Avoid requirement of submitting a gatekeeper informed consent form: a note

Avoid requirement of submitting a gatekeeper informed consent form: a note on research ethics for my MBA students

For MBA students doing dissertation projects, it is increasingly becoming more difficult to obtain a gatekeeper consent form (which is required if the student wants to study a particular organizational unit and its internal information (e.g. via interview of its staff and examination of its internal documents, etc). There is a way to avoid doing so. Essentially, this implies avoiding to collect primary and secondary internal (e.g. organizational specific) data of the organizational unit concerned.

The suggested research method practice: revise your research objective such that you only collect data not to do with the internal information of organizations. For example, you could interview your friends on their opinion about the general management concerns of the retail sector in a particular place (e.g. Hong Kong) [case 1], but not to learn their opinion (e.g. they being employees of Watsons HK) about the management concerns of a particular company, (e.g. Watsons HK) [case 2]. For case 1, there is no need to provide a gatekeeper informed consent form  from a specific organization (note **), while , for case 2, you need to provide a gatekeeper informed consent form from an authorized manager of Watsons HK. This is because, for case 2, you intend to gather internal information (e.g. Watsons HK employee opinions on Watsons HK). It is very likely that the university will reject your ethical form application for case 2 if you are not able to submit a proper gatekeeper informed consent form from Watsons HK.

Note **: if you request a manager of a particular company to introduce colleagues to you conduct opinion survey about the broader business/ industry trends, it probably is useful (nice to do?) to seek for informed consent from the manager concerned. In this case, ask the manager to fill in a gatekeeper informed consent form.

*** you need to make sure that your revised research method (no gathering of internal data of a specific organization) is useful to address your (revised) research objective (e.g. not specific organization-related).   To revise the dissertation research objective set properly, it is highly recommend to review the supportive management concerns diagram or research gap-related diagrams as propounded in the agile literature review approach.

The nature of dissertation: e-resources (videos)

 The nature of dissertation: e-resources (videos)

1. What is a dissertation?

2. What is a dissertation?

3. What is a dissertation?

4. What Is a Dissertation & Basic Dissertation Overview and Format for Grad Students

5. Difference between thesis and dissertation (discussion mainly at PhD level)

6. Characteristics of research

Related reading: a study note on dissertation project characteristics.

Business dissertation project types and their associated tasks: a summary table for the ALRA

Business dissertation project types and their associated tasks: a summary table for the ALRA:

• Type 1 project: consulting-oriented.
• Type 2 project: academic-oriented.

Note: For academic-oriented project type, task 4, the researcher could use the academic literature review tree-b in lieu of the theoretical framework B.

References:

1. Collections of blog notes on ALRA 2019,  2018, 2022, 2023 and 2024 [total 5 volumes].

2.  ALRA articles.

Difficulties to formulate specific research methods to use: 3 examples

Difficulties to formulate specific research methods to use: 3 examples

Example 1. My project is to study my personal business venture to launch a new service business, for the zone 2 research objective "to evaluate the business model development capability of ABC Ltd", what research method to use. I am the only person (the founder) of the new venture at this stage?

Example 2. My project is to study my ex-employer, my ex-colleague (as the gatekeeper) introduce me to interview a senior sales representative. Could my dissertation project employs a single research interview on 1 interviewee? To compensate for this research limitation, could I extend my questionnaire survey so that I have more survey data for analysis?

Example 3. My project is to study the sales department of ABC Ltd, and I am the newly appointed sales manager of ABC Ltd. I have difficulties to study the managerial competence of ABC Ltd, as the CEO who employs me is not in the office most of the time and does not like to communicate with the staff at ABC Ltd. CEO appears quite unapproachable. What research methods should I use too study this research objective (on managerial competence) in this case?

The key considerations in doing dissertation projects: a note to students

The key considerations in doing dissertation projects: a note to students:

Many students hold some misunderstanding about doing dissertation projects:

1. What research methods to use?

2. Can any people offer me some relevant academic readings to study?

3. Can I use my course assignment works to re-engineer a dissertation proposal?

4. Can I use my company's research reports, e.g. customer survey, employee survey, as my dissertation project research methods "to use"?

Comments: 

1. What research methods to use?: This is not the first question to ask.

2. Can any people offer me some relevant academic readings to study?: Ask this question only after you have figure out your agenda to do literature review; and then doing literature search is straightforward; you do not need to ask your "professor" friends to do that for you.

3. Can I re-engineer my course assignment works to come up with a dissertation proposal?: It may influence your research interest, but normal subject course work requires you to show knowledge a particular subject; dissertation project requires you to show competence as a researcher. So, it is not a good idea to "re-engineer" your assignment work in this regard.

4. Can I use my company's research reports, e.g. customer survey, employee survey, as my dissertation project research methods "to use"? Do not do that; it is not your primary research methods to use and they are not informed by your literature review findings.

My advice:

1. Follow the agile literature review approach (ALRA).

2. Reflect on your learning objectives, mindset*, intellectual curiosity and life priority.

3. Pay attention to time management on dissertation projects.

4. Pay attention to methods to accelerate learning.

5. You are the researcher and your project supervisor is your mentor**, not a supervisor who "instructs" you how to perform clearly defined tasks, nor your tutor on management subjects and research methods, and, finally, nor your boss who alone determine your dissertation project result.

* a case study on mindset and intellectual curiosity: student A: "all those discussion of academic theories are essentially dribbling". 

** as a mentor, in this setting, your supervisor raises "insightful"  (e.g. exploratory) questions to guide you to do your dissertation projects, mainly by reviewing and commenting on your dissertation project ideas. Some research experience sharing from your supervisor is also provided to you from time to time.

E-resource on positionality in Research Method study: a list

 E-resource on positionality in Research Method study: a list

Videos:

1. Positionality & Research: Awareness Strategies

2. Positionality Statements.

3. Positionality Statement-Megan.

4. Reflexivity and positionality in research.

5. Lightning Talk: Positionality Statements.

6. Good practices: reflexivity.

Lightweight academic-oriented dissertation project: a note for MBA students

Lightweight academic-oriented dissertation project: an ALRA note for MBA students

While consulting-oriented dissertation project type (in ALRA study), being management-concerned driven, is most suitable for MBA students to conduct, finding a case study and requesting a gatekeeper  (a topic in research ethics) to approve the MBA student to conduct the dissertation project in his/ her organization could be a serious challenge to many MBA students. In this case, a lightweight academic-oriented dissertation project appears more feasible. The initial steps are as follows:

1. Pick up a business management topic, e.g. talent management, AI application in business, and consumer behavior of generation Z, etc., and do some preliminary literature review of about 3-4 academic articles, plus a quick newspaper article study (about 3-4 articles).

2. Perform a quick research gap analysis to come up with 2-3 research gap statements. (All academic articles discuss research gaps in the introductory part of them in order to justify the study in terms of academic originality).

3. Convert the research gap statements into research objective statements.

4. Construct preliminary diagrams as specified in the agile literature review approach (ALRA) (for the academic-oriented dissertation project type).

Having done that, the MBA student should now be capable of producing a synopsis form and, shortly afterward, a dissertation proposal. 

Taking up an academic-oriented dissertation project avoids the necessity to do a case study research (and the need to gain the approval of a gatekeeper). Nevertheless, it is still expected to employ  at least two primary research methods, e.g. observational research, questionnaire survey, interview research and focus group research.

The lightweight guideline proposed here is mainly about how to produce a dissertation proposal in a lightweight manner.