The academic topic-based nature of theoretical framework level-0 items: a note on ALRA

The academic topic-based nature of theoretical framework level-0 items: a note on the subject of the agile literature review approach (ALRA)

While the management-concerns diagram is essentially co-created by the researcher and a few major stakeholders using the prevailing language used by them in the case study setting, the theoretical framework level-0 has to be deliberately expressed using the language that involves terms of academic topics [note: one can easily spot these academic topics in the table of contents of management discipline textbooks]. The main reason is that the theoretical framework level-0 serves as the "agenda to do literature review", though it is derived from the management-concerns diagram. As such, the researcher (in my case of my MBA students) needs to make use of his/ her management discipline knowledge, e.g. marketing management, supply chain management, strategic management and human resource management to perform such framework item construction task. Because more generic academic topic terms are used, it is a relatively straightforward task to provide some illustrative example of theoretical framework level-0 items. Examples are as follows [the academic topic terms are in bold]:

Zone 1: environmental drivers

Example 1.1: to evaluate the intensity of competition in the fast-food restaurant sector in Hong Kong.

Example 1.2: to evaluate the increasingly diversified consumer behavior of the sportwear products in Hong Kong

Zone 2: organizational capabilities

Example 2.1: to evaluate the staff recruitment capability of ABC Ltd.

Example 2.2: to evaluate the marketing competence of ABC Ltd.

Zone 3a: outcomes-related

Example 3a.1: to evaluate the staff morale of ABC Ltd.

Example 3a.2: to evaluate the competitive advantage status of ABC Ltd.

Zone 3b: solutions-related

Example 3b.1: to evaluate the existing management development programme of ABC Ltd.

Example 3b.2: to revise the marketing strategy of ABC Ltd so as to more effectively respond to the external challenges facing ABC Ltd.

Note: 

1. the academic topic terms should be able to assimilate the more idiosyncratic language used in the management-concerns diagram.

2. the academic topic terms are employed as the keywords to do literature search in order to construct the theoretical framework level-1a.