e-resource on primary (or empirical) research

 e-resource (mainly videos) on primary (or empirical) research

1a. Empirical research

1b. Empirical research

2. Top three primary research methods

3. Primary vs secondary research

4. Primary vs secondary sources

My teaching plan on the layer 2 (research approaches) of the onion model of research

My teaching plan on the layer 2 (research approaches) of the onion model of research

The study materials are organized by me in terms of three views on the research approaches: (1) the logic view, (2) the empirical research cycle view and (3) the enriched research approach view.

Four class activities to go through:

Class activity 1: introduce the logic view

Class activity 1a: introduce the topic of inductive and deductive logic. (A pre-study topic: what is an argument?)

Class activity 1b: scientific thinking: inductive and deductive reasoning.

Class activity 1c: deductive, inductive and abductive reasoning. (also study the slide presentation on abductive reasoning; a sophisticated discussion on abductive analysis.).

"Inductive reasoning is a method of drawing conclusions by going from the specific to the general. It's usually contrasted with deductive reasoning, where you proceed from general information to specific conclusions".  

“Inductive reasoning is a logical approach to making inferences, or conclusions. Deductive reasoning is a logical approach where you progress from general ideas to specific conclusions” 

(re: the source).

Class activity 2: introduce the empirical research cycle view

Choose either Class Activity 2a or 2b to introduce in the lecture is adequate: the empirical research cycle view.

Class activity 2a: introduce the empirical cycle of research (re: the video).

Class activity 2b: introduce the research approach cycle (re: the video).

Class activity 3: a more elaborated briefing on research approaches (e.g. discussion with reference to the topics of research philosophy and data types): the enriched research approach view (re: the video). Also take a closer look at the topics of (1) abductive reasoning (re: a sophisticated discussion on abductive analysis. [video]) and analytic induction for a more enriched discussion on the topic of the research approach.

“Inductive research is a method of developing theories or generalizations based on specific observations or data. It begins with data collection and identifies patterns to form new theories or hypotheses” (re: the source)

“Deductive research starts with a theory, forms a hypothesis, and tests it through observation and evidence” (re: source)

Class activity 4: Class discussion on the topic of research approaches.

Additional reading: a tool to organize dissertation report discussion related to the topic of research approaches.

e-resource (videos) on quantitative vs qualitative research

e-resource on quantitative vs qualitative research

Topic 1: Quantitative research

1.1. Characteristics of quantitative research

1.2. Quantitative data collection

1.3 Quantitative data analysis

Topic 2: Qualitative research

2.1 Characteristics of qualitative research

2.2 Qualitative data collection

2.3. Qualitative data analysis

Topic 3: Quantitative vs qualitative research (and data)

3.1. Quantitative vs qualitative data (video)

3.2 Quantitative Research vs Qualitative Research (video 1)

3.3 Quantitative vs qualitative research (video 2)

3.4 Quantitative vs qualitative research (video 3)

3.5 Empirical studies: qualitative vs quantitative (video 4)

3.6 How to measure the quality of quantitative and qualitative research? 

Work-in-progress dissertation content review worksheet: a note for the ALRA (academic-oriented type) users

Work-in-progress dissertation content review worksheet: a note for the ALRA (academic-oriented type) users

From time to time, a researcher using the agile literature review approach (ALRA) (academic-oriented type) needs to perform a stock-take and review of the major dissertation project ingredients to ensure that the project direction is in order. In this case, the researcher can make use of an inventory list (i.e. the work-in-progress (WIP) dissertation content review worksheet) to review the WIP dissertation quality. The worksheet template is shown as follows:

The research gap statements	The derived research objective statements	The subsuming research questions	Academic ideas to use	Research methods to use
Research gap statement 1	Research objective statement 1	Research question 1.1 Research question 1.2 … etc.	Academic idea 1.1 Academic idea 1.2 Academic idea 1.3	Research method 1.1 Research method 1.2
Research gap statement 2	Research objective statement 2	Research question 2.1 Research question 2.2 … etc.	Academic idea 2.1 Academic idea 2.2 Academic idea 2.3	Research method 2.1 Research method 2.2
Research gap statement 3	Research objective statement 3	Research question 3.1 Research question 3.2 … etc.	Academic idea 3.1 Academic idea 3.2 Academic idea 3.3	Research method 3.1
… etc.	… etc.	… etc.	… etc.	… etc.

 

There are a number of review questions to consider when studying this review worksheet:

Question 1: Do these lower-level research gap and objective statements constitute a coherent pair of overall research gap and objective statements?

Question 2: Do the research questions appear convincing to be subsumed under their respective research objectives?

Question 3: Do the academic ideas appear to be relevant to inform the investigation of their respective research objectives and research questions? Is it necessary to increase (or decrease) the number of academic ideas to use? Is it necessary to improve the quality of the academic ideas to use?

Question 4: Do the research methods appear to be relevant to inform the the investigation of their respective research objectives and research questions? Is it necessary to increase (or decrease) the number of research methods to use? Is it necessary to improve the quality of the research methods to use?

If some of the answers to the four questions are negative, the students need to spend additional effort to: (i) carry out research gap analysis,  (ii) carry out literature review, and (iii) study the subject of Research Methods. The effort then enables the researcher to refine the quality of the research gap and research objective statements, the quality of the research questions and the quality of the research methodology and the research method design.

** Some of the suggested research questions and academic ideas (e.g. theories to use) could come from your dissertation project supervisor. You, the researcher, can then include these suggestions into your review worksheet in order to carry out a holistic review of the WIP dissertation content.

Lastly, the review worksheet is for work-in-progress project review, it is thus not recommended to incorporate it into the researcher's dissertation report.

On the first layer of the onion model related to the popular research methodology profile of the MBA dissertation projects

On the first layer of the onion model related to the popular research methodology profile of the MBA dissertation projects.

This practice note is for my MBA students doing dissertation projects with the agile literature review approach (ALRA).

When designing and evaluating the research methodology of your dissertation project, you should be able to make use of the onion model of research to conduct the design and evaluation exercise. This note deals with the first layer of the onion model, which is about the research philosophy layer. The main concern here is how to anchor your research methodology more explicitly on an appropriate research philosophy. I make use of the following diagram to offer a suggestion, primarily for students using the agile literature review approach (ALRA).

(re: the source video)

For my MBA students doing dissertation project with the agile literature review approach (the consulting-oriented project type), they do case study research, with both quantitative and qualitative research methods (also a kind of mixed method research in this case). As such, they would find the research philosophy of pragmatism most suitable to constitute philosophical foundation of their dissertation projects. In other words, their research design is to be linked to pragmatism (on the first layer of the onion model of research).

As to those students using the agile literature review approach (the academic-oriented project type), most likely, they do not do case study research; nevertheless, their method choice (layer 4 of the onion model) is very likely to be mixed methods research. Thus, the most attractive research philosophy choice (layer 1 of the onion model) for them is also pragmatism.

1. Two related videos to study: on research philosophy: the key concepts and ontology, epistemology, positivism and interpretivism.

2. A video on: qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods research design

Reference

Saunders, M.N.K., Lewis, P. & Thornhill, A. (2019) Research methods for Business students. 8th edition. Harlow: Pearson.

A tool to organize the discussion on the onion model layer of "approaches" in the agile literature review approach

A tool to organize the discussion on the onion model layer of "approaches" in the agile literature review approach (ALRA).

This practice note is for the MBA students doing dissertation project with the agile literature review approach.

On writing the dissertation report chapter of Research Methodology, students using the agile literature review approach make use of the diagrams of the theoretical framework level-1c (for the consulting-oriented project type) and the academic literature review tree-b (for the academic-oriented project type). It is expected that the students will then evaluate his/her research methodology in terms of the onion model of research. This practice note deals with layer 2 of the onion model, which is about the approaches to theory development (re: a brief video on this Research Method topic).

This note proposes using the following table to make explicit what specific approaches (to theory development) [layer 2 of the onion model] are employed in the research methods employed in the dissertation project under examination. The table template is as follows:

 Table 1: The research approach tasks involved by the research methods in the dissertation project.

Research methods employed	Research approach tasks involved
Research method 1: semi-structured interview	Induction task 1.1: Induction task 1.2: Deduction task 1.1: Deduction task 1.2:
Research method 2: questionnaire survey	Deductive task 2.1:
Research method 3: document study of exit interview records of ABC Ltd.	Induction task 3.1: Deduction task 3.1:
….etc.	….etc.

 

Further reading: examples of inductive and deductive reasoning.

Reference

Saunders, M.N.K., Lewis, P. & Thornhill, A. (2019) Research methods for Business students. 8th edition. Harlow: Pearson.

A note on autobiography as a research method to use in MBA dissertation projects

A note on autobiography as a research method to use in MBA dissertation projects

One of my MBA students asked me whether he could use his own previous startup failure for a case study research for doing his dissertation project. My answer is that it cannot be a case study research because it is case history and not a contemporary phenomenon for investigation. This should become clear from the one of the features of case study research (Yin, 2018) that case study research focuses on contemporary events whereas history study does not. (note: a video on case study research).

The MBA student that raises his query could, instead, consider the research method of autobiography: "The autobiographical method refers to a specific form of research. Data collected within autobiographical research come from the own life experiences of the research and the author of the work" (source). To consider to use the research method of autobiography, the student needs to discuss the idea with his/her supervisor as the employment of autobiography research method in an MBA dissertation project is not common.

A historical study of a case is not suitable for usage  with the agile literature review approach (the consulting type) as it is not addressing a set of present management-concerns as owned by some of the managers of an organization and revealed in a management-concerns diagram.

As a side issue, it is acceptable to study a reported (past) case study (reported in a business journal) as a secondary research; in this case, the researcher might conduct a theory-driven analysis on the case study reported in a business journal (i.e. on the secondary data).

Reference

Yin, R. 2018. Case Study Research, Sage.