation report word count figures are beyond 16,000 words and one of them told me that his friend's dissertation report in the same MBA programme is more than 16,000 words and he got a dissertation mark at 60 something.

My view is as follows:

1. Dissertation report should have a recommended word count at 15,000 words. Set at 12,000 words, it is much more challenging to produce a dissertation report up to MBA level because this requires report writing be much more concise.

2. Now that the recommended word count figure is 12,000, I would say that a dissertation report with an actual word count figure a bit less than 14,000 is quite acceptable.

3. When a student earned a dissertation report score at 60 something, with word count figure at more than 16,000 words (exceeding the recommended figure at 12,000 words.), the student should keep a low profile because exceeding the recommended word count figure by more than 30% is not something to be proud of, to say the least. As a marker, I will state in the assessment report that this is a major report weakness with figure excess such as this. I am not interested to know that the other markers and the university examiner do not mind or care about word count figure requirement and that they are happy to give such a report an academic score at 60 something. When other markers and students do not mind or do not care about the official word count guideline, it does not imply that I also do not mind or do not care about it.

4. If students now realize that the recommended word count figure should be 16,000 words, and not 12,000 words, they should ask the university to change the requirement back to 16,000 words.

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What to write on the overall assessment in terms of the ALRA dissertation report in report chapters 4-5

What to write on the overall assessment in terms of the ALRA dissertation report in chapters 4-5: some advices:

Advice 1

With reference to the MBA dissertation report chapter 4: presentation of research findings and 5: discussion of findings, there is a specific section called: 

Chapter 4

"4.4. Findings in terms of the theoretical framework of the dissertation project"

Chapter 5

"5.3. Discussion on the research findings in terms of the theoretical framework of the dissertation project"

My advice, as related to the zoning in the ALRA (agile literature review approach) theoretical framework, is as follows:

Focus on: 

(a) the overall assessment of how zone 1 [environmental drivers] status affects zone 2 [organizational capabilities] status, and, in turn, how zone 2 status affects zone 3a [outcomes-related] status. Finally, how zone 2 status and zone 3a status affect affect zone 3b[solutions-related] status, possibilities and prime considerations; This assessment endorses both systems thinking with sensitivity to the emergent properties at the zone level as well as the strategic alignment approach in I. Ansoff's work on strategic management.

(b) highlights the most critical factor and the prime wild card factor(s) in zone 1 [environmental drivers], and how these zone 1 factors affect the most critical factor [1 factor; in special cases, maximum 2 factors] and the prime wild card factor(s) [1-2 factors] in zone 2 [organizational capabilities], so on and so forth in zone 3a [outcomes related] and zone 3b [solutions related]. This assessment endorses critical path analysis (in project management), the management by exception principle and risk management rationale.

{note: on wild cards: "If you refer to someone or something as a wild card in a particular situation, you mean that they cause uncertainty because you do not know how they will behave"}

Due to word count constraint for dissertation report writing, this discussion has to be limited to less than 1 page [single line spacing].

Advice 2

As to "4.5. A synthesis of the main research findings: some overall comments" [chapter 4] and "5.4. A summary of the overall discussion results on the main research findings" [chapter 5], the discussion mainly offers a few concluding remarks, without additional serious viewpoints and insights. It should be in 2-3 short paragraphs.

Concluding remarks

By discussing the research findings and discussion findings at the zone level, the researcher presents these findings at a more holistic level in these report sections.

A research objective as an agenda item to do literature review: an example

 A research objective as an agenda item to do literature review (in the agile literature review approach): an example.

Research objectives are items that appear in theoretical framework level-0. In the context of theoretical framework level-0, a research objective serves as an agenda item to do literature review. An illustrative example is as follows:

Research objective (also known as a high-level research task): an example:

To evaluate the business model development capability of ABC Ltd (a startup). {also a core-focus-domain item located in zone 2 [organizational capabilities] in this case}

Now, go to google scholar to perform literature search with these key words

1. key words "Business model" (especially with "business model canvas"), select 2 articles on business model to extract two academic ideas via literature review.

2. key words "business model development", select 2 articles on business model development to extract two academic ideas via literature review.

3. key words "business model development startup", select 2 articles on business model development as related to startup to extract two academic ideas via literature review.

4. key words "business model development capability", select 1-2 articles on business model development capability to extract one to two academic ideas via literature review.

5. key words "core competence", select 1-2 articles on core competence to extract one to two academic ideas via literature review.

Having gone through this literature search exercise, you should have 8-10 articles containing 8-10 academic ideas to carry out a literature review. This literature review outcome (e.g., the intellectual learning gained, the construction of theoretical framework level-1a and the ability to write up dissertation report chapter 2: Literature Review) will inform you to conduct your high-level research task {i.e. to meet the research objective "To evaluate the business model development capability of ABC Ltd (a startup)"}.

This example illustrates how to make use of the key words in the research objective to carry out the literature search. The student should also carry out this literature search exercise on the academic publisher websites. Major examples are as follows:

Academic publisher websites:

1. Sciencedirect.

2. Proquest.

3. Emerald.insight.

4. Wiley online library.

5. Taylor and Francis online.

6. Sage journals.

7. Springer.

8. pdfdrive. [ebooks]

This example also explains why a research objective (in the context of the theoretical framework level-0) is also called an agenda item to do literature review (comprising both literature search and literature review).

Making recommendations in dissertation report (MBA) chapter 6: a note

Making recommendations in MBA dissertation report chapter 6: a note

Recommendations should be grouped into strategic, tactical and operational levels. They should be concrete. The following format is suggested for your reference:

Recommendation 1: with reference to discussion findings 2 [DF2] (xxx) and 3 (xxx) [DF3], the urgent management concern 4 (xxxx) [UMC4], and inspired by the successful business practice of ABC Ltd, it is recommended that (xxx, e.g, the top management team) adopt the XXX approach in the near future, as supported by (xxxx, e.g. the marketing team). It is estimated that this XXX approach will require about $xxxx investment.. This recommended approach is estimated to take XXX months to implement, and is able to generate XXX benefit. The recommendation is useful to address the management concern of XXX [re: UMC3 of the management-concerns diagram (Figure 1.1).    {note: UMC means urgent management concern}.

Note 1: this recommendation format adopts the chain of evidence practice (COEP), notably with the COEP pointers.

Note 2: when writing dissertation report, try to provide pointer labels next to the pointers, e.g., management concern 4 [on tight labour market on medical staff.] {pointer [pointer label]} for readers would have difficulties to comprehend sentences with lots of pointers without pointer labels.

The notion of strategic, tactical and operational levels for presenting dissertation recommendations: videos for study

The notion of strategic, tactical and operational levels for presenting dissertation recommendations:

The general recommendation for Chapter 6: conclusions and recommendations is that recommendations should be grouped into strategic, tactical and operational levels. However, quite some MBA students could not tell the differences between these three levels. Because of that, I compile the following list of YouTube videos on strategic, tactical and operational levels for study purpose:

1. strategic, tactical and operational planning

2. what is the difference between strategy and tactics?

3. DEVELOPING STRATEGIC PLAN TACTICAL AND OPERATIONAL PLANS

How to respond to dissertation supervisor's feedbacks with the agile literature review approach: an example

How to respond to dissertation supervisor's feedbacks with the agile literature review approach: an example:

This student refers the following supervisor's feedback to me and seek for my advice:

"My supervisor said that my questionnaire survey research design is not sophisticated enough and not up to MBA level. He asked me to revise it. I have attached the survey questionnaire herewith; pls give me some advice".

My advices are as follows:

"First of all, I am not your supervisor, so I will not review your survey questionnaire. You need to discuss with your supervisor for more specific advice on how to improve your questionnaire survey design. What I can offer are some suggestions on how you could proceed to improve your questionnaire design using the agile literature review approach. Try to do the following to make your survey research design "more sophisticated":

1. Review your theoretical framework level-1c to understand your present questionnaire survey research design (QSRD) in terms of what research objective your QSRD tries to address, as well as what academic ideas have been chosen to inform the QSRD. It is also useful to review your present questionnaire survey research design to refine it via more study on the topic of questionnaire survey research (e.g. via YouTube videos).

2. Try to uplift the level of sophistication of your QSRD (and possibly the overall research design) by doing the following 5 steps:

Step 1: review the management-concerns diagram to provide a more complicated understanding of the management concerns of the organization under study, especially on those management concerns closely associated with the present QSRD-linked research objective (as derived from specific management concerns). This may implies increasing more management-concerns items as well as using more complicated management-concerns item in your management-concerns diagram.

Step 2: review the theoretical framework level-0 to uplift the sophistication level of intellectual response to the management-concerns as depicted by the management-concerns diagram, especially on those items related to the QSRD.

Step 3: review the QSRD-linked research objective in the revised ("more sophisticated") theoretical framework level-0; and use this revised theoretical framework level-0 to conduct additional literature review such that the QSRD-linked research objective now has additional academic ideas to use and probably more complicated academic ideas to use in the theoretical framework level-1a (i.e. a more sophisticated theoretical framework level-1a to use now). [note: if the QSRD-linked research objective does not belong to the core-focus domain, then it is undesirable to uplift its sophistication level, notably in theoretical framework level-1a and 1c].

Step 4: review the theoretical framework level 1c to see if the questionnaire survey design can be enhanced to achieve a higher level of intellectual sophistication that is up to MBA level (as required by your project supervisor). Bear in mind that, a more sophisticated questionnaire survey design does not imply more questions, especially more open-ended questions to use in your QSRD, because a more complicated survey questionnaire can become so time-consuming that fewer willing respondents to participate in your questionnaire survey. Thus, consider step 5.

Step 5: consider if it is useful to employ one more research method, e.g. interview research, to address your QSRD-linked research objective. Bear in mind that different research method has different strengths and weaknesses; thus using an additional research method of a different kind with your questionnaire survey will uplift your sophistication level of research design to address the QSRD-linked research objective.

Finally, bear in mind that the sophisticated level of research work, including research design, is very much determined by your intellectual competence; thus, you (the researcher) should engage in your intellectual learning to strengthen your intellectual competence. In this regard, you may be interested in my research topic on managerial intellectual learning (which is grounded on critical systems thinking).

Now, after performing steps 1-5, discuss with your supervisor again to see if your strengthened research design, including that of the questionnaire survey, is up to your supervisor's perceived MBA level. IF you find that the situation remains unclear and worrying, and that the supervision relationship between you and your supervisor still works quite poorly, do not seek for my help; discuss with school admin direct.

References
1. KKH Folder of Learning and Development

2. An article "thinking systemically about complex systems" (free pdf download)

Chain of evidence design and execution in the agile literature review approach: an explanation

 Chain of evidence design and execution in the agile literature review approach (ALRA): an explanation:

Underlying the agile literature review approach is the chain of evidence. The chain of evidence establishes the validity and relevance of the actionable knowledge produced to address the management concerns as depicted in the management-concerns diagram of a case study (most likely a single case study). There are two chain of evidence exercises: (1) the design of the chain of evidence and (2) the execution of the chain of evidence. Further explanation is as follows:

I.  On the chain of evidence design phase

The following pointer symbols should also be noted for further discussion:

Management concerns (MCs): can be urgent management concerns (UMCs) and management concerns (MCs)

Research objectives (ROs)

Academic ideas (AIs)

Research methods (RMs): including data capturing methods (DCMs) ad data analysis methods (DAMs)

The direction of pointers in the design phase is:

MCs ---> ROs  ---> AIs --> RMs

[note: when writing dissertation report, try to provide pointer labels next to the pointers, e.g., RM1 [interview research on managerial competence] {pointer [pointer label]} for readers would have difficulties to comprehend sentences with lots of pointers without pointer labels .]

II. On the chain of evidence execution phase

The chain of evidence execution phase
Dissertation report chapters	Major evidence type
1. Dissertation Chapter 4: Presentation of Research Findings	A set of research findings (RFs) by research methods (RMs), associated with specific research objectives (ROs)
2. Dissertation report Chapter 5: Discussion of findings.	A set of discussion findings (DFs), using specific academic ideas (AIs) and data analysis methods on research findings (RFs).
3. Chapter 6: Conclusions and recommendations	A set of recommendations (Recommendation #), supported by specific discussion findings (DFs), academic ideas (AIs), plus additional researcher's intellectual judgements and imaginations, in response to specific ROs and management concerns (MCs).

Note the additional pointer symbols used in the execution phase:

Research findings (RFs): from chapter 4: presentation of researching findings

Discussion findings (DFs): from chapter 5: discussion of findings

Recommendations (Recommendation #), e.g. recommendation 1, recommendation 2, etc.... in chapter 6: conclusions and recommendations.

The direction of pointers in the execution phase is:

RFs (by RMs, notably DCMs, directed at ROs) ---> DFs (drawing on RFs, AIs and DAMS, directed at ROs) ---> Recommendation # (drawing on DFs; directed at ROs and MCs)

Concluding remarks

Overall, the directions of the chain of evidence design phase and the chain of evidence execution phase work in opposite direction. Also, the design phase covers only dissertation report chapters 1 to 3 while the execution phase deals with dissertation report chapters 4 to 6. It is important to insert the pointers in the dissertation report with clear labels (not just the pointer symbols) so as to (a) make the dissertation report easier to follow and (b) the chain of evidence explicit and clear.

It should be pointed out that the quality of analysis, including the quality of chain of evidence, depend ultimately on the intellectual, research and writing skills of the researcher. The researcher's skills determine the chain of evidence design and execution quality of the dissertation report. This practice note solely deals with the clarity of chain of evidence in the agile literature review approach. The quality of line of reasoning also benefits substantially from the subject of argumentation.

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How to identify zone 3b items for theoretical framework level-0 construction

How to identify zone 3b [solutions related] items for theoretical framework level-0 construction in ALRA:

Similar to the identification of zone 3a items, the identification of zone 3b items (solutions-related) is done via two major routes:

1. Via the exploratory interviews with stakeholders in the project orientation phase. In this, case you, the researcher, simply ask the stakeholders (e.g. the gatekeeper) what change initiative, organizational intervention effort and similar "solutions" have been or are being formulated and evaluated.

2. Via logical thinking, primarily by deriving zone 3b (solutions-related) items from from zone 2 (organizational capabilities) items. For example [example 1], the zone 2 item "to evaluate the sales force competence of ABC Ltd" can be transformed into a corresponding zone 3b item "to formulate effective training and development programmes for the sales force of ABC Ltd". Another example [example 2] can be a zone 2 item "to evaluate the salespeople recruitment competence of ABC Ltd", which can be transformed (logically derived) into a zone 3b item "to formulate and introduce an effective salespeople recruitment approach for ABC Ltd".

Further comments

A. Sometimes, the logical derivation from a zone 2 item to a zone 3b is less straightforward: e.g. "to evaluate the managerial competence of ABC Ltd" [zone 2] can be related to a zone 3b item of "to introduce measures to improve staff morale", BECAUSE weak managerial competence could lead to poor staff morale. Thus, the zone 3b item about staff morale is a consequence of weak managerial competence.

B. The ultimate decision on which items are to include in theoretical framework level-0 is based on the personal intellectual interest of the researcher, although the theoretical framework level-0 and its items are based on the management-concerns diagram. More specifically, not all management-concerns diagram items have to be transformed into theoretical framework level-0 items.

Note: a reasonable number of zone 3b (solutions-related) in theoretical framework level-0 is 2-3 items.

How to identify Zone 3a items for theoretical framework level-0: a guide

How to identify Zone 3a items for theoretical framework level-0: a guide:

First of all, it is useful to have 2 to 3 items (i.e. research objectives) for Zone 3a (outcomes-related) of a theoretical framework level-0, in order to exhibit a reasonably complicated intellectual response to the management-concerns diagram of a dissertation project that utilizes the agile literature review approach (ALRA).

The next question is: how to identify these zone 3a items? These items are the consequences (i.e., outcomes) of the concerns from items in zone 2 (organizational capabilities-related). Thus, these zone 3a items are identified from the following sources;

1. Learned from the stakeholders (notably, the gatekeeper of a case study), via the initial exploratory interviews with them in the project orientation phase. They are identified from the "so-what" questions on the management-concerns items related to zone 2.

2. Logically derived from the zone 2 items direct in the theoretical framework level-0. For example, if the zone 2 item is : "to evaluate the sales force competence of ABC Ltd", then the logically derived zone 3a item can be "to evaluate the sales force performance of ABC Ltd". And, if the zone 2 item is "to evaluate the operations management capability of ABC Ltd", then the logically derived zon3a item can be "to evaluate the operations management performance of ABC Ltd". It should also be reminded that the logical derivation can be less than direct. For example, the zone 2 item "to evaluate the managerial competence of ABC Ltd" can be employed to develop a zone 3a item "to evaluate the staff morale of ABC Ltd" BECAUSE weak managerial competence of ABC Ltd can lead to poor staff morale of the company.

Subsequently, which zone 3a items are to be chosen to include in the theoretical framework level-0 depends on the intellectual preference of the researcher who does the dissertation project. 

Note: do not say that it is based on the "instructions" of your dissertation project supervisor, because your dissertation project supervisor is your coach and mentor, not your boss.