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THE RESEARCH PROCESS: AN OVERVIEW - Coggle Diagram
THE RESEARCH PROCESS: AN OVERVIEW
THE RESEARCH PROCESS, exhibit 4-1
STAGE 6: REPORTING THE RESULTS
Adjusts the style and organization of the report according to the target audience, the occasion, and the purpose of the research
A research report should contain the following:
Overview of the research
Implementation strategies
Technical appendix
Executive summary
STAGE 1: CLARIFYING THE RESEARCH QUESTION
Begin with management dilemma -
symptom of an actual problem
Discover management dilemma => 1a Exploration => Define management question => 2a Exploration interview with... => Define research question(s)
Outcome: management-research question
Management question => Research question => Investigative questions => measurement questions. A poorly defined management question will misdirect research question.
STAGE 2: PROPOSING RESEARCH
RESOURCE ALLOCATION AND BUDGETS
project planning => data gathering => analysis, interpretation, and reporting each shares about equally in the budget
Rule-of-thumb budgeting, Departmental or functional area budgeting, Task budgeting
no more than one-third of the total research budget
Exhibit 4-3
VALUING RESEARCH INFORMATION
EVALUATION METHOD
PRIOR OR INTERIM EVALUATION: review costs and benefits at the end of each stage and give or withhold further authorization.
OPTION ANALYSIS: when management has a choice between well-defined options
EX POST FACTO EVALUATION: after-the-fact event, sharpen the manager’s ability to make judgments about future research proposals.
DECISION THEORY: When there are alternatives from which to choose
each alternative is explicitly stated
decision
variable is defined by an outcome that may be measured
a decision rule is determined by
which outcomes may be compared.
THE RESEARCH PROPOSAL
A written proposal: may serve the purpose of a legally binding
contract.
A research proposal: oral, when a manager directs
STAGE 3: DESIGNING THE RESEARCH PROJECT
SAMPLING DESIGN
target population
Census: requires all elements
Sample
PILOT TESTING
be skipped when the researcher tries to condense the project time frame.
detect weaknesses in design and instrumentation and to provide proxy data for selection of a probability sample
Pretesting: rely on colleagues, respondent surrogates, or actual
respondents
RESEARCH DESIGN
By creating a design using diverse methodologies, researchers are able to achieve greater insight
The research design is the blueprint for fulfilling objectives and answering questions
STAGE 4: DATA COLLECTION
AND PREPARATION
Characterized by abstractness, verifiability, elusiveness, and closeness to the phenomena
Primary data, Secondary data
Data are edited to ensure consistency across respondents and to locate omissions
STAGE 5: DATA ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION
Explore relationships among variables.
Determine if the results are consistent with their hypotheses and theories.
Involves reducing accumulated data to a manageable size, developing summaries, looking for patterns, and applying statistical techniques
RESEARCH PROCEDURE ISSUES
UNRESEARCHABLE QUESTIONS
To be researchable, a question must be one for which observation or other data collection can provide the answer
Many questions cannot be answered on the basis of information alone.
COMPANY DATABASE STRIP-MINING
Turn raw data into useful information
Data mining rarely answers all management questions
related to a particular management dilemma
ILL-DEFINED MANAGEMENT PROBLEMS
POLITICALLY MOTIVATED RESEARCH
THE FAVORED-TECHNIQUE SYNDROME
Will dominates the decisions about what will be studied (both investigative and measurement questions) and how (research design)
Total quality management (TQM),...
