DOING RESEARCH
IN BUSINESS AND
MANAGEMENT
An essential guide to planning your project
Mark Saunders
Philip Lewis
Second Edition
Doing Research in
Business and Management
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Doing Research in
Business and Management
An essential guide to planning your project
Mark Saunders and Philip Lewis
Second Edition
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Names: Saunders, M. N. K., author. | Lewis, Philip, 1945– author.
Title: Doing research in business and management / Mark Saunders and Philip
Lewis.
Description: 2nd edition. | Harlow, England : Pearson, 2018. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017023723 | ISBN 9781292133522 (print) | ISBN 9781292133539
(pdf) | ISBN 9781292222318 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Business—Research.
Classification: LCC HD30.4 .S277 2018 | DDC 650.072—dc23
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Print edition typeset in 9/13pt Stone Serif ITC Pro by iEnergizer Aptara®, Ltd.
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NoTE THAT ANY PAGE CRoSS REFERENCES REFER To THE PRINT EDITIoN

1 Choosing your research topic 1
2 Reviewing the literature critically 31
3 Managing the research process 58
4 Using secondary data 85
5 Choosing your research design 104
6 Collecting data 137
7 Analysing data 179
8 Writing and presenting the research proposal 215
Appendix 1: How to reference 239
Bibliography 247
Index 250
Brief contents
This page intentionally left blank
About this text xi
About the authors xv
Acknowledgements xvi
1 Choosing your research topic 1
1.1 Why you should read this chapter 1
1.2 Why choosing the right research topic is so important 2
1.3 Why choosing a research topic is difficult 4
1.4 Ten ways to generate ideas for a research topic 5
1.5 How to refine research topic ideas 11
1.6 What makes a good research topic? 15
1.7 How to turn a research idea into a research project 18
Summary 28
Thinking about your research topic 29
References 30
2 Reviewing the literature critically 31
2.1 Why you should read this chapter 31
2.2 What a critical literature review is 32
2.3 Why it is important to review the literature critically 34
2.4 The types of literature available to you 37
2.5 Searching for and obtaining literature 39
2.6 Evaluating the usefulness of literature to your research 46
2.7 Reading, noting and correctly referencing useful literature 47
2.8 Drafting your critical literature review 52
Summary 55
Thinking about your critical literature review 56
References 57
3 Managing the research process 58
3.1 Why you should read this chapter 58
3.2 Getting access to your research organisation, respondents
and participants 59
3.3 What about access to information? 61
3.4 Six strategies for making sure that you get the organisational
access you want 62
3.5 Managing yourself 69
3.6 Managing your supervisor 71
Contents
viii Contents
3.7 Managing your university 74
3.8 The ethics of doing research 75
Summary 83
Thinking about your research process 84
References 84
4 Using secondary data 85
4.1 Why you should read this chapter 85
4.2 Forms secondary data can take 86
4.3 The potential of secondary data 93
4.4 Possible pitfalls of using secondary data 96
4.5 Assessing the suitability of secondary data 98
4.6 Where and how to find secondary data 100
Summary 101
Thinking about using secondary data 102
References 103
5 Choosing your research design 104
5.1 Why you should read this chapter 104
5.2 The importance of research philosophy 106
5.3 Differing approaches to theory development: deduction,
induction and abduction 111
5.4 Differing purposes: exploratory, descriptive and explanatory studies 115
5.5 Differing strategies 119
5.6 Making sure your research conclusions are believable 131
Summary 135
Thinking about your research design 136
References 136
6 Collecting data 137
6.1 Why you should read this chapter 137
6.2 Selecting samples 138
6.3 Collecting data using questionnaires 148
6.4 Collecting data using semi-structured or unstructured interviews 158
6.5 Collecting data using observation 168
Summary 176
Thinking about collecting data 177
References 177
7 Analysing data 179
7.1 Why you should read this chapter 179
7.2 Different types of data 180
Contents ix
7.3 Analysing data quantitatively 183
7.4 Analysing data qualitatively 202
Summary 212
Thinking about analysing data 213
References 214
8 Writing and presenting the research proposal 215
8.1 Why you should read this chapter 215
8.2 The importance of the research proposal 216
8.3 When you should write your research proposal 220
8.4 What you should include in your research proposal 220
8.5 The style you should use to write your research proposal 227
8.6 How your research proposal will be judged 231
Summary 237
Thinking about your research proposal 237
References 238
Appendix 1: How to reference 239
Bibliography 247
Index 250
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It is now 20 years since we collaborated in the writing of our first research methods
book and six years since we wrote the first edition of Doing Research in Business and
Management. The success of both books suggests that research methods is a popular subject with business and management students. This may be so. But we think that it has
more to do with the fact that research methods is a complex area – one where it is easy
to do things, but much less easy to do things right.
In writing the second edition of Doing Research in Business and Management, we have
responded to the many comments we have received regarding the previous edition as
well as recent developments in research methods and methodology. In particular this
has led us to revise Chapter 4 to take account fully of the numerous sources of secondary data available online; Chapter 5 to incorporate fully revised sections on philosophical underpinnings of management research including a discussion of postmodernism,
and on different approaches to theory development including a discussion of abduction; Chapter 6 to incorporate a new section on observation; and an appendix on how
to reference. Alongside this we have taken the opportunity to also update examples and
references as well as revise tables and figures. Inevitably, the body of knowledge of
research methods has developed further since 2012, and we have revised all chapters
accordingly. Our experiences of teaching and supervising students and working
through the methods with them have suggested alternative ways to explain concepts,
and we have incorporated these where appropriate. However, the basic structure
remains the same as the first edition.
When we wrote the first edition of Doing Research in Business and Management, we
had one overall mission in mind. That was to write a text that was clear and straightforward and explained things in a way that lost none of the complexity, or academic rigour, of the subject. In writing the second edition this mission has not altered. We still
feel just as passionate about clear communication.
In fully revising Doing Research in Business and Management, we have taken into
account that although some degree programmes require students to complete an
assessed research project, they may be told that, rather than collect their own data, they
should use only data that have already been collected for some other purpose (secondary data) or, alternatively, write an extended review of the literature. For a second category of students on undergraduate programmes, the extent of their research work is a
research methods module which is assessed by a research proposal. There is a third category, those business and management students who opt not to do a research project at
all. For those undertaking research to be assessed by a written project report, we aim to
help in all aspects of the research process: from thinking of a topic through to writing
the final submission. We therefore include material, in Chapter 3, on managing the
research process, as well as chapters on using secondary data (Chapter 4) and reviewing
About this text
xii About this text
the literature critically (Chapter 2). There are also two chapters (6 and 7) on collecting
and analysing data, as an understanding of these is important for all types of research
projects as well as preparing a research proposal. If you’re taking a research methods
module which is assessed by a research proposal, you will find that there is considerable
emphasis on the preparation of a research proposal. Indeed, Chapter 8 deals specifically
with writing the research proposal.
It may sound strange, but we think that business and management students in the
third category, those who opt not to do a research project at all, can gain just as much
from this book as those in the other two categories. As a student, you will spend much
of your time studying material which is the result of careful research that has been scrutinised by the research community prior to publication. This scrutiny is a guarantee of
good quality: that you should put your faith in what you have read. However, some of
what you read may not have been through quite such a rigorous process. Knowing
something about the research process enables you to ask the right questions of the
material you are studying. It gives you the sense of healthy scepticism that is the hallmark of a university education.
How you might use this text
We don’t anticipate that you will read this text progressively from Chapter 1 through
to Chapter 8. In fact, you may not read all the chapters, although we certainly hope
that you will! The reason, we suspect, is that you will choose those chapters that
meet your own needs. This may be because you are in one of the categories we mentioned earlier, have specific questions about the research process you need to answer,
or it may be that your research methods lecturers specify certain chapters. We’ve
written the chapters in such a way that they can be read on their own without
recourse to the other chapters. To some extent, they draw inevitably on material
from other chapters directly. Where this is so, we have cross-referenced to the relevant chapter. But the point remains that you can pick up any chapter in isolation
and make sense of it.
This book is not a self-study text in the truest sense; there are no questions with
model answers! However, we have included points in each chapter which facilitate an
element of independent learning. Each chapter begins with a summary of content
which we call ‘Why read this chapter?’ This gives you some idea of the chapter content
and the approach we have taken on the topic being discussed. Each chapter contains a
small number of examples of research called ‘Research in practice’. These serve to illustrate in a practical manner some of the points being made in the chapter, in much the
same way as a lecturer would give practical examples in a research methods lecture.
Every chapter ends with a summary of the main points in the chapter and a section
called ‘Thinking about . . .’ Here we make suggestions as to how you may test and reinforce the learning you have achieved during the reading of the chapter. Throughout the
book, key research terms we use are isolated and placed in ‘Definition’ boxes to make it
easy for you to refresh your understanding of these terms as you read through each
chapter.
About this text xiii
What’s in the text?
Chapter 1 deals with the first issue you will encounter in the research process: choosing
the right research topic. We suggest some novel ways in which you may decide upon
your topic, offer guidance in deciding what constitutes an effective research topic and
consider some topics which may be problematic. In the latter part of the chapter, we
deal with the issue of defining suitable research questions and objectives. The chapter
ends with a discussion on what is meant by the all-important term ‘theory’.
In Chapter 2, we approach the subject of the critical literature review. We offer some
practical suggestions on the way you may go about approaching your literature review
and actually conducting it, using full-text databases of academic articles. The chapter
also explains what constitutes an effective critical literature review and offers guidance
in how it may be structured.
Chapter 3 is concerned with practical issues regarding gaining access to organisations from which you may collect your own research data. In this chapter, we also consider the issues of self-management you may face in conducting your research,
particularly the effective use of resources such as time. The management of other
aspects of the research process is also discussed, such as your supervisor, university and
those from whom you collect your data. We also help you to think about the ways in
which you adhere to the code of research ethics that you will be required to observe.
In Chapter 4 we consider the use of secondary data. We discuss the valuable role
which secondary data may play in your research and the reasons you may use secondary data. The ready availability of a wealth of secondary data online is considered. We
also warn you about some of the pitfalls inherent in the use of secondary data and how
to assess its value to your own research project.
The subject of Chapter 5 is research strategy. This involves a consideration of the
main philosophies you may adopt and the ways in which they affect choice of strategy.
We discuss the different types of research strategy, with an emphasis on the possibility
of mixing strategies in one research project. We end the chapter with a discussion of the
importance of validity and reliability: ensuring that your research results and conclusions are believable.
Chapter 6 gets to the core of the research process: the collection of data. We first
explain how to choose a sample. We then consider three frequently used methods of
collecting primary data in more detail. In this we look at how to design and distribute
effective questionnaires, including the use of Internet questionnaires; conduct face-toface, telephone and Internet-mediated interviews; and undertake structured and
unstructured observations.
In Chapter 7 we deal with the process of data analysis. We discuss the two types of
data – quantitative and qualitative – and the ways in which these data may be prepared
for analysis and actually analysed. The use of statistics in both the presentation and
analysis of data is explained with particular emphasis on the use of different software
packages. We also discuss ways in which qualitative data may be prepared for analysis
and analysed. As with the analysis of quantitative data, we emphasise the way in which
you may develop theory from the analysed data.
xiv About this text
Chapter 8 is devoted to the writing of your research proposal. We explain how the
process of writing clarifies your ideas, and we emphasise the importance of treating the
research proposal as an item of ‘work in progress’ by constantly revising it. The chapter
also includes a discussion on what content the proposal should contain, how it may be
structured and the appropriate writing style to be adopted. Finally, we suggest some of
the criteria against which the quality of your research proposal may be assessed.
We hope you will learn a lot from this book: that’s why it exists! But we also hope
that you will enjoy reading it. Doing your research project should be fun!
Mark and Phil
July 2017
Mark N.K. Saunders BA, MSc, PGCE, PhD, Chartered FCIPD is Professor of Business
Research Methods at Birmingham Business School and Director of Postgraduate
Research Methods Training for the College of Social Sciences at the University of
Birmingham. He is a Fellow of the British Academy of Management and member of the
Fellows’ College. Mark currently holds visiting professorships at the Universities of
Surrey and of Worcester. He teaches research methods to master’s and doctoral students
as well as supervising master’s dissertations and research degrees. Mark has published
articles on research methods, and human resource aspects of the management of
change including trust and organisational learning, in a range of journals including
British Journal of Management, Human Relations, Journal of Small Business Management,
Management Learning, R and D Management and Social Science and Medicine. He is coauthor with Phil Lewis and Adrian Thornhill of Research Methods for Business Students,
currently in its seventh edition and, with Bill Lee, co-author of Doing Case Study Research
for Business and Management Students. He is also co-editor with Bill Lee and Vadake
Narayanan of the Mastering Business Research Methods book series and editor of the
Handbooks of Research Methods in Management book series. Mark undertakes research
and consultancy in public, private and not-for-profit sectors. Prior to becoming an academic, he had a variety of research jobs in local government.
Philip J. Lewis BA, PhD, MSc, MCIPD, PGDipM, Cert Ed began his career in HR as a
training adviser with the Distributive Industry Training Board. He then taught HRM
and research methods in three UK universities. He studied part-time for degrees with
the Open University and the University of Bath, from which he gained an MSc in
Industrial Relations and a PhD for his research on performance pay in retail financial
services. He is co-author with Mark Saunders and Adrian Thornhill of Research Methods
for Business Students, currently in its seventh edition, and of Employee Relations:
Understanding the Employment Relationship; and with Adrian Thornhill, Mike Millmore
and Mark Saunders of Managing Change: A Human Resource Strategy Approach; and with
Mark Saunders, Adrian Thornhill, Mike Millmore and Trevor Morrow of Strategic Human
Resource Management. He has undertaken consultancy in both the public and private
sectors.
About the authors
We are grateful to the following for permission to reproduce copyright material:
Figures
Figure 1.1 from Competitive Advantage Maps, Working Paper, Centre for Strategy &
Performance, Institute for Manufacturing (Platts, K., and Khater, M., 2006), Reproduced
with permission by Dr M. Khater from the Institute for Manufacturing; Figure on
page 95 from Eurostat (2016) Copyright European Communities, 2016, Source: Eurostat,
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu, © European Union, 1995–2017; Figure 7.3 from
Organic farming. Organic crop area on the rise in the EU. Two million hectares more
since 2010, Eurostat News Release, Source: Eurostat, http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu,
© European Union, 1995–2017.
Screenshots
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Services; Screenshots on page 197, 7.7 from IBM SPSS Statistics Viewer, screenshots
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Tables
Table 2.6 adapted from Critical Reading and Writing for Postgraduates, 3rd ed., Sage
Publications Ltd (Wallace, M., and Wray, A., 2016)
Text
Extract 1.1 adapted from Rural broadband and digital-only services, Seventh Report of
Session 2014–15, House of Commons Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, p. 3, Contains
Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0;
Extract 2.2 from SME innovation and learning: the role of networks and crisis events,
European Journal of Training and Development, Vol. 38, Issue 1/2, pp. 136–49 (Saunders,
M. N. K., Gray, D. E., and Goregaokar, H., 2014), doi: 10.1108/EJTD-07-2013-0073; Article
3.1 from Sweden leads the race to become cashless society, www.theguardian.com,
04/06/2016 (Henley, J.), Copyright Guardian News & Media Ltd. 2017; Extract on page
76 from Research Ethics for Research involving Human Participants: Code of Practice (2016),
Acknowledgements
Acknowledgements xvii
https://www.brookes.ac.uk/Documents/Research/Policies-and-codes-of-practice/
ethics_codeofpractice/, Oxford Brookes University Research Ethics Committee; Extract
on page 94 from Eurostat (2016) Copyright European Communities, 2016, Source:
Eurostat, http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu, © European Union, 1995–2017; Extract on
page 95 from Methodological Manual for Tourism Statistics, Version 3.1, p. 59 (2014),
Source: Eurostat, http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu, © European Union, 1995–2017;
Extract 4.1 from http://www.edelman.com/insights/intellectual-property/2016-
edelman-trust-barometer/global-results/, Daniel J. Edelman, Inc. and/or its subsidiaries
and affiliates are the owners of the TRUSTBAROMETER trademark and copyright in the
TRUSTBAROMETER surveys worldwide, which are used under license. These materials
are not sponsored or endorsed by Daniel J. Edelman, Inc.; Article 5.1 from Emergence of
‘serial returners’ – online shoppers who habitually over order and take advantage of free
returns – hinders growth of UK businesses, Barclaycard, Barclaycard 2017; Extract 7.6
from The influence of culture on trust judgments in customer relationship development by ethnic minority small businesses, Journal of Small Business Management, Vol.
52, Issue 1, pp. 67–8 (Altinay, L., Saunders, M. N. K., Wang, C. L.), Copyright © 2013,
John Wiley and Sons; Extract on page 288 from The Sociological Imagination, OXFORD
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Chapter 1
Choosing your research topic
This is a big moment in your life. You are about to embark on a voyage of discovery. You
will discover a lot about the research process, the topic you are going to research and, we
hope, a lot about yourself too. For many of you, the research project is the one part of your
course where you have an opportunity to choose what you are going to study and the way
in which you study it. We hope that you see this as an exciting opportunity because we
believe strongly that’s what it is. It’s your chance to express your individuality, your ingenuity and imagination, your resourcefulness and, above all, your personal organisational skills.
These attributes have always been important. But in the twenty-first century, they are
more important than ever. Why do we say this? It’s because we think that all the social,
economic and technological changes of the last few years have empowered us all to take
charge of our own lives to a greater extent than ever before. So take charge of your
research topic now!
The overall purpose of this chapter is to enable you to get your research project off to a
good start by choosing a topic to research that will give you the best chance of succeeding
and passing this important component of your course. It’s worth bearing in mind that however good you may be at all the relevant skills that go into producing a good research project,
you will give yourself a better chance of succeeding if you have chosen your topic wisely.
In this chapter, we talk about why choosing the right research topic is so important. We
then explain why, for many of us, the choice of topic is so difficult. The choice is made
easier if this decision-making process is tackled in a systematic way. In the chapter, we
outline some of the procedures for adopting a systematic approach. Then, having got to
the stage where you have chosen a topic, we examine ways in which the topic you have
chosen can be refined in such a way that it is acceptable to your assessors and will provide
you with the maximum amount of satisfaction.
We end the chapter with a consideration of what makes a good research topic, and
some help on writing research questions and objectives.
1.1 Why you should read this chapter
2 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
It is possible, of course, that you may be constrained in your choice of research topic.
Your university may define strict limits outside which you may not stray. Alternatively, it
is possible that an employer has asked you to undertake a piece of research. In either
case, some of the points in the next two sections on choosing the right research topic
and generating research ideas may not apply to you directly. However, we encourage you
not to ignore the points made. It may be that although you may not have a free choice of
the general topic, the way in which you approach it may be entirely your decision.
Now let’s look at some of the reasons why choosing the right research topic is so
important.
You have to live with it
The decision about which research topic to choose is something you will have to live
with, maybe for as long as a year or more. We mean this in two senses. First, it is a topic
you will become intimately familiar with, so it makes sense to choose something that
you will enjoy. Ask yourself: what am I really interested in? OK, so it may be that football is your passion. Well, football nowadays is big business, particularly in the major
leagues in Europe such as the English Premier League. So if your passion has a business
dimension, then maybe there is a research topic to be pursued. One of our student’s
undergraduate projects explored the reasons why attendances at matches were generally lower when the match was screened live on television. This led into interesting
areas such as the affiliation aspect of motivation theory, where some people, for example a football team’s fans, have a need to be affiliated with like-minded people and are
motivated towards interaction with these people, leading them to attend matches. This
posed a question about the extent to which a comfortable armchair and the economic
benefits of not attending the match in person overrode the need for affiliation!
The second sense in which we mean that the decision about your choice of research
topic is something you will have to live with is that when you have chosen it, normally
there is no going back. You will make life much more difficult for yourself if you find out
after one half of the time period allotted to your research that you have chosen the
wrong topic. It may be possible to change even at that stage, but you spend the rest of the
allotted time playing catch-up. We talk later in this chapter about problems in choosing
a research topic, and the consequences of making the wrong choice. So it is better to
spend the time at the outset making sure it’s right for you. It is a time-consuming process. Many students have remarked to us in the past that they thought that choosing
their topic would be easy. It may be easy to choose one that interests you, but turning it
into a viable proposition for your course may take much longer than you thought.
It will be better choosing a topic that will both exploit and develop
your knowledge and skills
As well as choosing a topic that you will enjoy, it obviously makes sense to choose a
topic that you are capable of doing well. Making a list of your skills and knowledge
1.2 Why choosing the right research topic is so important
1.2 Why choosing the right research topic is so important 3
seems a good starting point. Here are a few questions you can ask yourself to help you
prepare the list.
What are your personal strengths and weaknesses?
We are all better at some things than others. You may have discovered strengths on your
course that you may want to exploit. These may relate to your background experience or
particular skills that you can practise in the data collection and analysis stages of the
research. The knowledge gained in previous or current work experience is a good knowledge source for many students. You are more likely to know your way around some of the
areas that need specialist knowledge. In addition, this specialist knowledge will lead more
easily to an informed research question that needs answering. Alternatively, you may be
keen to learn about an industry that’s new to you. For example, you may be fascinated by
software design and want to learn more about that industry with a view to possible
employment. In this case, you will need to ask yourself whether locating a research project in that industry will give you an equal chance of success compared to an industry
with which you may be familiar. It’s also a good idea to think about the modules you have
studied and those in which you have had success. This will give you a confident start.
The data collection and analysis methods you adopt offer slightly different options.
Here, you may be experienced at interviewing but less so at designing questionnaires.
Do you exploit your expertise or decide to learn the skill of questionnaire design? Of
course, you can include an element of both. The choices you make may be based on
practical as well as personal development considerations. It’s not much good having
learned a lot but not passed the module!
What knowledge and skills do you think you will need in the future?
This may be quite a difficult question to answer for many of us. Few of us could have
predicted 25 years ago the extent to which we all now need information technology
skills in both our work and home lives. Yet it may be possible for you to predict some of
the generic skills you will need for effective personal performance. Some of these, such
as influencing others and conducting meetings, you may have encountered during
your course. The opportunity may present itself in your research to practise some of
these skills, particularly in the data collection stage. In the same way, your choice of
topic could help develop your specialist knowledge of an aspect of your chosen area
of employment.
What resources can you draw upon to help?
Perhaps the value of this question is most evident when it reveals the absence of
resources. Most of you will have access to key people such as lecturers, managers and
colleagues. The extent to which these can be of assistance will, of course, vary. It will be
very valuable to be able to consult an ‘expert’ in the subject area you are studying for
your research but, if you have chosen a fairly specialist field, the absence of such assistance may be a considerable block to your progress. You will, of course, have access to
information technology, but such issues as the processing of questionnaire answers
and the analysis of questionnaire data is a complex and demanding affair if you have no
experience in this. Don’t be afraid to ask for help!
4 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
Will your choice of topic help you pass the whole course?
Although we have put the emphasis here upon self-development, the point remains
that you must choose a topic that will allow you to meet the assessment requirements
and will give you the best possible chance of ultimate success. If there is one fundamental lesson that we have learned as a result of supervising many research projects over the
years, it is this: the earlier you start deciding upon your topic, the more likely you will be
to choose the right one and ensure final success!
There is no question that for many of us, choosing the right topic is one of the most difficult aspects of the whole research process. At this stage, you are on your own! It has to
come from you; and making decisions, which have important consequences, is often
difficult for most of us. So, what are some of the reasons why this one may be particularly difficult? Let’s have a look at some of them.
There is simply too much choice
It’s wonderful living in an age when so much information is available at the end of our
fingertips. But this can lead us to think that there is no question that has not been
asked and no problem which has not been solved. Whatever it is we are interested in,
there appears to be a vast amount of information available, much of which there is
never enough time to read. This results in the inevitable feeling that whatever it is you
have in mind will have been done before. Well, it probably has, but maybe not in the
way you intend to do it. But that doesn’t mean that you can’t tackle it. One of the most
popular undergraduate research topics is worker motivation. ‘What is that workers
value most about their working lives?’ is a frequently asked question. The textbooks
are full of generic answers to this question, and your university library will be full of
project reports which have asked the same question. Yet there are lots of managers in
organisations who need to know the answer in respect of their own employees. In
other words, even the most familiar topic can be applied to many different, specific
situations.
The fear it will be too difficult
The research process is challenging enough without making it more difficult by choosing a topic that stretches you too far. How will you know if that is the case? Have a look
at the literature on a topic that interests you as a possible choice. Maybe the way in
which the topic is covered has an overly theoretical approach which makes it too difficult for you to ‘think your way in’. The motivation of people to work has a distinctly
practical feel. But researching the way in which the brain operates to direct our enthusiasm to one interest rather than another seems to emphasise the biological aspects
rather than the business perspective, for which your course has prepared you.
1.3 Why choosing a research topic is difficult
1.4 Ten ways to generate ideas for a research topic 5
The fear that it will be insufficiently theoretical
It’s quite understandable that you should feel a mild sense of panic when you go to your
supervisor to explain with great enthusiasm your choice of research topic only to be
greeted by ‘yes, very interesting, but what role will theory play?’. This is where it starts
to get tricky. But don’t despair, because theory has a role to play in all project reports.
It’s just a question of how and where you use it. Later in this chapter we explore the role
of theory in writing research questions and objectives. And in Chapter 5 we explain
that theory can be used as a ‘way in’ to your research by setting up theoretical propositions which can be tested. It can also be used as a lens through which you can study
your data, or a structure against which you can perform your data analysis.
In case you are unconvinced, just consider this statement: ‘students read research
methods textbooks in the hope that they perform more effectively in their research module’. That’s a theory, and what you are doing right now is evidence that it is accurate!
The temptation to re-use work you have already done
It is tempting to take the easy way out and use an assignment which you have written for
a previous purpose and just enlarge it to make it into a research project. There is a similar
temptation for part-time students who perhaps have produced a research report at work.
The trouble is that it never quite ‘fits’. It’s a bit like fitting a wheel to a bike that’s not quite
the right size. It may be OK, but it’s never more than that. You are likely to spend more
time getting it to fit than you would spend on thinking through a purpose-made topic.
Now that we have given you some general guidelines on choosing a suitable research
topic, let’s look at some techniques for deciding on the topic itself. We have listed our
favourite 10 of these in Table 1.1. They are in no particular order.
1.4 Ten ways to generate ideas for a research topic
Table 1.1 Ten techniques for generating research ideas
1 Thinking
2 Looking at past project titles
3 Using past projects from the university library
4 Using past course assignments
5 Using relevant literature
6 Following the news media
7 Brainstorming
8 Concept mapping
9 Making a note of ideas
10 Discussion with helpers
6 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
Thinking
We are bound to start with this one, because there is no escaping it! By thinking, we
mean really thinking. Keep the need to select a topic in your mind all the time – when
you watch TV, read a newspaper, browse relevant web pages, talk to colleagues, talk and
listen in seminars, discuss issues with your lecturers. Probably, like us, prompted by
your study of business and management, questions often go through your mind when
you are in stores, airports and buses – questions such as ‘How are the work rotas for
these people organised?’; ‘How can the cost of delivering this service be reduced while
maintaining quality of service?’ This is what you may call ‘background thinking’. Now
let’s look at a series of more specific techniques for generating ideas.
Looking at past project titles
You are not the first person to have trodden the path, so it’s a good idea to look at what
those before you have attempted. You may find a list of past research project titles for
your course in your university library; alternatively, your course leader may have one.
This will give you an idea of the sort of topic that may be suitable. It will also fire your
imagination and help you to start thinking about how that title may relate to something
that you have thought about. Don’t worry about what you think may not be a particularly well-written title. And do bear in mind that in some universities, all past projects
are placed in the library whether they are bare passes or distinctions. So the fact that a
project is in your library does not necessarily mean that it’s a good piece of work. The
point is to generate ideas for your project, not work out what makes a good project.
Using past projects
Having delved into the university library to look for past project titles, why not spend
some more time checking the projects which have caught your attention? Raimond (1993)
suggests a useful method for generating research topic ideas this way (see Table 1.2).
Table 1.2 Four steps for generating research topic ideas using past projects from the
university library
1 Select six projects that you like.
2 For each of these six projects, note down your first thoughts to answer these three questions
(if responses for different projects are the same, this does not matter):
(a) What appeals to you about the project?
(b) What is good about the project?
(c) Why is the project good?
3 Select three projects that you do not like.
4 For each of these three projects, note down your first thoughts to answer these three
questions (if responses for different projects are the same, or cannot be clearly expressed, this
does not matter; note them down anyway):
(a) What do you dislike about the project?
(b) What is bad about the project?
(c) Why is the project bad?
1.4 Ten ways to generate ideas for a research topic 7
Having completed these four steps, you will have a note of the things that you like
and dislike about projects and, of equal importance, what you consider makes good and
poor projects. What’s more, that list will be personal to you. It’s your opinion, and that
is what you can use to guide your choice for your own research topic.
Using past course assignments
Many students find that past course assignments serve as a good starting point for
research topic ideas. It seems logical to develop the work of an assignment in which you
have had some choice of topic, particularly when you have enjoyed it and received a
good grade. However, do bear in mind the maxim that ‘all research ends with ideas for
more research’. Look hard at what you have done and ask yourself: ‘Are there questions
posed by my work which I have not yet answered?’
Beware of developing the assignment because you got a good grade! There must be
scope for development, and it must meet the assessment criteria. For example, many
universities have self-plagiarism rules to prevent students from re-using work that they
have already submitted as an assignment.
Using relevant literature
Since what you are going to tackle should use the literature relevant to your topic, it seems
sensible to start examining that literature. Let’s assume that you have decided to look at a
possible research topic that is a development of a module you have enjoyed. Go back to
your lecture notes and course textbooks on that topic and make a note of the names of
relevant authors. This will give you a basis on which to undertake a preliminary search.
This should help you to produce a list of articles, books, reports and other items.
A particularly valuable literature source of research topic ideas is academic review articles. They are valuable because they contain both a thorough review of the state of
knowledge in that topic area and pointers towards areas where further research needs to
be undertaken. Browsing recent journals in your field is also a good source of possible
research ideas. For many subject areas, your project supervisor will be able to suggest possible recent review articles, or articles that contain recommendations for further work.
Books, by contrast, are often less up to date than journal articles. But they do often
contain a good overview of research that has been undertaken, which may suggest ideas
to you. Reports may also be of use. The most recently published are usually up to date
and, again, often contain recommendations that may form the basis of your research
idea. An example of such a report is shown as Research in practice 1.1.
Using reports to generate research topic ideas
Access to broadband in the UK is inconsistent, the impact being particularly in rural
areas where speeds are unacceptably slow. Written evidence to the House of Commons
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee explains how poor broadband can lead
Research in practice 1.1
➔
8 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
Table 1.3 lists some useful questions to ask when searching articles and reports for
possible research topic ideas. The answers to these can help progress your choice of
topic.
Table 1.3 Useful questions to ask when searching articles and reports for possible
research topic ideas
•  What did the authors conclude?
•  What alternative conceptual models, explanations or hypotheses did the authors consider?
•  What methods did the authors use to approach the problem?
•    Do you accept the authors’ conclusions? If not, are there other methods that could allow you
to test their conclusion?
•  Does the authors’ research suggest new ways to interpret a different problem?
•  Are there other problems that could be studied using the same methods?
Following the news media
We would always encourage you to go to the academic literature as your first port of call,
but don’t ignore the value of keeping up to date with items in the news. News media can
be a very rich source of ideas. The stories which occur every day in the ‘quality’ newspapers (e.g. The Times, The Financial Times, The Guardian, The Independent and The Daily
Telegraph) in both print and online versions may provide ideas which relate directly to a
possible research topic. Don’t forget, there may be other ideas which flow from the
main story. On the morning of writing this section in 2016, it was announced that
to a range of problems: from reduced access to online learning resources for students,
families being unable to use everyday online services and the effectiveness of rural
businesses being severely affected. Slow broadband can produce a feeling of a two-tier
society, with rural communities suffering markedly due to infrastructure problems which
make them harder to reach.
The committee expressed concern that BT, the infrastructure developer, told it that
the 2015 target of 95% of premises receiving superfast broadband by 2017 may slip.
The committee recommended that the government unit overseeing broadband development should insist upon the 2017 target being met. Moreover, a target date for when
the last 5% of premises will obtain access to superfast broadband coverage must be
published.
The importance of good broadband for all is highlighted by the government’s policy
of providing its services ‘digital-by-default’. This policy has clear ramifications when
broadband access is limited or non-existent.
The report emphasised that it is vital that the last premises in the UK to have access
to basic and superfast broadband are treated just as well as the first premises and are not
left behind or forgotten.
Source: House of Commons Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (2015) Rural broadband and digital-only
services, Seventh Report of Session 2014–15. London: The Stationery Office Limited.
1.4 Ten ways to generate ideas for a research topic 9
the film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice had taken $424m (£300m) at the box office
worldwide in its first five days, a record for a March debut and the sixth-highest US
opening weekend. This suggests a research topic exploring the enormous amount of
marketing spin-off opportunities presented by such a high-profile brand.
Brainstorming
Brainstorming can be a useful and fun way of generating research topic ideas. It is particularly valuable when you brainstorm with a group of people, ideally those who really understand why you are doing this. You can brainstorm on your own – but it’s much less fun!
To brainstorm, you start off by defining the general field you are interested in. Try to
make this as precise as possible. In the early stages of formulating a topic, you may have
to be pretty imprecise, such as ‘I am interested the effects of the weather on food retailing, but I am not sure how I can turn this into a research topic’.
The next stage is to ask the other members of the group for suggestions, relating to
the imprecise topic you have suggested. It’s a good idea to arm yourself with a pen and a
large sheet of paper and note down all the suggestions you receive. The following five
rules are very important:
1 Do record as many suggestions as possible.
2 Do record all suggestions, however ‘wacky’ or ‘off the wall’ they may appear at first sight.
3 Don’t criticise or evaluate any ideas until they have been considered.
4 Do consider all the suggestions and explore the precise meaning of each of them.
5 Do analyse the list of suggestions and decide which appeal to you most as research
ideas and why.
Definition
brainstorming: a technique that can be used to generate and refine research ideas. It is best undertaken with a group of people.
Concept mapping
Having completed your brainstorming, you may move on to use another technique
which we find very useful in many contexts – concept mapping. This is a process which
moves from a general idea that may have been the outcome of a brainstorm, or other
idea-generating technique, to the creation of a map which represents visually the
organisation of your thinking. Concept maps may be elaborate or simple; indeed, they
Definition
concept map: a diagram which represents visually the way we organize our thoughts about a set of
related ideas.
10 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
may start out very simple and end up quite detailed. The purpose is to help you organize
your thinking about a topic and get them into a coherent state. Concept maps are very
useful in helping you recognise where you have gaps in your knowledge. This can help
with planning further searches in the literature. They are also a good base from which
you can move on to develop research questions and objectives. An example of a concept
map is shown in Figure 1.1.
Competitive
advantage
Product
differentiation
improves improves improves
Technical
superiority
helps
Effective
R&D
Effective
supply chain
Low-cost
production
Efficient
operations
drives
Perceived
quality
Brand
awareness
Strong brand
equity
Brand
loyalty
requires
requires
requires
Product
quality
Service
quality
depends on depends on
requires requires
Figure 1.1 A simple concept map showing representation of competitive advantage
Source: Competitive Advantage Maps, Platts, K. & Khater, M., Working Paper, Centre for Strategy & Performance,
Institute for Manufacturing, 2006. Reproduced with permission from the Institute for Manufacturing.
Making a note of ideas
Many of you will look at this title heading and say ‘that’s all very well for them but I
never get any ideas!’ You do; all of us do. Think positively and forget any notions that
ideas are reserved just for the creative few rather than for the rest of us. It’s perfectly
normal to go through several days without having any ideas at all. Then, perhaps when
you are thinking of something else entirely, an idea will come to you followed by more
ideas. Sometimes, the ideas will come pretty quickly, so you will have to make sure you
capture them before they are forgotten. When you start getting ideas, you will learn not
to worry about the times when the ideas are not coming. It’s just important to take full
advantage of those idea flows when they happen.
So what about capturing those precious ideas when they come? It’s important to
voice-record or note ideas on your mobile phone or keep a notebook for this purpose.
All you need to do is to note any interesting research ideas as you think of them and, of
equal importance, what started you thinking of the idea. You don’t have to go as far as
Mark, who takes his notebook on holiday with him so he can jot down any flashes of
inspiration that occur to him while sitting in a cafe!
1.5  How to refne research topic ideas 11
Discussion with colleagues, friends and lecturers
Don’t forget the more usual sources of ideas and advice: your colleagues, friends and
university lecturers. Project supervisors will often have ideas for possible student projects which they will be pleased to discuss with you. These may be based upon work done
by other students which may be developed, or taken in a different direction. One of our
students conducted an analysis of a food manufacturer’s advertising strategy for launching a new brand with a view to discovering the optimum advertising expenditure level.
We suggested a similar project using an insurance company. Each of the two students
tackled the project in a different way. Both delivered very successful pieces of work.
You can also pick up useful ideas from talking to practitioners and professional
groups. Find out if your local professional association has a students’ evening. Here you
can meet local managers who will be more than willing to discuss ideas with you. Most
professional groups are pleased to welcome students to meetings where often interesting presentations are given which may spark off your ideas. Once again, do bear in
mind the value of discussing possible ideas and make a note of them.
Refining topics given by your employing organisation
The choosing of a research topic may be less problematic than we have suggested above.
At least, on the face of it, this may be so. We say this because you may be given a topic.
This may apply particularly to you if you are a part-time student and your manager has
given you a topic to research. The problem here is that it is not ‘your’ topic, and you
may not be wildly enthusiastic about it. If you find yourself in this situation, you will
have to weigh the advantage of doing something useful to the organisation against the
disadvantage of a potential lack of personal motivation. Aim for a balance.
One of the problems in this situation is that the research project your manager
wishes you to undertake is larger than that which is suitable for your course. This may
not be an insurmountable problem. Within the larger project there may well be a
smaller element which you can concentrate upon for your university research project.
In such cases, it may be possible to complete both by isolating an element of the
larger organisational project that you find interesting and treating this as the project
for your course.
1.5 How to refine research topic ideas
Refining a topic given by an organisation
Peng, a student of Phil’s, worked for a large manufacturing organisation which felt it
had a problem with communicating with its employees. She was asked by the HR manager to carry out an employee survey to establish what employees felt about the way in
Research in practice 1.2
➔
12 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
One final point about the potentially tricky job of ‘serving two masters’: the biggest
potential problem may be one of your own making: to promise to deliver research outcomes to your employer and not do so. After all, don’t forget that in this situation, as an
employee, you get paid for what your employer asks of you.
The preliminary study
Even if you have been given a research idea, it is still necessary to refine it in order to
turn it into a research project. This is often called a preliminary study.
For some research ideas, this study need only be an initial review of some of the
literature. This is similar to ‘using relevant literature’ and ‘following the news media’
in the ‘ten techniques for generating research ideas’ section (Table 1.1). You may
think of this as the first attempt at drafting your critical review of the literature, a
topic we deal with in detail in Chapter 2. Other research ideas may benefit from
revisiting the techniques discussed earlier in this section, in particular looking at
past project titles, using past course assignments and using past projects from
the university library. Discussions with lecturers and managers may also be very
valuable.
which managers communicated with their staff, and the way the company in general
delivered important news to employees. One of the motives behind this managerial initiative was the feeling of the HR director that the company should have a regular newsletter. (Not the least reason for this motive was the thought that this would promote the
profile of the HR function!) This project was not one which Peng would have chosen.
However, she was interested in the theoretical proposition that employees would feel
more committed to the company if they felt trouble was being taken to communicate
effectively with them. Peng talked this over with Phil and, with the approval of the HR
manager, included some questions designed specifically to test this theoretical
proposition.
Peng decided to treat the company research as one major piece of work with a separate element which was ‘hers’ for her university research project. This involved writing a
large report for her employer and a smaller report for her university work.
Peng was very aware of the political dimension to her work. She knew that the HR
director had a vested interest in the outcomes of her work. Phil advised her to keep this
in mind but not let it compromise the element of the work she was doing for her university course. Peng and Phil agreed that it was important to have a clear stance with
regard to her personal objectives, and to stick to them.
Definition
preliminary study: the process by which a research idea is refined in order to turn it into a research
project.
1.5  How to refne research topic ideas 13
Your university may require you to complete a research project which restricts you to
collecting secondary data, data that already exists and was originally collected for some
other purpose (see Chapter 4). If so, it is important that you establish that the data you
require are available.
If your research is going to be conducted in an organisation, it is essential to gain a
good understanding of that organisation. One good way of doing this is to shadow
employees who are likely to be important in your research. They will usually provide
useful insights into the way the organisation works as well as specific guidance for your
research. Whatever way you choose to familiarise yourself with the organisation, don’t
forget that the underlying purpose is to gain a greater understanding so that your
research question can be refined.
At this early stage you will be testing your research ideas. However, it may be that
after a preliminary study, or after discussing your ideas with colleagues, you decide that
the research idea is no longer viable. Don’t despair too much if this is the case. It is
much better to revise your research ideas at this stage than to have to do it later, when
you have undertaken far more work.
The Delphi technique
Another approach you may use for refining your research ideas is the Delphi technique.
This technique involves using a group of people who are either involved or interested in
the research idea to generate and choose a more specific research idea. To use this technique, you need to:
1 explain your research idea to the members of the group (they can make notes if they
wish);
2 encourage group members at the end of your explanation to seek clarification and
more information as appropriate;
3 ask each member of the group, including the originator of the research idea, to generate independently up to three specific research ideas based on the idea that has been
described (they can also be asked to provide a justification for their specific ideas);
4 collect the research ideas in an unedited and non-attributable form and to distribute
them to all members of the group;
5 conduct a second cycle of the process (steps 2 to 4) in which individuals comment
on the research ideas and revise their own contributions in the light of what others
have said;
6 undertake subsequent cycles of the process until a consensus is reached. These
either follow a similar pattern (steps 2 to 4) or use discussion, voting or some other
method.
Definition
Delphi technique: a technique which can be used with a group of people who are either involved or
interested in the research topic to generate and select a more specific research idea.
14 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
Using a Delphi Group
Kumar worked part time at The Sizzling Wok, a restaurant specialising in Asian fusion
cooking. The owner of the restaurant, Virat, explained to him that while business in
general was good, it was important that the restaurant generated more turnover in the
traditionally slacker periods, i.e. during the day and on evenings in the early part of the
week.
Kumar thought that a research project involving some consumer research and business costings would be useful for Virat and provide a project for his university course
which would involve marketing, accounting and business planning.
Kumar was part of a small group of course colleagues which met frequently to discuss
ideas and help each other with the more challenging parts of the study programme. He
explained his research idea to the group members. As a result the group generated a
series of research ideas for Kumar to explore. These were:
● Having ‘special offers or special menus’ at ‘quiet’ times, meaning that customers
could eat more cheaply at these times.
● A loyalty scheme with points awarded to customers leading to free meals and extra
points awarded at ‘quiet’ times.
● Promotions including features such as ‘show cooking’, where the chefs prepared special dishes responding to customers’ wishes in the restaurant itself, thus generating
interest and a sense of ‘bonding’ with the customer.
● Restricting the opening times of the restaurant to avoid opening for business at
‘quiet’ times.
● Examining the costs of opening at ‘quiet’ times (e.g. staffing costs) with a view to
making these times more profitable.
Following on from the list of general ideas, the group then developed some more specific research ideas, among which were the following:
● how the restaurant may generate more business during the ‘quiet’ times of the week,
and
● examination of the profitability of operating during the ‘quiet’ times of the week.
At the end of this process, Kumar was able to refine his thinking and decide upon a
research idea with which Virat was pleased and his research supervisor was impressed.
It was: ‘How can The Sizzling Wok operate during the less busy times of the week in
order to meet the demand of maintaining a consistent level of profitability at all trading
times?’
Kumar was delighted with the outcome of the meetings and resolved to help his colleagues with the same level of commitment with which they had helped him.
Research in practice 1.3
People generally enjoy trying to help one another, so this technique can be very effective. It is also very good for forging team spirit among groups of people. An example of
the developing of a research question is shown in Research in practice 1.3.
1.6 What makes a good research topic? 15
Narrowing down
The Delphi technique illustrates what is perhaps the most difficult aspect of refining
your research ideas: the move from the general to the specific. Many of us start out with
some idea of what we want to do for our research but find it tricky to narrow down.
One useful way of moving from the general to the specific is to think of research
ideas as developing through a process which goes through three stages of idea classification. These are:
1 The general area.
2 The more specific field.
3 The precise focus of the research.
One of our students recently was following the marketing route through his degree. He
was also very interested in environmental issues. These can be termed his general area
of interest. More specifically, he was also very enthusiastic about exploring the different
ways in which marketeers can learn about ‘greener’ ways of conducting marketing for
their organisations. After much thinking and discussion, he developed the research
questions: ‘What methods do marketeers use to learn about “greener” ways of conducting marketing for their organisations?’ and ‘Why do they decide upon the methods
chosen?’
The next section draws together some of the thoughts in the section ‘Why choosing the
right research topic is so important’ as well as introducing ideas about what goes into
making a good research topic choice. Some of the most significant of these ideas are
listed below.
It is a topic about which you are enthusiastic and which matches
your career goals
Let’s start with by repeating two of the points we made earlier. A good research topic is
one in which you have a genuine interest because, as we said earlier, you have to live
with it for possibly a few months or longer and you want to give yourself the best chance
of success. A well-chosen topic is also one that matches your career goals.
There are resources available, particularly data and time
We also referred to the question of resources, in particular those of your skills and
knowledge and individuals, such as lecturers, who may be able to help you. But there
are two other key resources to think about. The first of these is data. It is all very well
thinking up and precisely defining an intriguing research idea, but it’s of little use if you
cannot get access to the data to explore it. You may, for example, be very interested in
1.6 What makes a good research topic?
16 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
the effect on patients of specific management initiatives in the UK National Health
Service. However, getting primary data from patients may be far from easy for all but
researchers appointed by the Service. Secondary data may be available, but will it
answer precisely the research question you have set?
The second question to ask yourself is: ‘Is the research topic achievable within the
available time?’ This may be quite a difficult question to answer at the beginning of
your research project because you cannot anticipate the potential delays. If you are
dependent on data from other people such as managers, customers or colleagues, it is
reasonable to say that this will not be as high a priority for them as it is for you. It is
always a good idea to be realistic (or even pessimistic!) in your assessment of the timescale necessary to gather data. Even the collection of secondary data may be less
straightforward than you envisage, particularly that from non-official sources. The
more realistic you are in setting your timescales at the beginning, the less stressful you
will find the latter stages of the research process.
The subject is topical
In the winter of 2015–16, Apple was locked in a bitter dispute with the FBI over the latter’s
desire to compel Apple to access the information on the iPhone of a mass killer. Apple
obviously expressed the deep concern felt by most people about the reasons for the FBI
request but refused, arguing that if the US government could make it easier to unlock an
iPhone, it would have the power to reach into anyone’s device to capture their data. The
government could then extend this breach of privacy and demand that Apple build surveillance software to intercept an individual’s messages, health records or financial data,
location, or even access the phone’s microphone or camera without the user’s knowledge.
At the time of writing this dispute remained unresolved. But it is likely to be repeated
in other cases, particularly as other technology organisations such as Amazon and
Google came out in support of Apple.
This raises an interesting question about the ownership of digital data and the extent
to which the privacy, which is at the heart of our relationship with many of the digital
companies with which we deal, may be compromised in particular circumstances. This
may be the basis of a marketing investigation about the degree to which technology
companies can stress data privacy as part of their market appeal.
The Apple–FBI case may have been the catalyst for this project and serve as a useful
example from which another research project may be developed.
Whatever the outcome, you still have a worthwhile project
Let’s say that you develop a research question such as ‘How do severe winter weather
conditions affect retail food supermarket trading patterns?’ On the face of it, this
sounds a reasonable question. It could be expected that there would be an effect, not
only on the volume of trade but on the type of food purchased. However, it is possible
that the answer may be ‘there is no effect’. The consequence of the ‘no effect’ result for
you is not only that it is rather dispiriting, but you don’t have an interesting story to tell
in your project report.
1.6 What makes a good research topic? 17
The trick is to define a research question that gives you results of similar value whatever you find out. In the example here, ‘To what extent does the weather affect retail
food supermarket trading patterns and why?’ is a much wider question that will guarantee that you have the scope to write an interesting project report, whatever the
outcome.
The topic fits the specifications and will meet the assessment
criteria set by the university
Your lecturers are likely to issue a set of guidelines to help you with completion of your
research project. This will give you general ideas of what constitutes a successful project. A good place to start in your study of this is the assessment criteria. It’s a good idea
to check through these criteria to make sure that your choice of research topic will enable you to meet those criteria. So, for example, if there is a criterion that your research
must aim to solve an organisational problem, it’s of little use pursuing a study that analyses consumer expenditure data over a given time period. Similarly, if the assessment
criteria state that you should only use secondary data, you should not design a questionnaire or interview people.
It is taken for granted that the chosen research topic should match the content of
the course being undertaken. Yet we have seen a number of cases where this is questionable. An interest in the under-representation of women in management, for example,
could easily develop into a study of the role of women in society in general, rather than
in organisations specifically. This is an easy trap to fall into. One of the problems with a
study chosen by you, and pursued by you, is that you become so close to it that you lose
sight of the fact that you are wandering away from the initial brief. That is why talking
to people is such an important part of the process.
As with all concerns you may have about the progress of your research, talk to your
lecturer if you are not sure about the appropriateness of your topic choice.
There is a clear link to the relevant literature
It is almost certain that your assessment criteria will specify the need to link your work
to the relevant academic literature. It is essential here to ask yourself: ‘Why am I doing
this?’ Too often the literature chapter in project reports we read is of the ‘he said this,
she said that and they said the other’ variety (section 2.2). You should not use the literature in this way. Rather, an alternative way of thinking about the review of the literature
is to call it a ‘review of previous research on my topic’. From this you can extend this
work. This can be done, for example, by setting your study in the context of the literature reviewed. A student of Mark’s, for example, reviewed studies of workers who have
some autonomy over the way in which their work is organised and applied this to her
project on the work organisation of courier drivers. As well as locating your study in a
different work context to that which has been covered in your literature review, you can
set it in a different time context or national culture. Many of the classic management
theories are several decades old. You may well ask the question: ‘Does this still apply in
the twenty-first-century post-industrial age?’
18 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
Fresh insights into the topic are provided
We hope it will have occurred to you that the previous points about the extension of
your literature search will guarantee that your research will be able to provide fresh
insights into your chosen topic. A fresh context leads to fresh insights. What is less easy
to guarantee is the degree to which your project report’s discussion conclusions are
insightful.
Research question(s) and objectives are capable of being
stated clearly
Perhaps the best test of the clarity of your research question(s) and objectives is the
extent to which those who know nothing about your topic can understand what it is
you plan to do. If you pass this test, and the others listed in Table 1.4, you are well on
your way to developing a successful research topic. We say more about writing clear
research questions and objectives in the next section.
Table 1.4 Summary: what makes a good research topic?
•  It is a topic about which you are enthusiastic and it matches the career goals.
•  There are resources available, particularly data and time.
•  The subject is topical.
•  Whatever the outcome, you still have a worthwhile project.
•    The topic fits the specifications and meets the standards set by the examining institution.
•  There is a clear link to the relevant literature.
•  Fresh insights into the topic are provided.
•  The research question(s) and objectives are capable of being stated clearly.
Settling on a suitable research idea is a great step forward in the research process. It is
challenging and time consuming. But the early stages are not complete yet. The task of
turning your big idea into precise and meaningful research question(s) and objectives is
vital if you are to end up with reliable and valid data from which you can draw valid
conclusions.
Do you need research questions and objectives? Well, we think that you do. We see
them as a progression: from research questions, you then move on to define objectives.
Perhaps this is clearer if we define what we mean by these two key terms. Research questions are those questions that the research process will address. They are often the forerunner of research objectives. On the other hand, research objectives are clear, precise
statements that identify what you wish to accomplish as a result of doing the research.
And research objectives are vital. Why? You’ve guessed it – because if you don’t know
where you’re going, you’re likely to end up somewhere else!
1.7 How to turn a research idea into a research project
1.7 How to turn a research idea into a research project 19
Developing research questions
Rather like generating research ideas, defining research questions is not a simple, straightforward matter. Here again, we come up against what is a suitable research question. For
the answer to this, we go back to the last section, ‘What makes a good research topic?’ A
suitable research question is one that reflects the that fact you have thought about what
fits the specifications and meets the standards set by the examining institution, provides a clear link to the relevant literature and promises fresh insights into the topic you
have chosen. Let us concentrate on that word ‘insights’. Here we raise the point about
two types of questions – those questions that are too easy and those that are likely to
provide insights. An example will illustrate the difference. Let us say that your research
idea involves examining the impact that Internet banking has had upon local bank
branch closure. Asking the question ‘How many local bank branch closures have there
been in the period since Internet banking became widespread in my country?’ would be
too simple. It would merely describe a situation and not provide insights into the link
between the growth of Internet banking and local branch closures. Questions that
would promise more insights would be ‘What effect has the growth of Internet banking
had upon the uses customers make of branch facilities?’ and ‘Why do customers prefer
to bank online in preference to visiting their local branch?’ The answers to these questions may give some clue as to the eventual effect on branch closures of Internet banking. If, for example, you found that the overwhelming response to the question ‘Do you
still value your local branch?’ put to Internet banking users was negative, then the obvious conclusion would be that the future for local bank branches is bleak.
Avoiding the asking of questions that promote descriptive answers, because they are
too easy, is one way of ensuring that you do not ask unsuitable research questions.
Another is asking questions that are too difficult. Earlier in this chapter, we cited the
example of a research interest that many researchers have had in recent years in the
under-representation of women in management. There are several ways you may be able
to gain insights into the research question ‘Why are women under-represented in
senior management positions?’ but it is a difficult question to answer definitively. In
this case, as with most research questions, there is a simple response to the question of
how to find out the answer: ask those who select the appointees to senior management
positions. But the reality here is that it would probably be very difficult, if not impossible, to gain access to those key decision makers in large organisations. Without such
access it would not be possible to get a good understanding of the subtle ‘unofficial’
processes that go on at staff selection which may favour one type of candidate over
another. Overreaching yourself in the definition of research questions is just as big a
danger as asking simple, descriptive questions.
To end up with a research question that is suitable, try subjecting it to the ‘Goldilocks
test’. This is what Clough and Nutbrown (2012) use to decide if research questions are
either ‘too big’, ‘too small’, ‘too hot’ or ‘just right’. By ‘too big’ they meant those that
Definition
research question: the one overall question or a number of key questions that the research process
will address. These are often the precursor of research objectives.
20 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
probably need significant research funding because they need too many resources.
Questions that are too small are like those that we mentioned earlier – the ones that just
promote descriptive answers. The ‘too hot’ questions are so called because they stray
into sensitive areas, rather like our example of asking senior managers why they tend
not to recruit women to senior management positions. There are other reasons why the
context may be too sensitive. Many of these are likely to involve issues of status and
power among subjects whom you wish to play a part in your research. Alternatively, the
timing of the research may be inappropriate. One of our students was conducting
research on redundancy. His requests to organisations were often met with refusals
because the organisations that refused to participate were going through difficult times.
Outside people talking about redundancies would have sparked off suspicion among
employees that these organisations were planning redundancies. On the other hand,
research questions that are ‘just right’ (Clough and Nutbrown, 2012: 43) are those that
are ‘just right for investigation at this time, by this researcher in this setting’.
Defining the research question
Rebecca was studying for a BSc in Management Studies and taking her placement year
in Forsure, a multinational insurance company. The company’s overall mission was: ‘to
help our customers live their lives with more peace of mind by protecting them, their
relatives and their property against risks and by managing their savings and assets’. One
of the company’s strategic objectives was:
During her degree Rebecca had become particularly interested in corporate strategy.
She was particularly interested in the way in which the often rather ambitious mission
statements were put into practice by organisations.
Rebecca was rather concerned that the strategic objective of her placement company
quoted above contained two areas of her course-customer focussing and employee
involvement- neither of which she had studied in depth on her course.
She confessed her concern to her research supervisor, Dr Hunt, who suggested that it
might be useful for her to concentrate upon the process of delivering the strategic objective rather than the objective itself. This would lend the project an element of generalisability which would not be the case were it to focus on either customer focussing and
employee involvement.
Together with Dr Hunt, Rebecca developed the following research question:
Research in practice 1.4
To become the preferred company for all our stakeholders by strengthening our focus on
the customer and fostering employee involvement through building a culture of trust
and achievement.
How do the procedures and processes the senior management of Forsure use to cascade
downwards support their strategic objective of becoming the preferred company for all
their stakeholders by strengthening the focus on the customer and fostering employee
involvement through building a culture of trust and achievement?
1.7 How to turn a research idea into a research project 21
Another useful metaphor to help you think about clarifying your research question
is Clough and Nutbrown’s (2012) Russian doll principle. Here your research can be broken down from the original statement to something which strips away all the complicated layers and obscurities until the heart of the question can be expressed, in the
same way as the Russian doll is taken apart to reveal a tiny doll at the centre. Table 1.5
has some examples of research ideas and the general focus research questions they
suggest.
Table 1.5 Examples of research ideas and the focus research questions they suggest
Research idea General focus research questions
1 The marketing of security in credit cards To what extent does a credit card company
market the measures it takes to ensure
consumer security in order to gain competitive
advantage?
2 Organisations’ employee newsletters How effective are organisations’ newsletters at
gaining employee identification with the
organisation in geographically diverse
organisation structures, and why?
3 The use of shelf display point-of-sale
material in retail supermarkets
How does the use of shelf display point-ofsale material in retail supermarkets affect
buyer behaviour?
4 Sustainable accountancy To what extent are organisations ensuring that
environmental and social performance is
better connected with strategy and financial
performance, and why?
In the examples in Research in practice 1.4 and Table 1.5, there is one general focus
research question generated from the central research idea. Of course, this may lead to
several more detailed questions or the definition of research objectives. In the next section, we deal with the development of research objectives.
Developing research objectives
Having written your research questions, you may be asking yourself why it’s necessary
to develop research objectives. The answer is that it may not be. Your research project
assessment brief may state that it’s acceptable to write research questions or research
objectives. In our view, it’s better to do both. Why? Because we think that research
objectives add an element of precision to research questions. In Table 1.6 we illustrate
Definition
research objectives: clear, specific statements that identify what the research process seeks to
achieve as a result of doing the research.
22 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
this point by showing research objectives alongside the research questions from
which they have been developed. In general, research objectives tend to be more
acceptable to the research community. Research in practice 1.5 is an example of how an
official research report prepared by the UK government expresses an overall research
aim and then expands this into specific objectives.
Developing research objectives from an overall research aim
The UK Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) commissioned a leading public
affairs research agency to explore how employers approach the recruitment and hiring
process for unskilled and semi-skilled workers. This included the factors that influence
recruitment decisions and how hiring decisions are made in practice. The purpose of the
research was to support Jobcentre Plus* customers seeking work and further inform the
Department’s employer engagement practices.
A qualitative research study was carried out between May and July 2013 based on
focus groups with small employers reflecting a range of industry sectors, and a small
number of employer case studies which provided the opportunity to observe any differences in how employers describe their recruitment process and what they do in practice.
Research aim
The DWP wished to explore how employers approach the recruitment and hiring process, what influences recruitment decisions, and to understand how hiring decisions are
made in practice.
Research in practice 1.5
Table 1.6 Phrasing research questions as research objectives
Research question Research objective
1 Why have organisations introduced
employee communication schemes?
1 To identify organisations’ objectives for
employee communication schemes.
2 How can the effectiveness of employee
communication schemes be measured?
2 To establish suitable effectiveness criteria
for employee communication schemes.
3 Has employee communication been
effective?
3 To assess the extent to which the
effectiveness criteria for employee
communication have been met in
published studies.
4 How can the effectiveness of employee
communication be explained?
4a To determine the factors associated with
the effectiveness criteria for employee
communication schemes being met.
4b To estimate whether some of those factors
are more influential than other factors.
5 Can the explanation be generalised? 5 To develop an explanatory theory that
associates certain factors with the
effectiveness of employee communication
schemes.
1.7 How to turn a research idea into a research project 23
Table 1.6 comes from research we did on an organisation’s employee communication scheme. This was the forerunner of research on the scheme of a particular organisation who wanted to establish if their scheme was ‘working’. This prompted us to
explore a highly debatable question to which the literature offered no satisfactory
answers.
Writing research question 1 as an objective prompted a consideration of the objectives of the organisations. This was useful because it led to the finding that there often
were no clear objectives. This in itself was an interesting theoretical discovery. (How
often management initiatives are introduced with no clear objectives in mind!)
Objectives 2 and 3 operationalise the matching research questions by introducing
the notion of explicit effectiveness criteria. This is particularly important if measurement of success is to be attempted. Similarly, objectives 4a, 4b and 5 introduce an element of precision about factors that lead to effectiveness in question 4. The most
significant difference between these questions and objectives is illustrated by the way
in which question 5 becomes objective 5. Although similar, they differ in the way that
the objective makes clear that a theory will be developed that will make a causal link
between two sets of variables: effectiveness factors and employee communication
scheme success.
You may find it easier to write specific research questions than objectives. But, as
Table 1.6 demonstrates, research objectives add a further level of precision. Our view is
With this key aim, research was designed to consider how DWP might firstly, support
its customers who are seeking work and secondly, further inform the Department’s
employer engagement practices.
Within this overarching aim, there were four key objectives:
● to explore how employers approach the recruitment process, including:
– the sources they draw on to identify potential candidates;
– the recruitment processes and practices they use;
– the candidate features that influence an employer’s decision about whether to
employ; and
– the rationality of the recruitment process and the circumstances in which employers change their practices, either explicitly or implicitly;
● the effect of labour market and sector requirements on the recruitment process;
● experiences and views about Jobcentre Plus and third party agencies as recruitment
organisations; and
● the impact of government initiatives on recruitment decision-making.
* Job Centre Plus is a DWP agency providing services to those attempting to find employment.
Source: Department for Work and Pensions (2014) Small Employer Recruitment Practices: Qualitative Research
into How Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises Select Candidates for Employment. Report No 855, July 2014.
24 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
that research objectives require more rigorous thinking, which derives from the use of
more formal language.
We make one final point on the development of your research objectives. Think
about adding personal objectives to those specific research objectives. These may be
concerned with your specific learning objectives from your research or more general
personal objectives such as enhancing your career prospects. You will be familiar with
the SMART test, listed in Table 1.7. Try this when you have thought about your personal
research objectives.
Table 1.7 The SMART test
Check that the objectives are:

The part that theory plays in developing research questions
and objectives
There is no more misunderstood word in the research vocabulary than ‘theory’. In this
section, we clarify what theory is by explaining what it is not. It’s important that you get
this clear. In Chapter 5, we explain the importance of theory in research design. We
emphasise that the role of theory will play a key part in your study, as all projects will
need to link to theory in some way. The most likely link will be to an existing theory
explained in the literature relevant to your research topic.
Theory may be broadly defined as an explanation of the relationship between two or
more concepts or variables. So, for example, the fact that you are reading this text is
based (we hope!) on the theory that the outcome will be that you are better equipped to
pursue your study.
We said we would clarify what theory is by explaining what it is not. Sutton and Staw
(1995) help here and, although their article was written in the last century, it is still
really helpful! In their view, theory is not:
● lots of data;
● lists of variables;
Definition
theory: an explanation of the relationship between two or more concepts or variables.
1.7 How to turn a research idea into a research project 25
● numerous hypotheses;
● pages of references;
● frequent use of diagrams.
Theory is not lots of data
We warned earlier in this chapter about developing research questions that are too
easy. They often allow only for description of phenomena. Such questions lead to project reports which are full of data and little else. Data only describe what you have
found out and, possibly, report on the patterns observed: theory explains the relationships between these patterns. As Sutton and Staw (1995: 372) say, ‘data do not generate
theory – only researchers do that’.
Theory is not lists of variables
You may be tempted to list a series of variables in an attempt to explain the determinants of a given process or outcome. But simply listing variables which may predict an
outcome is insufficient. For example, in a study of effective management decisionmaking, merely listing those factors which seem to be associated with effectiveness is
insufficient. What is required for theory development is an explanation of why the
factors associated with effectiveness are likely to be strong predictors of effectiveness.
Theory is not numerous hypotheses
In section 5.5 we explain the role of hypotheses in a research design, and in section 7.3
we talk about hypothesis testing. Testing possible relationships between variables certainly has a part to play in setting up research projects. But they do not clarify why
phenomena have happened and therefore do not constitute theory.
Definitions
data: facts, opinions and statistics that have been collected together and recorded for reference or
for analysis.
variable: individual element or attribute upon which data have been collected.
hypothesis: tentative (usually testable) statement about the ‘relationship’ between two or more
variables.
Theory is not pages of references
‘How many references should I include?’ is a question you have probably been asked by
student colleagues; you may have asked it yourself. It’s as if the more references you
include, the more ‘theoretical’ your work will be. OK, so it may (only may) indicate that
you have done lots of reading, but that isn’t theory. Theory is present when you outline
why the things you describe occur.
26 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
Theory is not frequent use of diagrams
Diagrams, boxes and arrows may help in clarifying patterns and causal relationships
between variables, but they don’t usually explain why the relationships have
occurred.
So, to sum up, the key word to stress in establishing the presence of theory in your
project report is ‘why’. Why do certain things happen when particular variables are present and others absent? Why does A happen and B does not? Why do people behave in
this way rather than the opposite way?
We made the point earlier that the fact that you are reading this text is based on the
theory that it better equips you to complete successfully your research study. In that
case, every purposive decision we take is based on theory: that certain consequences
will flow from the decision. So, if your decision to read this text is theory-based, then so
is, for example, every manager’s meeting that is devoted to making decisions. Yet managers are unlikely to realise this. They are equally unlikely to want to acknowledge this!
After all, theory is something that belongs in the university; it is not something which
is part of the ‘real world’. Yet, as Kurt Lewin (1945: 129) said, ‘there is nothing as practical as a good theory’.
So, if theory plays an important part in our everyday lives and is implicit in the
decision-making processes which go on, it’s not something that you should be too
scared about. What is important is that the element of theory in your research is made
explicit, not left implicit.
How ‘grand’ does my theory need to be?
Still feeling a bit scared about the idea of theory development? Well, let’s try to put your
mind at rest by looking at a three-type categorisation of theory developed by Creswell
(2008). Creswell talks of ‘grand theories’, ‘middle-range theories’ and ‘substantive theories’ (Figure 1.2).
Grand
theories
Middle-range theories
Increasing restrictions
in terms of general
applicability
Increasing capacity
to change the way
we think about
the world
Substantive theories
Figure 1.2 Grand, middle-range and substantive theories
Source: Saunders et al., 2016; developed from Creswell, 2008.
1.7 How to turn a research idea into a research project 27
Grand theories are those that are so significant that they make a major contribution
to the way in which we understand the world around us. An example of one such grand
theory is Darwin’s theory of evolution. Don’t worry; there is no need for you to think
about following in Darwin’s footsteps! Neither is there the need for you to be so ambitious as thinking of middle-range theories. These are not as world-changing in their
scope as grand theories, yet they are clearly of great importance in their particular field
of study. You will have studied many of these in your course. Examples are those concerned with motivation, leadership or creative thinking. Of course, you may apply one
of these to your particular situation. But you wouldn’t be expected to come up with an
original theory of such significance, which could be generalised to many other
contexts.
However, most of us are concerned with developing rather more modest theories –
substantive theories. These are restricted to a specific context: a particular time, research
setting, population or problem. So you may be concerned with a study of the reason
why, for example, the introduction of a new computer system in a particular organisation proved to be a failure. The conclusion you draw would be prefaced by the word
‘because’ – a term which serves as a ‘trigger word’ for a theoretical statement (e.g. ‘it
failed because there was too little of A and not enough B and C’. Alternatively, ‘it failed
because management did not explain the reason for the introduction to staff concerned
which led to staff discontent’. Either of these theoretical explanations may stand alone,
or you may link them to well-established middle-range theories developed by other
researchers.
Substantive theories may be more modest, but they may lead to ‘middle-range theories’. And by developing substantive theories, we are doing our bit as researchers to
develop our understanding of the world about us.
Definitions
grand theories: theories that make a major contribution to the way in which we understand the
world around us.
middle-range theories: theories which are not as world-changing in their scope as grand theories
but are of great importance in their particular field of study.
substantive theories: theories which are restricted to a specific context: a particular time, research
setting, population or problem
Writing a research question based on a middle-range theory
Aafreen was a part-time management student at her local university. Her full-time job
was a practice manager at a large city health centre in which she was responsible for a
team of over 30 administrative personnel whose main duties included reception work,
patient record-keeping, financial control, stock control, prescription monitoring and
general clerical duties.
Research in practice 1.6
➔
28 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
In most respects, the local Health Service Trust and general practitioner doctors in the
practice were happy with the operation of the practice, including the way it was administered by Aafreen and her team. However, a recent customer satisfaction survey concluded that the way in which the practice’s performance was perceived by its clients was
not as good as it could have been.
In management meetings this survey conclusion was discussed at some length, and a
number of suggestions were made about how things could be improved. One central
theme ran through those suggestions: that the practice needed to improve its rather
dreary and pedestrian image. The management team, including, Aafreen, decided that
the way in which all staff members, including the professional medical staff, presented
themselves needed to improve.
Consequently, Aafreen was charged with the responsibility to implement a staff selfpresentation programme with the intention that all staff should present an image consistent with a modern, professional health centre. She knew that this would have to be
handled sensitively because a number of staff members, although excellent performers
in their jobs, presented a somewhat dowdy image.
Aafreen had studied motivation theory in the early part of her course and guessed
that the sure way for the initiative to fail was to impose it upon staff. She felt that the
route to programme success was to use empowerment theory, giving the ownership of
the programme to the staff members themselves, starting with a meeting where ideas
could be invited.
Aafreen decided that she would implement her investigation and keep detailed notes
of every aspect of it, and then write it up as her course project.
Aafreen felt that an initial research question would help her focus on both the practical project to be undertaken at the practice and her course project. After some thought,
and trial and error, she wrote the following research question:
‘How should a staff self-presentation programme be implemented effectively using
the principles of empowerment theory?’
● Choosing the right research topic is important because: you have to live with it for a
considerable period of time; it should exploit and develop your knowledge and skills,
and enable you to draw upon existing resources and help you to pass the course you
are studying.
● Choosing an appropriate research topic is difficult because: there is too much choice;
there are fears that it will be too difficult and insufficiently theoretical and there is a
temptation to choose a topic that you have done before for another purpose resulting in repetition.
● Ten techniques for generating ideas for research topics are: thinking; looking at past
project titles; using past course assignments; using past projects from the university
library; using relevant literature; following the news media; brainstorming; concept
mapping; making a note of ideas and discussion with helpers.
Summary
Thinking about your research topic 29
● Pursuing a research topic assigned to you by your employer poses its own problems.
In such cases, you should aim for a balance between the competing demands of your
employer and your university by, for example, isolating an element of the larger
organisational project that you find interesting and treating this as the project for
your course.
● Research topic ideas may be refined by the conduct of a preliminary study; application of the Delphi technique and a process of narrowing down.
● A good research topic is one: that you are enthusiastic about and it matches your
career goals; for which resources are available; that is topical; that, whatever the outcome you still have a worthwhile project; where the topic fits the specifications and
meets the standards set by the examining institution; that links to the relevant literature; that provides fresh insights into the topic and for which research question(s)
and objectives are capable of being stated clearly.
● The next stage from choosing the research topic is the development of research questions and objectives. A suitable research question is one that reflects the that fact you
have thought about what fits the specifications and meet the standards set by the
examining institution; provides a clear link to the relevant literature and promises
fresh insights into the topic you have chosen. Research objectives add an element of
precision to research questions.
● All projects will need to link to theory in some way. The development of a ‘grand theory’ or ‘middle-range’ is unnecessary; ‘substantive theory’ development is sufficient.
➔ Look again at the 10 techniques available for generating research ideas (Table 1.1).
Choose those that appeal to you most. Use these to try to generate a research idea or
ideas. Once you have some research ideas, or if you have been unable to find an idea,
talk to your project supervisor.
➔ Evaluate your research ideas against the checklist ‘what makes a good research topic?’
(Table 1.4).
➔ Choose a research report contained in an article in an academic journal relevant to
your topic. Revisit the useful questions to ask when searching articles and reports for
possible research topic ideas (Table 1.3) and apply these to the article.
➔ Write a general focus research question related to your research topic. Try to ensure
this is ‘Why?’ or ‘How?’ rather than a ‘What?’ question.
➔ Use the general focus research question to write more detailed research questions and
your research objectives.
➔ Go back to the research report contained in an article in an academic journal relevant to your topic that you used with the questions in Table 1.3. Assuming that the
research question and objectives are not made explicit, try to establish from the content of the article what the research question and objectives may have been.
Thinking about your research topic
30 Chapter 1 Choosing your research topic
Creswell, J. (2008). Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches (3rd ed.).
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Clough, P. and Nutbrown, C. (2012). A Student’s Guide to Methodology (3rd ed.). London: Sage.
Department for Work and Pensions. (2014). Small Employer Recruitment Practices: Qualitative
Research into How Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises Select Candidates for Employment.
Report No 855, July 2014.
House of Commons Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. (2015). Rural Broadband and DigitalOnly Services, Seventh Report of Session 2014–15. London: The Stationery Office Limited.
Lewin, K. (1945). The Research Centre for Group Dynamics at Massachusetts Institute
of Technology. Sociometry, 8(2), 126–36.
Raimond, P. (1993). Management Projects. London: Chapman & Hall.
Saunders, M., Lewis, P. and Thornhill, A. (2016). Research Methods for Business Students
(7th ed.). Harlow: Pearson Education Ltd.
Sutton, R. and Staw, B. (1995). What theory is not. Administrative Science Quarterly,
40(3), 371–84.
References
Chapter 2
Reviewing the literature critically
Since you started your programme, your lecturers have expected you to read textbooks
and academic journal articles as part of your studies. Sometimes your lecturers will have
told you exactly which book chapters and articles they want you to read. At other times,
such as when undertaking an assignment, you will have been expected to find at least
some books and articles yourself, deciding whether or not they were relevant. This will
have meant you searching in your university’s library catalogue to see if there were any
potentially useful books, as well as searching one or more of your university’s online databases of academic journal articles. You will probably also have searched the Internet for
relevant reports and articles using a general search engine such as Google or Bing. Having
found some books and articles, you would then have read them quickly to work out
whether or not they were relevant before reading them more carefully and using them in
your assignment. Well done! You have already started to develop some of the skills you
need to review the literature critically.
The overall purpose of this chapter is to help you further develop the skills and understanding you need to critically review the literature so that you can complete your research
project. The skills you develop will also be helpful for your assignments. We explore the
skills by looking at critically reviewing the literature as an iterative process consisting of four
activities which you will need to go through a number of times to develop your literature
review chapter (Figure 2.1).
However, before we do this, it is important that you understand what a critical literature
review is, why you need to review the literature for your research project and are aware of
the variety of literature available to you.
In this chapter, we therefore start by talking about what a critical literature review is and
its purpose. We then go on to explain why it is important that you review the literature
critically as part of your research project and describe the variety of literature available to
you. Next, we consider the skills and understanding you will need to conduct a critical literature review. First, we look at how you will search for and obtain the literature using your
2.1 Why you should read this chapter
32 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
university’s online databases of academic articles. As part of this we also consider briefly
your use of the general search engine Google and the online encyclopaedia Wikipedia.
Next, we talk about how you can evaluate the usefulness of the literature you have found
for your own research project. We then explain how to read, note and correctly reference
this useful literature, emphasising the importance of not passing off others’ work as your
own by mistake and so being accused of plagiarism. We end this chapter by talking about
how you can structure and draft your literature review.
Evaluate usefulness
to your research
Draft your
literature review
Search for and
obtain literature
Read, note and
correctly reference
useful literature
Figure 2.1 The process of critically reviewing the literature
You will find that, although there are numerous definitions of a critical literature review,
these usually emphasise four aspects. In particular, it:
● offers an overview of significant literature available in your chosen topic;
● includes relevant items such as academic journal articles, books and other sources;
● provides a discussion and critical evaluation of these, the level of detail reflecting the
significance of each item to your research questions;
● develops a clear argument to contextualise and justify your research.
This means your literature review is not like a book review, or series of book reviews,
simply describing and summarising what each book or article is about. First, it includes
only significant literature published on your research topic (Table 2.1. You will therefore have to decide what is significant to your research topic and why it is significant.
This will involve you in assessing how relevant, if at all, each item you read is to your
2.2 What a critical literature review is
Definition
(critical) literature review: a detailed overview of the significant literature available about your chosen topic, providing a discussion and critical evaluation, and using clear argument to contextualise
and justify your research.
2.2 What a critical literature review is 33
research and, on the basis of your assessment, deciding whether or not to include it. We
talk about this more in section 2.6. For those items (mainly articles and books) you
decide to include, you then need to ensure that your review is more than just a description of their contents. You will need to discuss those aspects of what has been said that
are relevant to your research, and within your discussion you must be critical. We would
be surprised if this was the first time you had heard the term ‘critical’. It, or something
similar such as the phrase ‘critically evaluate’, is often used in assignments and exam
questions. However, it is worth pausing for a moment to explain what is meant by ‘critical’ in relation to your literature review. This word is crucial as it summarises what you
must do when writing your literature review.
Within your literature review, being critical simply means you provide clearly justified, reasoned judgements about what you have read and are now writing about. To do
this, you need to have a good knowledge of the literature on your topic that both supports and opposes your ideas, and show through your writing that you have this knowledge. This is often referred to as ‘demonstrating familiarity with the topic’ in assessment
criteria and means that you also need to show you know whom the recognised experts
in your topic area are. When you read and note the items that relate to your research
topic, you will need to do so with some scepticism, questioning what you read. If you
think an author’s arguments, ideas or research findings are unclear, biased, poorly justified, inconsistent or need to be tested further, this may well mean that they are.
However, it is not enough for you to just write that the author’s arguments are unclear,
biased, poorly justified, inconsistent or need to be tested further. In your critical literature review, you must also include clear reasons why you think this. By justifying the
points you make, you are showing your critical judgement. Through this, you will also
provide a reasonably detailed justified analysis of the key literature in your research
topic area, including research that both supports and opposes your ideas.
Table 2.1 What a critical literature review is and is not
A critical literature review . . . A literature review that is not critical . . .
•    identifies and includes the most relevant and
significant research to your topic
•    includes all research that may possibly be
relevant to your topic
•    discusses and evaluates this research •    just summarises and describes this research
•    identifies the recognised experts (authors) •    fails to mention recognised experts (authors)
•    contextualises and justifies your research
questions
•    fails to justify or mention your research
questions
•    highlights areas where new or further
research is needed
•    does not highlight where new or further
research is needed
•    considers and discusses research that
supports and opposes your ideas
•    only considers and discusses research that
supports your ideas
•    justifies points made logically with reference
to published research and clear argument
•    makes unjustified or poorly justified points
•    distinguishes between fact and opinion •    mixes up fact and opinion
•    includes recent relevant research •    misses out on recent relevant research
•    references all items referred to fully •    fails to reference all or some items referred to
34 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
Now you know what a critical literature review is, it is important to understand why you
need to undertake one and include it in your project report. While we have already provided you with some hints about the reasons for this in the previous section, we still
believe it is worth talking about these and others in more detail.
Provides the base on which you will build your research project
Reviewing the literature critically is one of the first things you need to do when you
start your research as it will provide the base on which your research project is built. By
reviewing the literature, you will be able to develop a good understanding of what
research has already been undertaken on your topic area. This means that you will be
clear about what is known about your topic, and also the context in which it is known,
and will be able to write about this in your literature review chapter or chapters. Let’s
say your research topic is personalisation of marketing. As you review the literature, you
will begin to find out not only how online marketers are using technology to provide
potential customers with unique and customisable content, but also the reasons why
organisations are personalising their marketing. You will also become aware of the
countries and industry sectors in which this research was conducted – in other words,
the context of the research. Eventually you will have sufficient knowledge from what
you have read to discuss the broader context of your own research on personalisation of
marketing. You will also be able to explain and justify your own research questions in
relation to what is already known (and what is not known!) about viral marketing and
in what contexts (section 1.6).
Helps you decide on the topic you want to research for your project
You will have read about how reviewing the literature can help you decide on your
research topic in section 1.4. In that section, you read about the importance of academic review articles in providing you with a thorough review of the state of knowledge
in a topic area as well as with pointers towards areas where further research needs to be
undertaken. You also read how browsing peer-reviewed journals could provide you with
a good source of possible research ideas. You will find that such research ideas are often
introduced under the heading ‘Directions for future research’ or with the phrase
‘Further research is needed.’ These articles are useful not only for the ideas, but also
because they highlight areas where research is needed and give you a justification for
undertaking your research to which you can refer. It is also likely that the theories these
articles identify will be those you will explore further in your own research.
Although books may be less up to date than journals, they can also suggest research
topics to you. In particular, edited books based on papers given at a conference or seminar often contain a final chapter that summarises the key findings from the earlier
chapters and draws out key themes, including future directions for research (Research
in practice 1.1).
2.3 Why it is important to review the literature critically
2.3 Why it is important to review the literature critically 35
In addition to reviewing academic journal articles and textbooks, you will also be
reading trade and professional magazines. Reviewing this type of literature will provide
you with an indication of whether your research topic is ‘hot’. Returning to our example of personalisation of marketing, if this has been discussed in recent issues of marketing magazines such as digital marketing magazine, it is newsworthy and likely to be a
‘hot’ topic. This can be helpful, particularly if you are going to collect your own data.
People are often keener to be involved in research they believe is topical and that will
have immediate benefits for them or their organisation (section 3.2).
Can give you insights into the secondary data that are likely
to be available
It is likely that you will make at least some use of data that have been collected by others
for some other purpose in your research project. Such secondary data are useful, not
least because they give you access to far larger data sets than you could collect yourself
and can also provide you with comparative and contextual data (section 4.3).
As you review the literature critically, you will become aware of the data that other
researchers looking at your topic have used. In some articles and reports (and occasionally books) the data collected will be presented as tables. You can use these as secondary
data for your own research, providing of course you reference the article, report or book
as the source of the data! In other articles, reports and books the authors will explain
how they have used data sets collected originally by someone else for some other purpose. Where these data sets are in the public domain, you will also be able to find,
download and use them in your research, providing of course there is a full reference to
the source of these data.
Can give you insights into possible ways of collecting
your own data
The literature you review will also give you ideas about how you might collect your own
data. This is important because, if a method has been used before to collect similar data
and worked well, it will hopefully work if you decide to use it. In particular, articles and
book chapters that report research using data that the researcher has collected will
nearly always describe how those data were collected in a section headed ‘Method’ or
‘Methodology’. While you would hope that the description is in sufficient detail for you
to be able to understand fully and repeat the same method, unfortunately this is not
always true. However, even if the description is not particularly detailed, it can still provide you with an indication of how you might collect your own data. In addition, it is
likely to include references to other items which you can read to find out more about
the method used.
Let’s say that you read an article on your research topic that has used a questionnaire
to collect the data. This article provides both a detailed description of the method and,
as an appendix, a blank copy of the questionnaire that the authors used to collect their
data. This gives you a clear idea of the questions you need to ask if you decide to also use
a questionnaire to collect your own data. If you think the questions are suitable for the
36 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
people you are intending to collect your data from, you may decide to use the same
questions. However, if you do this, you must give credit to the people who originally
designed the questions and include the full reference to their article in your methods
chapter. If you do not do this, you may be accused of plagiarism, as you are passing off
the work of others as your own.
Alternatively, you may read an article in an academic journal that focuses on
research methods, such as Organizational Research Methods or Field Methods, which
explains the use of a particular technique for collecting data such as a form of interviewing or observation or a specific use of questionnaires. Such articles will provide
you with helpful insights about how to conduct your own research and what to avoid.
They are likely to contain more detail about particular techniques than we have been
able to include in Chapter 6. Where you use the ideas from one of these articles for
your own method, you should refer to that article in your methods chapter (Research
in practice 2.1).
Can give you insights into possible ways of analysing
your own data
Academic journal articles can provide insights into how to analyse both data you collect yourself and secondary data. The techniques used to analyse data are usually
named in the ‘findings’ or ‘results’ section. Where these are widely used techniques, in
particular statistical tests, it is likely that, although the test is named, it will not be
explained in any detail as it will have been assumed that the reader (you) will already
be aware of and understand the technique. In addition, you will not see a reference to
a journal article or a statistics textbook. This is not a problem as you will almost
Insights into research methods from the literature
An article by Mark (Saunders, 2012) in Field Methods concludes by offering a series of
recommendations about the use of web-based questionnaires for organisational research
which may be helpful for your research. These include:
1 For research in organisations, the use of web-based questionnaires should be considered
only where respondents are IT-literate and have ready access to the Internet at work.
2 Web-based questionnaires should be designed to allow the impact of people not
responding to be assessed.
3 Caution should be exercised regarding the inclusion of questions on topics related to
the use of the web or associated technologies.
4 Care should be taken when comparing responses to open (write in) questions from
web-based questionnaires with those from questionnaires delivered using other
methods, owing to the impact of the technology on response length.
Research in practice 2.1
2.4 The types of literature available to you 37
certainly be able to find sufficient information about the test in your own statistics
textbook or by using the Help feature of a statistics software programme such as IBM
SPSS Statistics.
Where an academic journal article uses data analysis techniques that are not widely
known, it is likely that the author or authors will have explained how to use the analysis
technique. Hopefully, this will be in sufficient detail for you to be able to understand
fully and use the same technique, although unfortunately this is not always true.
However, even if the description is not particularly detailed, it can still provide you with
an indication of how you might analyse your own data. In addition, it is likely to include
references to other books and articles which you can read to find out more about the
technique. Such articles are likely to contain far more detail than we have been able to
include in Chapter 7, and where appropriate should be referred to in your method or
findings chapter.
The amount of literature available to you is expanding rapidly as more sources are made
available online. In addition to the library catalogue, your university library’s web pages
will provide a comprehensive list of the other sources you can access and the types of
literature they contain. Most of these other sources accessed are databases, so your
library’s web pages will usually include direct web links and details of any passwords
needed.
We have listed the main types of literature you are likely to access through your
library catalogue and databases for your critical literature review in Table 2.2, along
with a brief description of their contents and an indication of their likely use for your
review. Textbooks, such as those that have been recommended to you for your modules,
will be very helpful as you start your literature review, providing an overview of your
research topic and the recognised experts. However, academic journal articles which
have been peer-reviewed (also referred to as ‘refereed’) will be the most useful to you in
your literature review and will form the majority of items you use. These articles will
have been read and evaluated by academic experts, called peer reviewers, to ensure they
meet the quality criteria of the journal before they are published. Peer reviewers are usually anonymous and ensure quality by both detecting errors, which have to be corrected
before the article is published, and providing a detailed assessment of the article. Where
peer reviewers consider the quality is not sufficient or there are too many errors, the
article will not be published.
2.4 The types of literature available to you
Definition
peer review: the process of evaluating an article by experts to establish whether it meets quality
criteria and is suitable for publication.
38 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
Table 2.2 Main types of literature available to you
Type Contents
Use for your critical literature
review
Textbooks Written specifically for audiences such as
students or professionals. Material usually
presented in an ordered and relatively
accessible form. Often draw on a wide
range of sources including peer-reviewed
academic journal articles.
Useful, particularly as an
introductory source for an
overview of your research
topic and to find the
recognised experts.
Peer-reviewed
(refereed) academic
journal articles
Provide detailed reports of research. Articles
written by experts in the field and evaluated
by other academics (peer reviewers) to
assess quality and suitability. Pay rigorous
attention to detail and verification of
information. Usually contain an extensive
list of references. Before publication, have
usually been revised in response to
comments. Not all academic journal articles
are peer-reviewed (see below).
The most useful type for your
literature review.
Non-refereed
academic journal
articles
Articles may provide detailed reports of
research. Articles selected by an editor or
editorial board with subject knowledge.
Relevance and usefulness
varies considerably. Beware of
possible bias.
Professional and
trade journal articles
Articles written for members of
professional or trade organisations, so
related to their needs. Consist of a mix of
news items and more detailed accounts of
a practical nature. Articles rarely based on
research, although some provide
summaries of research.
Can provide useful insights
into practice, although may
be biased. Need to be used
with considerable caution.
Newspaper articles Articles written for members of public,
most newspapers addressing a particular
market segment. News presented is
filtered dependent on events, priority
being given to headline-grabbing stories
that are likely to appeal to that
newspaper’s readers.
Good source of topical events
and developments. May
contain bias in reporting and
coverage.
Conference
proceedings
Selected papers presented at a conference,
often published online, as a book or special
edition of a journal. Usually peer-reviewed.
Sometimes difficult to find.
Very useful if the theme of
the conference matches your
research.
Reports Reports on specific topics written by
academics and various organisations,
including market research organisations
and government departments. Often
available online. Beware of possible bias.
May not have gone through same review
process as peer-reviewed academic journal
articles, but those from established
organisations often of high quality.
Often difficult to access or
expensive to purchase. Can
be a useful source of
information when the topic
matches your research.
2.5 Searching for and obtaining literature 39
Although your skills in using general search engines such as Google and Bing are likely
to be excellent, we have found that many of our students are unaware of at least some of
the search features of full text databases of academic articles such as Business Source
Premier and Emerald Insight. While you will have already used these or similar databases
of academic journal articles for assignments, there are relatively simple things you can
do to make your searches as fruitful as possible.
The process of searching for and obtaining the literature consists of five stages:
1 Decide on your topic.
2 Identify and note the search terms and phrases you will use.
3 Choose your online databases.
4 Undertake your search.
5 Download relevant publications.
We will now look at each stage in more detail.
Decide on your topic
You have probably already got a reasonably clear idea of your research topic. However, if
you haven’t, don’t worry. Just turn back to Chapter 1 and look at sections 1.4 and 1.5,
which talk about generating ideas for your research topic and refining these ideas. This
process of refining these ideas is important because, unless you have a reasonably clear
and specific idea of the topic you wish to search for in the literature, most of the items
you find are not going to be of use for your research project!
Let’s say you’ve defined your research topic as ‘financial management’ and decide to
search for items on this topic in one of the online databases to which your university subscribes. Because the topic of financial management is so broad, an initial search for ‘financial management’ will probably find more than 100,000 items – far too many for you to
ever download, let alone read! However, if you define your topic as ‘the impact of recession
on financial management’, you can be more precise in your choice of keywords with
which to search the literature. By using keywords and phrases such as ‘financial management’ and ‘recession’ as search terms, you would be likely to find about 1,000 items, a
slightly more manageable number for you to begin to look at. You might have been even
more specific, defining your topic as ‘the impact of recession on financial management
budgeting’. Searching for this topic in the online database using keywords and phrases
such as ‘financial management’, ‘recession’ and ‘budget’ as search terms would find fewer
than 100 items. Not only is this a far more manageable number to look at, but it is also
likely that a greater proportion will be directly relevant to your research topic.
Identify and note the search terms and phrases you will use
Databases find relevant items by matching specific words and phrases with either the
full text or part of the publication such as the abstract (summary) or title. You will have
2.5 Searching for and obtaining literature
40 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
found when searching with Google or Bing that the more specific the word or phrase
you type in, the more likely you are to find relevant web pages. You will have also found
that if the word or phrase you type in is too specific, you don’t find the web pages you
need. The same principle applies to searching databases, including those of academic
journal articles. You therefore need to think carefully about the search terms you will
use while searching, and, as when searching using Google or Bing, you need to be prepared to try a variety of keywords and phrases.
Definition
Search term: a word or phrase that describes your research topic, question(s) or objectives and can
be used either on its own or in combination with other phrases in databases.
Choose your databases
Your choice of databases will, not surprisingly, be dictated primarily by those available
through subscriptions paid by your university. We have listed those most frequently
available in Table 2.4, along with a brief description of what they cover and therefore
what you can search for using your search terms and phrases. Of these, the most widely
used by business and management students such as you are Business Source Premier
and Emerald Insight. We would recommend that you start your literature search using
these. However, these databases do not have such a good coverage of older items, particularly those published over three to four decades ago. You will find the database
JSTOR a useful source for journal articles, particularly when you need to obtain a copy
of that seminal article recommended by your supervisor.
Your ideas for possible search terms and phrases, such as ‘financial management’ and
‘recession’, are likely to be based upon what you already know about your research topic
and any reading you have already done. In addition, you will probably find some of the
techniques to generate research topics outlined in section 1.4 helpful. Techniques such as
looking at past project titles, brainstorming, concept mapping and discussing your ideas
can all help you clarify your thoughts and come up with possible search terms and phrases.
You will also find that dictionaries and encyclopaedias (including Wikipedia) are often
helpful for suggesting alternative words and phrases. We have listed six things to think
about when identifying your search terms in Table 2.3. They are in no particular order.
Table 2.3 Six things to think about when identifying your search terms
Using: Example

2.5 Searching for and obtaining literature 41
You will notice that we have included Google Scholar in Table 2.4. This is because it has
a number of useful features to support your search of the literature and is readily available. In particular, once you know the names of recognised experts researching your
topic, you can find out who has referred to (cited) their work by simply searching for
their names. Google Scholar will rank all the recognised experts’ publications and, for
each, list the full references of other documents that have cited (referenced) the publication. This means you can see which of your experts’ publications have been cited
most, and you can find these other documents that have cited these publications
subsequently.
You will have also noticed that, in contrast, we have not included Wikipedia in our
table. There is no doubt in our minds that Wikipedia is useful if you want to find out
something quickly. However, the level of detail provided is unlikely to be sufficient for
your research project. As you know, Wikipedia articles can be edited by anyone and are
allowed to be imperfect. Despite Wikipedia’s clear editing policy and their request that
Table 2.4 Frequently used online databases of academic articles in business and
management
Database Description
Business Source Premier
(sometimes called EBSCO)
Full text articles for over 2,900 English-language journals published
worldwide. Covers all areas of business and management with access
for some titles back to 1886. Embargo of up to a year for full text of
articles from the most recent issues of some journals. Also includes
Datamonitor company profiles for the world’s 10,000 largest
companies, Datamonitor industry profiles for various industries and
Economist Intelligence Unit country reports.
Emerald Insight Full text articles for over 160 English-language management journals
and reviews from over 300 management journals. Covers all areas of
business and management.
JSTOR Full text articles for science, social science, arts and humanities
journals. Coverage usually extends back to volume 1, issue 1 of
journals and more of the current issues of journals are also becoming
available. Often the best place to find ‘old articles’.
Blackwell Reference
Online
Blackwell Encyclopaedia of Management, Blackwell ‘Handbooks’ and
‘Companions’ in business and management.
Wiley Online Includes over 1,100 full text journals covering the sciences, business,
law, humanities, psychology and social sciences.
Google Scholar Scholarly literature consisting of articles, theses, books, abstracts or
court opinions from many disciplines and sources. Usually provides a
web link, but access can depend on subscription. Literature ranked
according to the full text of each document, where published,
author(s), how often and how recently cited in other scholarly
literature.
Nexis Full text of articles in newspapers across the world and UK national
and regional newspapers as well as company information and
reports.
42 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
contributors ensure the information they add is verifiable, errors and misinformation
can and do occur. While these errors are usually put right quickly, an article may be
wrong at the time you read it. Finally, although Wikipedia expects articles to be phrased
to reflect the present consensus on a subject, people with rival opinions do compete to
change what is written, resulting in the information you find changing overnight. We
therefore recommend that you do not use Wikipedia as a source for your critical literature review.
Undertake your search
Now you have identified the search terms and phrases you are going to use and chosen
your databases, all you need to do is click on the links on your university library’s web
page and you are ready to start searching.
Most databases allow you to undertake a variety of searches ranging from ‘basic’ or
‘quick’ to ‘advanced’ in their complexity. Basic searches, as their name suggests, are
relatively simple, often limiting the number of search terms you can type in. More
advanced searches, as we will see shortly, allow you to specify your search more precisely. In addition, many databases have a browse facility allowing you to look through
electronic copies of journals by title or by subject.
The first thing you need to do for a basic search is to type in the search term. If you
look at the basic search screen for the online database Emerald, you will see that you
can type in one term or phrase as a search term (Figure 2.2, point 1) and have only one
option, selecting the content you want to search, in this case ‘articles and chapters’
(Figure 2.2, point 2). When you click on ‘Search’, this will retrieve all relevant items in
the database containing the search term, in this example ‘articles and chapters’ articles
about ‘service quality’. For this example, this is likely to be over 100,000, as the search
term is very broad!
1. Type in search
term
2. Select content
you wish to
search
3. Note ability to
browse content
by subject area
Figure 2.2 Quick search using Emerald Insight
Source: Emerald Insight, reproduced with permission.
2.5 Searching for and obtaining literature 43
For more advance searches, again the first thing you need to do is to type in your
search terms (Figure 2.3, point 1) using Boolean operators to link two or more search
terms (Figure 2.3, point 2). Boolean operators are the words you use to join together
your keywords and phrases for your search. If you look at the advanced search screen for
the online database Business Source Premier (Figure 2.3), you will see that the search
terms ‘supply chain’ and ‘power’ are joined by the Boolean operator ‘AND’. This
means that when you undertake this search, you will retrieve only items that contain
both these search terms. In other words, the word ‘AND’ is narrowing your search to
retrieve items that contains both search terms. Other Boolean operators that you may
find useful are ‘OR’ and ‘NOT’. The word ‘OR’ broadens your search by retrieving items
that, in this example, contain either the search term ‘supply chain’ or the search term
‘power’ or both search terms. The word ‘NOT’ narrows your search by excluding items.
This means that if you searched for ‘supply chain’ NOT ‘power’, you would retrieve only
items that included the search term ‘supply chain’ but that did not also include the
term ‘power’.
In many databases, you can amend your search by truncating your search terms or
using wildcards. For most databases, the truncation character is *. If you truncate the
1. Type in the search
term(s)
6. Select publication
type to constrain
your search
5. Select dates to
time-constrain
your search
4. Select if you want
only peer-reviewed
publications
3. Select where you
will search for
each term
2. Use Boolean
operators to link
search terms
Figure 2.3 Advanced search using Business Source Premier
Source: EBSCO Information Services, reproduced with permission.
44 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
keyword ‘learning’ to ‘learn’ by typing in the search term ‘learn*’, the database will
retrieve all items that include the word ‘learn’, including ‘learn’, ‘learning’ and ‘learner’.
Wildcards are useful if you have to deal with spelling variations, particularly between
US and UK English. The wild-card character differs between databases, but is often ‘?’.
So, if you type in ‘organi?ation’ as a search term, you will retrieve items with both the
US spelling organization and the UK spelling organisation.
You will find it is best to start most searches by looking for your search term or terms
only in the abstract field (Figure 2.3, point 3). Abstracts are summaries of articles, books
or reports that normally provide sufficient detail for you to decide whether or not they
are likely to be useful for your research. By only searching for your search terms in the
abstract, you will exclude literature that does not focus on your topic, even if your
search terms appear elsewhere in the main text.
Most online databases, including Business Source Premier, allow you to check ✓
whether you want to retrieve all items or only those where the full text is available
and you have access to it. Similarly, you can often check whether you want to retrieve
all items, or only those that have been peer-reviewed (Figure 2.3, point 4). You can
specify the dates for which you want to retrieve publications (Figure 2.3, point 5) and
the type of publication (Figure 2.3, point 6). This can be useful if, say, you want to
retrieve only items that have been published in the last five years in academic
journals.
Definition
abstract: a summary of an article, book or report, providing an overview of what it contains and sufficient information for the original to be located.
Download the relevant publications
Before you obtain a copy of a relevant publication, usually by downloading an article in
an academic journal, it is worth making a quick assessment of its likely usefulness to
your research project. You can usually do this by reading the abstract on the screen
(Research in practice 2.2).
Obtaining articles is very easy if you have checked the box for only retrieving articles
where full text is available. For most journal articles, you will only have to click on an
icon to download an electronic ‘PDF Full Text’ copy which you can read using Adobe
Reader (if you have not already downloaded this, you can do so for free). For articles
where an electronic copy is not stored in the database, you will often be able to click on
a different icon and download the ‘Linked Full Text’. Again, you will usually be able to
be read this using Adobe Reader. For those articles not available electronically, your
library may well have a print copy. If not, you may be able to order it from another
library as an inter-library loan. You will probably be charged for this service, so use it
very sparingly.
2.5 Searching for and obtaining literature 45
Using an abstract to assess likely use of an article
Jaimie’s research project was about entrepreneurial learning in small and medium-sized
Enterprises (SMEs). In a search using the Emerald Insight database, she had found an
article in the peer-reviewed academic journal European Journal of Training and
Development by Saunders and colleagues (2014) that she thought would be useful. She
decided to read the abstract online to check.
Research in practice 2.2
Abstract
Purpose: To contribute to the literature on innovation and entrepreneurial learning by
exploring how SMEs learn and innovate, how they use of both formal and informal
learning and in particular the role of networks and crisis events within their learning
experience.
Design/methodology/approach: Mixed method study, comprising 13 focus groups,
over 1000 questionnaire responses from SME mangers, 13 focus groups and 20 case
studies derived from semi-structured interviews.
Findings: SMEs have a strong commitment to learning, and a shared vision. Much of this
learning is informal through network events, mentoring or coaching. SMEs that are
innovative are significantly more committed to learning than those which are less
innovative, seeing employee learning as an investment. Innovative SMEs are more likely
to have a shared vision, be open-minded and to learn from crises, being able to reflect on
their experiences.
Implications for research: There is a need for further process driven qualitative research
to understand the interrelationship between, particularly informal, learning, crisis events
and SME innovation.
Implications for practice: SME owners need opportunities and time for reflection as a
means of stimulating personal learning – particularly the opportunity to learn from crisis
events. Access to mentors (often outside the business) can be important here, as are
informal networks.
Originality/value: This is one of the first mixed method large scale studies to explore the
relationship between SME innovation and learning, highlighting the importance of
informal learning to innovation and the need for SME leaders to foster this learning as
part of a shared organisational vision.
Source: Saunders et al. (2014). Copyright © 2014 Emerald Group Publishing Limited Emerald Group
Publishing Limited 2046-9012 DOI 10.1108/EJTD-07-2013-0073. Reproduced by permission of the
publisher
The abstract confirmed that the Purpose of the article was to explore how SMEs learn
and innovate using both formal and informal networking. More detail was given in the
Findings and Research limitations/implications sections of the abstract. The Design/
methodology/approach indicated that the research had been undertaken in the United
Kingdom using a questionnaire answered by over 1,000 SMEs’ managers as well as 13
focus groups.
Based on this information, Jaimie decided that the article was likely to be useful to her
research project, so she downloaded and saved the PDF file.
46 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
You have already started evaluating the usefulness of the literature to your research
through reading the abstract (Research in practice 2.2). Inevitably, the usefulness of any
item will depend on your research question and your aim and objectives. This means
that an article, which may be very useful for your friend’s research project, could be of
little or no use for your research project. As you review the literature, you will need to
read as much of the literature that is closely related and of value to your research question as time permits. Let’s say your topic is one where research has been ongoing for
some years. If this is the case, you should find plenty of literature of value that relates
directly to your research question. However, if your research question is about a new
topic, you may find that not much of value that is closely related has been published.
You will therefore have to review the literature more widely and set your own research
in a broader context of what is already known.
Each time you evaluate the usefulness of publication for your research project, you
are asking yourself questions about two interrelated aspects: its relevance and its value.
At the same time, you are also probably asking yourself ‘Have I read enough articles
yet?’ Any item’s relevance to your research project depends on the appropriateness of
the research reported and the connections you can make with your own research project. A publication’s value to you depends on the quality of the research that is reported.
This includes things such as how well methods and theory have been used, as well as
the quality of the argument. In contrast, the answer to the question ‘Have I read enough
articles yet?’ is about you having read sufficient publications to allow you to position
your research project in the wider context of what is already known, and to cite the
main writers with confidence.
Our students have found the questions in Table 2.5 helpful when they have been
evaluating the relevance of a publication to their research, and we hope that you will
also find them helpful for your own research.
2.6 Evaluating the usefulness of literature to your research
Table 2.5 Questions to help evaluate the relevance and value of literature
Question Comment
Relevance
1 Is the item recent? Although more recently published items are
often more relevant, do not discount items just
because they are old!
2 Is the topic of the research similar to your
own?
If it is, you may be able to compare and
contrast your findings.
3 Is the context of the research similar to
your own?
Beware: do not discount items just because the
context is different; you can often still get
useful insights.
4 Is this item cited (referenced) in other
items that you have also found useful?
If it is often referred to in other items, it is
probably important.
2.7  Reading, noting and correctly referencing useful literature 47
Question Comment
5 Is the author cited (referenced) in other
items you have found useful?
If yes, then the author is probably a recognised
expert.
6 Does the author contradict or support the
arguments you will make?
In either case, it is likely to be useful!
Value
7 Does the author use emotional words,
illogical argument or seem to only choose
examples that support the points being
made?
If the author does, the item is probably biased
and needs to be used with caution. If you do
use it, you should comment on the possible
bias and give reasons why you think this is so.
8 Does the author describe theory clearly
and in sufficient detail?
Even if there are gaps in the description of
theory, the item may be useful for the
references to the original theory.
9 Is the method used described clearly and in
sufficient detail?
Even if there are gaps in the method, the item
may still be of use. If you do use it, you may
need to comment on those aspects of the
method that are less clear.
10 Does the author highlight gaps in current
research or offer suggestions for future
research?
If the gaps or suggestions relate to your
research topic, they could provide a useful
justification for what you are doing.
11 Is there an extensive list of references at
the end?
A long list of references will often include
relevant publications that you have not yet
discovered – a great help.
Sufficiency
12 Do you recognise the author and her/his
ideas from other things you have read?
If you do, you are getting closer to having read
sufficient publications.
13 Have you read the publications by those
considered to be key researchers in the
field?
If you have, you are getting closer to having
read sufficient publications.
14 Can you write about the topic and
associated research with confidence?
Confidence normally only comes if you know
the topic well.
Source: Developed from Saunders et al. (2016).
Table 2.5 Continued
Reading and noting
You may be one of those people who, as they read an article or book, only uses a highlighter pen to mark those pieces they think are useful. If you are, beware! Just highlighting sentences and paragraphs that are likely to be useful will not help you concentrate
nearly as well as making notes in the margin or on a separate piece of paper. Your notes
Reading, noting and correctly referencing
2.7 useful literature
48 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
can remind you why you thought the passage in the article was important, how an idea
fits with your own research topic or even why you disagree with what you have just
read. Making notes will help keep your mind focused on what you are reading and to
remember what you have read.
Harvard College Library (2011) suggests that as you read, your note taking should
focus on:
1 summarising;
2 comparing and contrasting.
When you write a summary of what you have just read in your own words, you probably
find the process quite difficult. This is not surprising, as by summarising in your own
words, you have to understand fully what you have read. In contrast, copying sentences
just shows that you can copy. Copying sentences can also be a problem if you later forget they were copied and include them in your project report as your own words. Most
plagiarism detection software will highlight your copied sentences as actual direct
quotes and suggest their original source. If you have not put the copied sentences in
quotation marks and also stated their source as a reference, you will, quite rightly, be
accused of plagiarism. You can minimise this problem by making notes in your own
words that summarise what you have read and always acknowledging the source of the
ideas. If you decide you must copy a sentence exactly, enclose it in quotation marks and
note the full reference and page number next to it.
As you make your notes, ask yourself how the item you are reading compares or
contrasts with other articles and books you have read and your own thoughts upon
reading it. Within this you need to think carefully about the clarity of the arguments and whether they are justified by the evidence presented. Let’s say you have
already read Hofstede et al.’s (2010) book Culture and Organizations about national
cultures. The article you are now reading by McSweeny (2002) is very critical of
Hofstede’s research and in particular the assumptions on which he bases much of
the research in this book. You are not sure who to believe, but you no longer feel so
positive about Hofstede’s theories! You therefore emphasise in your notes that
McSweeny believes Hofstede’s arguments are flawed, the reasons why and that you
don’t feel so positive towards Hofstede’s theories about national cultures. You also
find your notes on Hofstede’s book and add a brief comment, ‘See McSweeny (2002)
for critique’, to help ensure you do not forget to include this information in your
literature review.
Five questions that can help you to read critically and make useful notes are listed in
Table 2.6, along with a brief comment on each.
Definition
plagiarism: presenting the work and ideas of other people as it were your own, without acknowledging and referencing the original source.
2.7  Reading, noting and correctly referencing useful literature 49
Referencing
As you write your project report, you will need to record the sources of all the information, research findings, theories and other ideas to which you refer in your writing. This
process is known as referencing and allows you to acknowledge and give credit to the
work of others, also helping ensure you are not accused of plagiarism. It allows you and
anyone else who reads your project report to find the original source of this work. You
reference work by identifying the source of the ideas briefly in your main text and then
provide full details as a list of references or bibliography at the end of your project report.
As a general rule, it is better to avoid quoting directly. However, if you do use a quotation, you must enclose this in quotation marks and state the number of the page from
which it was copied. So, if you were quoting directly from a book Mark and Phil wrote
with their colleague Adrian Thornhill, you would write:
Table 2.6 Five questions to help critical reading and noting
Question Comment
1 Why am I reading this? This question will help you focus on the reason or
reasons you are reading the item, rather than be sidetracked by the author’s agenda.
2 What is the author (or what are the
authors) trying to do in writing this?
Your answer to this question will help you to decide
how useful the material that you are reading may be
for your research project.
3 What is the author (or what are the
authors) saying that is relevant to my
research topic?
Your answer to this question will give you the focus
of your summarising notes.
4 To what extent am I convinced by
what is being said and why?
Your answer to this question will help you make
notes that compare and contrast what you are
reading with the other items you have already read.
5 What use can I make of what I have
read in my research project?
This question forces you to think about how you will
write about what you have read in your literature
review.
Source: Developed from Wallace and Wray (2016).
“For some project reports you will be required to include a bibliography. Convention dictates
that this should include all the relevant items you have consulted for your project, including
those not referred to directly in the text. For others you will be asked to include only a list of
references for those items referred to directly in the text.” (Saunders et al., 2016: 107)
Definitions
(list of) references: list of those items you have consulted, used and referred to directly in the text.
Your university will specify the precise style.
bibliography: list of all relevant items you have consulted and used, including those you do not refer
to directly in the text. Usually in alphabetical order. Your university will specify the precise style.
50 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
You would then provide the full reference at the end of your project report. We have
provided a guide in Appendix 1 to a version of each of the most commonly used styles
of referencing in business schools: Harvard and the American Psychological Association
(APA).
For books
• Title of book
• Edition (unless 1st)
• Place of publication
• Publisher
For all items
• Surname and initials of
author(s)
• Year of publication
For book chapters
• Title of chapter
• Surname and initials of
author(s)’ of the book
• Title of book
• Edition (unless 1st)
• Place of publication
• Publisher
• Page numbers of
chapter
For journal articles
• Title of article
• Title of journal
• Volume number
• Part or issue number
• Page numbers of
article
Figure 2.4 Information you need to reference publications
However, rather than just using one of the two formats we suggest, please check to
see if your own university or faculty has a preferred referencing style for recording articles, books and chapters in books as well as other items you have referred to in your literature review and elsewhere in your project report. If it does, it is essential that you
obtain a copy of this and follow it exactly. Sloppy referencing suggests you do not care
about your work and is likely to lose you marks. Whatever referencing style you use, the
information you will need to record for the most common publications you reference is
listed in Figure 2.4.
The most common referencing style in Business and Management is the author–date
system. When using this system, you usually use the author’s (or authors’) surname(s)
and the year of publication to identify documents in the main text as you refer to them.
All these references are then recorded in full in one alphabetical list by author’s surname at the end of your project report under the heading ‘References’ (Research in
practice 2.3). Another referencing system you may come across in your reading is the
footnotes system. Footnotes systems (such as Vancouver referencing), identify references in the main text with a number that is usually in superscript. All these references
are recorded in full in the order to which they were first referred, usually in one sequential list at the end of your project report under the heading ‘References’. This means
that, if you use the footnotes system, your list is unlikely to be in alphabetical order
(Research in practice 2.3).
2.7  Reading, noting and correctly referencing useful literature 51
Footnotes and author–date (Harvard) systems
Amina had used the footnotes system to reference the books and journal articles she
referred to in the first draft of her literature review on strategic change. This is shown in
the following two extracts from her literature review and list of references:
Research in practice 2.3
2.3 Barriers to strategic change
. . . The cultural web22 offers a way of auditing an organisation’s culture and the barriers
to change that culture can present. It has been argued that the web can be used to help
build a vision for the new organisation, which managers can then compare with the web
for their existing organisation.23 Despite the numerous obstacles to strategic change,
summarised by Franken and colleagues24 as . . .
References
22. Johnson, G., Whittington, R., Scholes, K., Angwin, D. and Regnér, P. (2014) Exploring
Corporate Strategy (10th ed.), Harlow: Pearson.
23. Balogun, J., Hope Hailey, V. and Gustafsson, S. (2016) Exploring Strategic Change
(4th ed.), Harlow: Pearson.
24. Franken, A., Edwards, C. and Lambert, R. (2009) Executing strategic change,
California Management Review, 51(3), pp. 49–73.
In his feedback her supervisor commented that, although she had used the footnotes
system correctly, the University’s assessment criteria asked for the Harvard author–date
system. Amina checked the guidance notes on referencing provided by her university
and amended her draft so that the references were in Harvard format. This is shown in
the following two extracts:
2.3 Barriers to strategic change
. . . The cultural web (Johnson et al., 2014) offers a way of auditing an organisation’s
culture and the barriers to change that culture can present. It has been argued that the
web can be used to help build a vision for the new organisation, which managers can
then compare with the web for their existing organisation (Balogun et al., 2016). Despite
the numerous obstacles to strategic change, summarised by Franken et al. (2009) . . .
References
Balogun, J., Hope Hailey, V. and Gustafsson, S. (2016) Exploring Strategic Change
(4th ed.), Harlow: Pearson.
Franken, A., Edwards, C. and Lambert, R. (2009) Executing strategic change, California
Management Review, 51(3), pp. 49–73.
Johnson, G., Whittington, R., Scholes, K., Angwin, D. and Regnér, P. (2014) Exploring
Corporate Strategy (10th ed.), Harlow: Pearson.
52 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
Theme A Compare and contrast authors’ ideas about each theme
Dickinson Gers McBrain
Authors
Murray Smith Wapram
Theme B
Theme C
Theme D
Theme E
Themes
Author’s ideas about themes
Figure 2.5 Structuring your critical literature review
Deciding on the structure
Your critical literature review is likely to form either one chapter or a series of chapters
in your project report. In being critical you will need to discuss different themes and
compare and contrast what different authors say about them. Your own opinions will
also need to be justified through your writing.
Many students’ early drafts of their literature reviews are simply listings of everything they have read, in which each author’s ideas are described one after another for
those themes they have discussed (vertical arrows in Figure 2.5). If you do this, your literature review will be boring and uncritical. You, and your readers, will find it much
more interesting if you take a thematic approach and write about one theme at a time.
As you compare and, where necessary, contrast those authors who have said something
about each theme, you will be writing critically (horizontal arrows in Figure 2.5).
2.8 Drafting your critical literature review
In our book Research Methods for Business Students (2016), we suggest that you should
think of your literature review as a thematic funnel. This means you should take the following steps:
1 Begin by providing a more general overview of your research topic before narrowing
down to your research question or research aim and objectives.
2 Start by providing a brief overview of the key themes and ideas in the literature
reviewed.
2.8 Drafting your critical literature review 53
3 For each theme, summarise, compare and contrast the research of recognised experts.
4 Within each theme, highlight previous research you have found that is most relevant to your own research, including work that may not be by recognised experts.
5 Provide a detailed account of the findings of this previous research and show how
they are related to the theme.
6 Use your review to highlight those aspects where your own research will provide
fresh insights, linking these explicitly to your research questions or objectives.
7 Tell your reader that these aspects will be explored in subsequent sections of your
project report.
8 Finish with a summary that links to your next chapter.
The key to you drafting an interesting and critical literature review is therefore to link the
different ideas you find within each theme in the literature, and then link the themes to
form a clear, well-justified argument. You need to ensure that this places your research in
the context of what is already known and justifies why your research is worth doing.
Getting on with writing
Although you will not be able to start writing until you have done some reading, it is
important you begin to draft your literature review before you have completed reading
all the literature. The process of drafting your literature review will help you get your
ideas about your research clear in your own mind. As you read more, you can update
and revise your draft as necessary.
You, like everyone we know, will find drafting your literature review difficult. As you
write, you have to get your ideas clear in your own mind and put them into words such
that anyone who reads them can understand. Phil refers to this writing process as the
‘rewriting process’, emphasising the need to improve early drafts of what you have written. Your literature review writing process will be no different, and you should expect to
have to rewrite your critical review more than once. Indeed, what you write at the start
of your literature review will almost certainly have to be updated and revised as you read
more over the course of your research project.
We often compare a poor literature review to a shopping catalogue. This describes
what your literature review should not be like. If you wrote your literature review as a
shopping catalogue, you would:
● Include every item you have read.
● Group each of the items you have read in some way.
● Sort the items within each theme in some way, such as by date or author.
● Describe each item using a similar number of words.
Obviously, your literature review will be far more than just a shopping catalogue, as you
need to be critical. Your writing, therefore, needs to show that you have:
● Reflected on the value of the findings of each item you have read.
● Reflected on the value of the ideas of each item you have read.
● Made reasoned judgements about the value of each item you have read.
54 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
● Included only those items that are relevant.
● Organised the ideas and findings into a coherent logical argument by theme.
Look at the project report extracts in Research in practice 2.4. You will notice that in the first
extract, Ben simply lists the ideas from the literature one after the other like in a shopping
catalogue. The order in which he has written about each of the items does not appear to be
logical, the more general ideas of Rousseau et al. and of Schoorman et al. being described
after his summary of more specific and focused arguments by Möllering. In addition, Ben
has only listed the items and has not linked the authors’ ideas together to form an argument.
At the end of this extract, he quotes a Wikipedia definition rather than discussing the definitions used by academic researchers, something which is unlikely to please his supervisor.
Writing – a shopping catalogue or critical review?
Ben was feeling pleased. He had spent a great deal of time reading the literature and felt
he had described clearly everything he had read. He emailed the first draft of his literature review to his project supervisor in advance of his supervision meeting. At the meeting his supervisor was obviously not impressed by Ben’s writing. She commented that
his draft was ‘more like a shopping catalogue than a critical literature review’ and needed
to be ‘completely rewritten’. Ben listened carefully to his supervisor’s comments and
went back to his room to redraft his work as a critical literature review.
This extract is taken from Ben’s first draft:
This is the same passage after Ben had redrafted it as a critical review:
Research in practice 2.4
. . . Möllering (2001) argues that trust develops from favourable expectations based
upon interpretations of the reality to which trust relates, enabled by a suspension of disbelief and a corresponding leap of faith. Rousseau et al. (1998) argue that the development of trust theory has, to date, been disparate, focusing on a range of levels of analysis
from the interpersonal to the inter-organisational. Schoorman et al. (2007) recognise that
there is a need for a context specific understanding of trust. Wikipedia (2017) states that
trust is the willingness of one party to be vulnerable to the actions of another party, with
the reasonable expectation that they will behave in a beneficial way . . .
. . . Development of trust theory has, to date, been more disparate, focusing on a range
of levels of analysis from the interpersonal to the inter-organisational (e.g. Rousseau et al.,
1998) and recognising the importance of context (Schoorman et al., 2007). Although this
has resulted in a variety of definitions of trust, these exhibit a number of common elements, including notions of ‘favourable expectations’ and a ‘willingness to become vulnerable’. Möllering (2001) has sought to use and develop these common elements in his
research, arguing that trust develops from favourable expectations that are based upon
interpretations of the reality to which the trust relates, enabled by a suspension of disbelief and a corresponding leap of faith. This suggests that . . .

unlike in the first extract, the order in which Ben writes about the ideas from the literature appears more logical, going from more general to more specific ideas. He starts
with a general summary statement, referring to two sources as examples (Rousseau et
al., 1998; Schoorman et al., 2007). In the next sentence, he provides a more detailed
evaluation, highlighting similarities between authors. Ben uses the phrase ‘although
this has . . .’ to link these two sentences. He then introduces Möllering’s more specific
and focused arguments, repeating the term ‘common elements’ from the previous sentence to help emphasise a clear link. This time Ben does not refer to Wikipedia. His final
phrase ‘This suggests that . . .’ provides a link between his summary of Möllering’s ideas
and what he is going to write next.
Finally, a quick reminder. Don’t forget to look at section 8.5, where we talk about the
process of writing in much more detail.
● Your critical literature review should offer an overview of significant literature available in your chosen topic, including relevant peer-reviewed academic journal articles, textbooks and other sources. It should provide a discussion and evaluation
covering each of these, the level of detail reflecting the significance of each item. It
should develop a clear argument to contextualise and justify your research.
● Critically reviewing the literature is important because it will provide the base on
which your research project is built, helping you to decide on your precise topic and
place it in the context of other research findings. It will also provide insights into
secondary data that are likely to be available, as well as possible ways of collecting
and analysing your own data.
● The amount of literature available to you is expanding rapidly. In addition to the
library catalogue, your university library web pages will provide a comprehensive list
of the other sources you can access as a student and the types of literature they contain. The most useful sources will be the databases of academic journal articles.
● Your literature review will consist predominantly of peer-reviewed academic journal
articles, although you are likely to find textbooks helpful, particularly early on in
your reviewing.
● The process of searching for and obtaining the literature consists of five stages: (1)
decide on your literature search topic; (2) identify the search terms and phrases you
will use; (3) choose your databases; (4) undertake your search and (5) download the
relevant publications.
● The usefulness of any item will depend on your research question and your aim and
objectives. When you review the literature critically, you will need to read as much of
the literature that is closely related and of value to your research question as time
permits.
Summary
56 Chapter 2 Reviewing the literature critically
● As you read, you should make notes in your own words of ideas that are useful to
your research. Your notes should provide a summary of the item and remind you
why you thought the particular idea was important, how an idea fits with your own
research topic or even why you disagree with what you have just read. Making notes
will help keep your mind focused on what you are reading and to remember what
you have read.
● As you write your project report, you will need to record the sources of all the information, research findings, theories and other ideas to which you refer in your text.
This process is known as referencing and allows you to acknowledge and give credit
to the work of others, helping ensure you are not accused of plagiarism.
● The most common form of referencing in Business and Management is the author–
date systems (e.g. Harvard, APA). Your university will probably have a preferred referencing style and, if it does, it is essential that you obtain a copy of this and follow it
exactly.
● Think of your literature review as a thematic funnel in which you link the different
ideas you find within each theme in the literature and then link these themes using
a clear, well-justified argument.
➔ If you have not yet begun to think about critically reviewing the literature, start now.
➔ Write your research question or aims and objectives on a piece of paper and refer to
them frequently to keep focused. (If you are still unsure what to do for your research
project, turn back to sections 1.4 and 1.5.)
➔ Based on what you already know about your research topic, identify the terms and
phrases you will use to search. Be prepared to use a variety of different terms and
phrases.
➔ Use the databases available through your university and your university library catalogue to search the literature for useful items. Although you will find textbooks listed
in the library catalogue useful in the early stages of your review, you should focus
mainly upon finding peer-reviewed academic journal articles, using databases of journal articles.
➔ Obtain the articles and other items that seem likely to be useful and assess their relevance and value (usefulness) to your own research.
➔ Use Google Scholar to find more recent items written by others that refer to those
items you have already found that you feel are most useful to your own research.
➔ Make your own notes about these useful items and include a summary in your own
words. As you make notes, write about how the item compares with other items you
have read.
Thinking about your critical literature review
References 57
➔ Note the full reference of each item, using your university’s preferred style of
referencing.
➔ Begin to draft your critical literature review, using a thematic structure and comparing
and contrasting what each author has to say about a theme. Be mindful that you will
have to redraft your review more than once.
Harvard College Library (2011) Interrogating Texts: 6 Reading Habits to Develop in Your First
Year at Harvard. Available at: http://bsc.harvard.edu/files/interrogating_texts_six_reading_
habits_to_develop_in_your_first_year_at_harvard.pdf [Accessed 12 October 2016].
Hofstede, G., Hofstede, G.J. and Minkov, M. (2010) Culture and Organizations: Software of the
Mind (3rd ed.). Columbus, OH: McGraw-Hill.
McSweeny, B. (2002) Hofstede’s model of national cultural differences and their consequences: a
triumph of faith – a failure of analysis. Human Relations, 55(1): 89–118.
Saunders, M.N.K. (2012) Web versus mail: the influence of survey distribution mode on employees’ response. Field Methods, 24(1): 56–73.
Saunders, M. N. K., Gray, D. and Goregaokor, H. (2014) SME innovation and learning: the role of
networks and crisis event. European Journal of Training and Development, 38(1/2): 136–49.
Saunders, M., Lewis, P. and Thornhill, A. (2016) Research Methods for Business Students (7th
ed.). Harlow: Pearson.
References
Chapter 3
Managing the research process
In Chapter 1 we noted that doing a research project gave you the chance to develop a
number of skills. Much of this chapter focuses in part upon the development of your personal organisational skills. Also in Chapter 1 we talked of the importance of managing your
own learning through choosing a research topic that will develop your skills and knowledge
as well as, possibly, your employment opportunities. We also noted the importance of
choosing a topic that matched the resources available to you, in particular time and data.
All of this suggests the importance of you taking control of the research process. It is a
process which you should lead, not one where you allow yourself to be led. In fact, we
would go as far as to say that self-organisation is a crucial factor in determining a successful
outcome to your research project.
So what are these components of the research process that need to be managed by
you? Well, assuming that you are doing primary research in a work organisation, the
organisation itself in the form of its key personnel, or its customers, are obvious starting
points. You will need to get access to the organisation in the first place. Then there are
the people from whom you wish to get the data. Obviously, paying attention to these
key resources is vital. Then there is the management of the components over which you
have more control. First, we concentrate upon the key component of managing oneself,
where attention needs to be paid to wider topics than just managing your time. Then
there is the relationship you have with your supervisor. Managing this does not mean
that you ‘take charge’ of your supervisor. It’s more subtle than that. Many students (and
lecturers, for that matter) talk of unsuccessful student/supervisor relationships. We help
you to ensure that your situation is successful. We then cover the relationship you have
with the university through, for example, the importance of paying attention to the
standards that are demanded of you. We represent the management of the research
process in Figure 3.1.
3.1 Why you should read this chapter
3.2 Getting access to your research organisation, respondents and participants 59
The final part of this chapter is about the ethics of doing research. This is a central consideration in the conduct of research. It’s essential that you consider the ethical implications
of your research in order to avoid falling foul of the expectations of your host organisation,
respondents, university and project supervisor.
Managing your research
organisation, respondents
or participants
Managing the
research process
Managing your
supervisor
Managing
your university
Managing
yourself
Figure 3.1 Managing the research process
So your research questions and objectives mean that it’s necessary to gain access to an
external organisation, or a number of organisations, to do some research. Much of this
section assumes that you will not be doing research using your employing or placement
organisation as the main context, so it’s one with which you are unfamiliar. (However,
we deal with issues that arise from being the ‘insider’ later in the section.) It’s possible, of
course, that you have had some introduction to the organisation, from a friend or a previous connection. But even if that is so, there are still key issues that you need to consider. These issues are divided into two main parts in this section. First, we consider some
of the main problems that you are likely to face when attempting to gain access to your
chosen organisation. Second, armed with an awareness of some of these problems, we
talk about how you may overcome them to achieve your goal of organisational access.
It would be good to think that the organisation in which you wish to do research will
be keen to help you. You may be lucky; it may. But the reality is that most will not be
keen. So what are some of the reasons for this possible lack of keenness to help?
What’s in it for us?
The reaction of the manager who receives the request is likely to be, ‘What’s in it for the
organisation?’ Managers are busy people who are paid by the organisation to help
achieve the organisation’s goals, not your goals! This seems a most obvious point, but
how often when we plan for a job interview, for example, do we concentrate upon what
we want and what we can offer and not think about the needs of the employer?
Getting access to your research organisation,
3.2 respondents and participants
60 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
Oh no! Not another request!
Be aware of the fact that your request may be one of many. You will be aware that there
has been huge growth in the number of degree students in recent years, including business and management students. This means that research access requests are much
more commonplace, particularly in a large national organisation.
Oh no! Not another student! Yet another demand on our time!
You must accept the fact that you may be a source of concern. This is probably the first
time you have done something like this, so the manager has to balance the wish to help
you (and many managers do genuinely want to help) and the risk that you may waste
valuable organisational time.
The manager receiving your request is going to be mindful of the resources that will
need to be devoted to you. That manager will need time to consider who may be responsible for dealing with your needs. In turn, the likelihood is that you will need to demand
the time of other people, for example, more junior employees. This will impact upon
the ability of people to do the jobs for which they are paid.
Who is going to get hold of this information?
There is also likely to be a worry about what you going to do with the information you
get from the organisation. We are not talking just about commercial secrecy here, but
organisational politics. Many managers are very sensitive about who knows what in
their own organisation, so they are going to be even more concerned about the public
availability of that knowledge outside the organisation. This may not necessarily be particularly rational – the information may not on the face of it seem sensitive. But we are
talking about human behaviour here, which isn’t always as rational as we may think!
Clearly you will need to give assurances about treating such information that you collect with strict confidentiality, assuming that this is what is required. You may also need to
promise that your participants or respondents will be anonymous so that their identity
cannot be traced.
Well maybe, but not right now . . .
Organisations will often cite reasons why they are not able to grant research access at the
time when you approach them. Of course, there may be an element of putting you off here,
in the hope that you will go somewhere else and leave them alone! But sometimes the reason
may be perfectly valid. It may coincide with a particularly busy period, such as new product
launch, or a sensitive time such as the announcement of a redundancy programme.
The discussion here refers to what may be called physical access, or the ‘gatekeeper’
level of organisational access. But you will usually need to get through the ‘gate’ to see
Definition
physical access: gaining access to an organisation to conduct research.
3.3 What about access to information? 61
other people. Although ‘gatekeeper’ access is essential, it may also be necessary for
you to gain acceptance and consent from those within the organisation order to gain
cognitive access to the data that they are able to provide. These people may be other
managers, or their employees whom you may need to see as individuals or in groups.
So, let’s face it, the problems you may face when dealing with the gatekeeper are equally
relevant at other levels.
Definitions
cognitive access: gaining agreement from individuals to providing research data, such as by the
answering of questions.
gatekeeper: the person, often in an organisation, who controls research access.
So far we have dealt with the question of access to the organisation in order to get into a
position where you can get the information you want. Now let’s deal with access to that
information itself. Here you need to be clear about precisely what data you wish to collect and the method or methods you intend to use to collect those data. This raises two
key questions:
1 Have you thought through fully the extent of the access that you will require in order
to be able to answer your research question(s) and meet your objectives?
2 Are you able to gain sufficient access to answer these research question(s) and meet
your objectives?
Both these questions point to the need for thorough preparation on your part – which
is a topic we will deal with in the next part of this chapter when we deal with strategies
to gain access.
Should organisational access be seen as a single event?
Your research question(s) and objectives may mean that you need to gain information
from people at different levels of the organisation, and from different parts of the
organisation, say different divisions or departments or geographical locations. Or it
may be that you need to gather data in fragments, separated by time. All of this suggests
that access is a continuing process and not just an initial or single event. So access negotiation becomes an even more important part of the management of the research process. Indeed, it may be continuous.
Getting access to the organisation as an ‘insider’
We mentioned at the start of this chapter that you may be an employee of the organisation in which you wish to do research, or you may be, or have recently been, a
3.3 What about access to information?
62 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
placement student in the organisation. This is great because people in the organisation
will know you and, hopefully, have positive views about you. But you are still likely to
face problems in getting the data you need. However, they may be rather different to
those faced by the ‘outsider’.
The likelihood is that, as the ‘insider’, you may still need to get formal approval to
conduct the research. The larger or more geographically diverse the organisation, the
more likely this is. All you may have is an introduction, so you may only be one step in
front of the ‘outsider’.
As the insider, you may come across the same issue of status. And it may not be just
because you are seen as quite a junior member of the organisation (indeed, you may be
quite senior). It will be an issue if, say, you belong to a part of the organisation which is
seen to be more powerful than the one in which you wish to do the research. Feelings of
suspicion may be even greater if you have been asked by your manager to take part in
the research project. (‘What are they up to now?’) You may not feel much like a management pawn, but that’s the way you could be seen.
There is another disadvantage as the ‘insider’ researcher. You may feel reluctant to
ask very basic questions (e.g. ‘What job does Mrs X actually do?’ ‘Who is our biggest
client?’) because you feel you should know the answer. As the outsider, you would
not be expected to know the answers to these questions, so you can gather information
that you really need to know to set your research information in context.
It sounds as if we are being totally negative in this chapter so far! Well, getting access to
your research organisation certainly does pose challenges. But this chapter is all about
managing the research process, so you need to manage the challenges.
You will have to plan your approach carefully. How do you do this? We explain in
this section six strategies you can adopt to manage the process.
Strategy 1: Try to use your existing contacts
It’s undoubtedly easier to use any existing contacts you have to get access to an organisation to do your research. These contacts may come from friends, family, student colleagues, lecturer suggestions or contacts that you may make at meetings of the
professional association related to your specialism. Having an introduction at least avoids
that difficult stage where you approach the organisation as a complete unknown.
Although using a contact who has mentioned you may not put the manager who receives
your request under any obligation to give you the access, you are more likely to have the
chance to make your request than in the case of asking when you do not know anyone.
We have mentioned the possibility of using your work placement organisation as
your research organisation already in this chapter. If your placement has been a success,
you will have made useful contacts that may be able to help you. Potentially, this is
Six strategies for making sure that you get the
3.4 organisational access you want
3.4 Six strategies for making sure that you get the organisational access you want 63
much better than using contacts given to you by someone else. You are known and
trusted, and the organisation’s managers will know that you are familiar with the context of the organisation’s work. So your demand on resources may not be as great. It may
be even better to build on the work you did on the placement by doing a research project
that relates to this work. This may lead to the ideal situation, access to an organisation in
which you are welcomed to conduct some research that is valued by the organisation!
You may also consider using the organisation with which you are familiar as a
‘launch pad’ for your research, facilitating access to another organisation from which
you may gather your data. (Research in practice 3.1 is an example of this approach.)
Negotiating organisational access in an organisation unknown to you
Nazaneen was a part-time business studies undergraduate who worked full-time in one
of the major banks. She was very interested in the issue of cashless pay, both the technology that facilitated this development and the way in which it had the capacity to
change consumer behaviour.
She had followed the media coverage of this topic for some time and was intrigued
in the extent to which cashless pay had spread in Sweden where cash transactions made
up barely 2% of the value of all payments made in 2015 – a figure some see dropping
to 0.5% by 2020 (Henley, 2016). In Swedish shops, cash is now used for barely 20% of
transactions, half the number five years ago, and way below the global average of 75%.
In the United Kingdom, a major milestone on the path to a cashless society was passed
in 2015. This was the first year that consumers used cash for less than half of all payments, according to Payments UK, the organisation which represents the major banks,
building societies and payment providers. As an example, the UK ready-to-eat food chain
Pret a Manger reported that 65% of their customers use contactless payment cards and,
increasingly, mobile ‘phone systems’ (e.g. Apple Pay) to make their purchases.
Nazaneen’s reading of the relevant literature suggested to her that the main stumbling block to the widespread adoption of cashless pay in the United Kingdom was the
reluctance to embrace its use by small retail businesses. So she concluded that the best
way to understand their reluctance was to interview them. She was a bit wary of just
going around to small shops on a ‘cold call’ basis and speaking to the owners, and she
thought that something a bit more formal may be more appropriate.
Nazaneen talked over the matter of access with her research supervisor, who suggested that she contact the relevant trade organisation, which in this case is the National
Federation of Self Employed & Small Businesses Limited. This she did by establishing the
identity of the executive who seemed the most appropriate to her needs and then writing to that person with a full explanation of her project.
The letter which Nazaneen sent (she decided against using email – see strategy 4 in
this section), which included a copy of her formal research proposal, impressed the executive concerned. It resulted in a helpful interview at the organisation’s HQ. She was also
given a list of small businesses to approach which would be able to provide more data to
give a richer understanding of the nature of the perceived problems of the small retailer.
Research in practice 3.1
64 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
Strategy 2: Put yourself in the shoes of the manager receiving
your request
If the organisation is likely to be resistant to your approach, you have to think about
why that organisation is likely to be resistant. Put yourself in the shoes of the manager
receiving your request and think about how to overcome some of that resistance.
Strategies 3–6 offer specific guidance on practical steps you take to overcome resistance.
All these need you to think through how your request is likely to be seen by the manager receiving your request.
We noted above that the reaction of the manager who receives the request is likely to
be ‘What’s in it for the organisation?’ which seems a reasonable reaction. So it’s important to think about any possible benefits to the organisation. And there may be some.
Frequently, we have experienced participants who have confessed to us after an interview that they viewed the prospect of being interviewed as a bit of a chore. Yet we have
been delighted to hear from them that they found the interview helpful. Rarely do they
have the opportunity to talk through issues with an interested outsider. The more probing your questioning, based on thoughtful listening, the more value the participant is
likely to get from listening to the responses.
Participants(s) may also appreciate a summary report of the interview, although it is
not normally appropriate to send them a copy of your project report. The report is for a
different purpose. An interview summary helps in three ways. First, it enables the participant to check the accuracy of your summary, second, it allows the addition of material which may have been overlooked during the interview and last, it shows that you
have actually done something as an end product of the interview.
Let’s go back to the worry the manager may have that you will take too much valuable organisational time. Your request for access is more likely to be accepted if the
amount of time you ask for is kept to a minimum. And it’s important to be realistic
about the amount of time you ask for. Be honest. For example, falsely stating that each
interview will last for only 30 minutes, and then deliberately exceeding this, may very
likely upset the person you are interviewing and prevent your gaining further access.
Strategy 3: Make sure you give yourself sufficient time
to set up the arrangement
We hope that one of the messages that come across clearly in this book is that of giving
yourself plenty of time to complete your research project. To summarise this message:
start early!
Nowhere is this message more significant than the issue of allowing sufficient time
to set up access to your research organisation. It can take weeks of delay between your
original request and the final approval to go ahead (or, regrettably, the refusal). Even
where the go-ahead is granted there will be further delay before you gain access to the
people from whom you wish to get information.
Assuming that you are not using an existing contact (and even where you may be),
you are unlikely to receive a direct reply to your first approach. There will be delay while
you wait for this, and then for a response to your follow-up. This raises the question of
3.4 Six strategies for making sure that you get the organisational access you want 65
the amount of time you should wait, and the ‘tone’ you adopt when sending your
‘reminder’. You must ensure that you keep to the right side of the line between persistence and pestering. Whether you use email, telephone or letter (or a combination of
the three) depends on the situation. We have found that a telephone approach with a
written follow-up can be very effective.
The larger the organisation, the more time consuming the access negotiation process may be. Where you have no existing contact, it may be necessary to make several
telephone calls simply to establish the best person to ensure that your request for access
will be considered. If you use a contact given to you, you will still experience delay while
your request is considered and an interview meeting arranged at a convenient time.
This may take a number of weeks.
More time will be needed for access requests that are more complex. You may wish to
get data in a variety of ways from across the organisation which, of course, has the
potential for more delays. The official go-ahead from the organisational gatekeeper may
mean that you are ‘in’, but you still have to gain cognitive access: the consent, support
and trust of those participants you will depend upon for your research data.
One final note to emphasise is that the worst may happen and you receive a refusal.
Not only is it essential to have a plan B (or even C and D!), but make sure the necessity
to enact plan B does not seriously jeopardise your overall timescale. Following experimentation, psychologists recently have concluded that time passes quickest when we
are busy. Many of our students have told us that this is not true: it passes like lightning
during the time allocated to a research project!
Strategy 4: Make your written request professional
Putting your request for research access into writing is highly advisable. Unless you read
from script, it is unlikely that you could achieve the same level of precision in a spoken
telephone request.
There are several reasons why it is advantageous to put your request in writing in a
clearly written manner. Among these are:
1 It allows people to be aware precisely of what will be required from them. This is
important because asking them for their help without being clear about your needs
will probably lead them to be wary, since the amount of time you require from them
may be more than they may reasonably expect to give.
2 It gives you the opportunity to set your request in context. You can explain the overall purpose of the research, the reason you are doing it, the university and department in which you are studying and the course you are completing.
3 It gives you the opportunity to enhance your credibility by presenting a professional
image through a well-written and carefully considered request.
Your written request should outline briefly:
● the purpose of your research;
● how the person being contacted might be able to help;
66 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
● the demands being made of those taking part in the research;
● a guarantee of anonymity (where appropriate);
● what you will do with the information you get from each person involved, including
any intention you may have of sharing the information during or after the data collection stage;
● your contact details so that the person can reply to you.
Should your written request be an email or a traditional letter? The advantages of an
email are clear, but don’t discount the value of a letter. The impact of the letter may be
greater as it is more unusual these days; it is much less easy to delete or mislay; and it
gives you greater opportunity to personalise and, therefore, impress. Whichever method
you choose, it is essential that your communication achieves the highest standard of
which you are capable. This warning is especially appropriate in the case of emails. We
all know how easy it is for normal writing standards to drop when we send emails and
how tempting it is to hit ‘send’ without double- and triple-checking in the same way
that we may do with traditional written forms of communication. Don’t be tempted.
The person reading your email may (like us!) be a stickler for correct written English, and
may reject your request on these grounds alone (see Research in practice 3.2.
Writing your research request
Below is a copy of the letter Nazaneen sent to the National Federation of Self Employed
& Small Businesses Limited regarding her planned research which we explained in
Research in practice 3.1.
Research in practice 3.2
Dear Ms Armfield
Further to my telephone call to your assistant, Stephanie Dixon, last Friday April 11th,
I would like to introduce myself and explain the reason for me contacting you.
My name is Nazaneen Ghorbani. I am a part-time business studies undergraduate at the
University of ………………. I also work full-time in one of the major banks. As part of my
course I have to complete successfully a research project. I am very interested in the issue
of cashless pay, both the technology that facilitates this development and the way in
which it has the capacity to change consumer behaviour. This is the subject of my project.
In my review of the large amount of research material available on this topic it seems that
the widespread adoption of cashless pay has particularly large important implications for
smaller retailers. I would like to gain a closer understanding of the attitudes of small
retailers to cashless pay by speaking to you and a number of your members. I hope you
are able to help me in this regard.
The details of my research plan are in the attached document called ‘Nazaneen Ghorbani
Research Proposal’.
3.4 Six strategies for making sure that you get the organisational access you want 67
Strategy 5: Work hard to ensure there are no concerns about the
way in which you will use the information
You will have noticed that one thing that virtually all organisations have in common is
that they like to present a positive front to the world! Even if the news is bad, they work
hard to put a less negative aspect on that news than perhaps is justified. Why else would
large organisations spend millions on public relations specialists? There is a message
here for those of us who want to pursue organisational research. You are unlikely to
gain research access if the subject of your research can be perceived as negative. So an
inquiry into the reasons for an organisation’s market failure in a particular product area
is to be avoided. However, you may learn from the public relations experts and lend a
positive emphasis to this by, for example, using the organisation of your choice as a
context for an inquiry into the changing nature of the demand for a particular product
area and what may be learned. Your choice of language in the written request will have
to be very carefully considered to ensure that no hint of negativity is suggested.
A more predictable area of concern is that of anonymity. This relates to that information which is given to you and what you do with it once it is given. Some topics, some
organisations and some people will be extremely sensitive about anonymity. While this
occasionally may be hard to understand, the point remains that it is their information,
and you must respect their wishes.
The introductory email or letter offers you the opportunity to give a guarantee of
confidentiality in writing at the time of making the request for access. This is a good
time to make the initial guarantee, as confidentiality may be uppermost in the minds of
the managers who will consider your approach. But do think of this as only the initial
guarantee. As you meet more people, you will need to repeat any assurances about confidentiality. This can be done, for example, with an assurance that any information
given to you will not be attributed to any individual. It is essential that you honour this
assurance, not only for your credibility, but for those researchers who may follow you.
At the end of the document I suggest a set of topics/questions for the interviews I plan
to conduct, which I hope will be valuable for you in thinking about this prior to my visit.
I assure you that I will take no more than one hour of your time and that the information
you give me will not be credited to you in any report that I subsequently write without
your approval.
I very much hope that you are able to help. If so please email me at [email protected]
or call me on 07123 456789. I will then contact Stephanie Dixon to fix an interview at a
time and place suitable for you.
I hope we are able to meet in the not too distant future. Meanwhile, thank you for
reading this letter.
Yours sincerely
Nazaneen Ghorbani
68 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
It is quite common for the organisation to ask you to not place your written report in
the university library, although you may not have identified the organisation or any
individuals. You must check the course requirements here with your supervisor, but whatever the regulations, the confidentiality wishes of your research organisation come first.
Strategy 6: Underline your credibility!
Perhaps this sixth strategy is a result of the efforts you have put in making your request as
professional as possible. The more credible you seem, the more likely you are to receive a
favourable response to your request for research access. But there is one point we haven’t
mentioned so far which we think will really underline your credibility: find out as much
as possible about the organisation before requesting access. The more you know about
the organisation’s context, such as their products and services, markets, competitors,
trading position, current challenges and development plans, the better. This will really
impress the person you’re approaching, particularly if that knowledge blends thoughtfully with the information you are seeking and your research question(s) and objectives.
In the end, do what’s possible
Like many research considerations, getting access to your research organisation is a balance between what is ideal and what is possible. OK, so you want to make sure that you
get a representative sample, conduct your interviews in a uniform way and collect sufficient data to ensure the answers to your research question(s) and objectives are valid
and reliable. But life isn’t perfect. People will deny you access to information, limit your
interview time, lose your questionnaire, go on holiday, and leave the organisation in
the middle of your research. You are at the mercy of events. You can manage much of
the process, but you can’t control the uncontrollable!
Table 3.1 Checklist of points to follow to increase your chances of getting access
to your chosen research organisation
•  Be clear about the overall purpose of your research project.
•  Write your research question(s) and objectives.
•  Use existing contacts where possible.
•    Consider using your work placement organisation (if appropriate) as a setting for your
research project.
•    Approach relevant appropriate local and/or national employer, or employee, professional
or trade bodies to see if they can suggest contacts.
•    Make a direct approach to an organisation to identify the most appropriate manager.
•    Think about the possible benefits for the organisation, should access be granted to you.
•    Offer a report summarising your findings.
•    Allow yourself plenty of time for the entire process.
•    Allow sufficient time to contact intended participants and gain their consent, once access
has been granted.
•    If you make your initial request for access by telephone, follow this with an email or letter
to confirm your request.
3.5 Managing yourself 69
•    Make sure the construction, tone, language, spelling, grammar and presentation of an
introductory email or letter are all likely to persuade the person to help you.
•    Consider how you will address concerns about the amount of organisational time you would take up.
•    Ensure you have considered any sensitivities concerning your research topic.
•    Assure participants or respondents you have recognised any needs for confidentiality and/or
anonymity.
•    Think about a range of contact methods for potential participants to use to reply.
Table 3.1 Continued
We now move on to consider the management of those components of the research
process over which you have more control: managing yourself, your supervisor and
your university.
Managing your time
We have already mentioned in this chapter elements of time management, particularly
those that refer to the process of gaining access to your research organisation. Here we
consider time management more widely, both in terms of your research project schedule and the allocation of time to your research.
It is important that you complete a research project plan at the beginning of your
research. Indeed, this may be a university requirement, as it helps your supervisor assess the
viability of your research proposal. It’s useful if you divide your research plan into stages.
This will give you a clear idea as to what is possible in the given timescale. But don’t forget
that however well your time is organised, the whole process seems to take longer than you
planned. An example of the sort of schedule you may develop is shown in Table 3.2.
3.5 Managing yourself
Table 3.2 Research project schedule
Task To be completed by

All data analysed ready for draft findings and conclusions
chapters to be written
20.03.2017

70 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
Even if the inevitable happens and you find that you have some slippage in your
schedule, at least you know what you are slipping from! Not having a schedule is simply
unthinkable.
Just as important as the project schedule is your personal timetable which shows the
amount of time you are going to devote to your research. Here you will have to be realistic. You have other demands. Other modules require lecture preparation and assessment completion. But it is all too easy to fall into the trap of allocating time by ‘what’s
the next most important deadline’. Of course, there is always another deadline looming, but the trouble for your research project is that the big deadline of final project
submission is months away for most of the year and it’s forever being left until later. It’s
best to schedule some time regularly, say each week, to do something towards your
research. Do this at the start of the year and get into the habit of it. The beauty of personal timetables is that they become part of a ‘self-contract’. If you meet your contractual obligation, you can feel pleased with yourself; if you don’t meet it, make sure you
feel suitably guilty! There is no substitute for getting into a routine. You will probably
have heard this before when you started university, but it’s the same for doing research,
or for us in writing this text. Get into the habit of doing something towards your
research right from the start on, for example, Monday afternoons in the library. It’s
always easy to find other things to do when the deadline is not pressing. Just try not to
be like Oscar Wilde, who could resist everything except temptation!
One final point about time management. We have known students who have been
perfectionists and ‘just do enough to pass’ types. Our advice is to be neither. The perfectionist runs into time management problems because of the need to polish everything
until it dazzles. This is great if there’s time: but there never is. ‘Just doing enough’, on
the other hand, can often lead to not doing enough and the necessity to re-submit the
report.
Keeping up your motivation
You are likely to be doing your research project for an extended period, so expect your
motivation to vary over that period. You may start and end on a high, but there will be
times in between when you can’t see your way forward. There are ways in which you can
overcome this. Let’s look at three of these.
First, set for yourself short-term goals. Sports coaches are renowned for using this
technique to improve participant performance. You can distinguish between long-term
goals, for example, breaking the world record or successfully completing your degree;
intermediate goals, such as lowering the 100-metre sprint time by one second or getting
all your fieldwork done on time, and short-term goals. Short-term goals may concentrate on each training session, or, in research project terms, the completion of a set of
notes at the end of a two-hour session reading a particular article. Do remember that
it’s important that your short-term goals are SMART (specific, measurable, achievable,
realistic and timely) (see Chapter 1, section 1.7).
Second, while we are on the subject of goals, think about setting some fresh learning
goals. Learning how to conduct an interview effectively; use a new statistical analysis
3.6 Managing your supervisor 71
package or how to sift, label and categorise qualitative data in a systematic way will not
only add to your repertoire of business skills but give you a sense of achievement.
Third, do keep focused. You can do this by keeping in touch with your supervisor and
talking through your progress. This can be quite motivational, either because you are
further on than you thought, or in giving you a refreshed sense of direction if you have
lost your way. Another important way of keeping focus is to review regularly your
research question(s) and objectives. It’s so easy to wander away from the main point of
your research into all sorts of interesting diversions. A regular review of progress against
your research question(s) and objectives is a vital way to keep focused. OK, so this may
involve some revision of your question(s) and objectives, but at least this will mean that
you’re on track.
Keep in touch with individuals who can help
We have already mentioned the need to keep in touch with your supervisor. Don’t forget there are other people who can help. It is useful to talk to these people regularly.
Among these are those student colleagues who helped you think about your research
topic in the first place and family and friends. It may also be useful to talk to the specialist librarian in your research topic area. This expert may be able to point you in the
direction of new resources and to suggest different perspectives on your research.
When you look back on your time at university and remember your research project, it’s
certain you will remember your research supervisor. Usually, this is for the right reasons,
because the relationship has been a fruitful one where both you and your supervisor
have had your expectations met. But, of course, it can all go horribly wrong. Fortunately,
this happens rarely. But it can happen, so in this section we look at the expectations that
you should have of your supervisor, and those that your supervisor should have of you.
Being aware of these, and acting accordingly, should mean that your eventual memories
of your supervisor are as favourable as those that we hope our students have of us!
What should you expect of your supervisor?
Your supervisor is there to advise you at every stage of your research project, from formulation of the project through to completion of the final report. However, do remember that it is your research project, and your supervisor is not there to write it for you.
What expectations should you have of your supervisor? Here are some:
You receive assistance with the selection and planning of a suitable and
manageable research topic
You should not expect your supervisor to impose a topic upon you; it has to be your
choice. But you should be prepared to have your ideas both praised and criticised. You
3.6 Managing your supervisor
72 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
want encouragement, but if your supervisor thinks an idea is a non-starter, you should
be told this.
Your supervisor is sufficiently familiar with the field of research
to provide guidance
This can be quite a problematic area. With the increasing amount of students who require
supervision comes the need of the university to resource this requirement. This sometimes
means that there is not an ideal match between your research topic and your supervisor.
However, do bear in mind that your supervisor will concentrate on the research process
rather than simply on the topic. In our view, the more effective supervisors are those who
are familiar with guiding their students on how to conduct the project rather than those
who are subject-only specialists. However, talk to the supervisors who are specialists about
your research plans. Getting them interested may mean that you end up with both a subject specialist and someone who can guide you successfully through the project.
Your supervisor should be available for consultation and discussion
about the progress of your research
How often you see your supervisor will depend upon several factors, not least of which
will be the norm as it applies in your department. Usually, you will meet during the
early stages of the project as things get going. As you become more confident, and you
immerse yourself in reading or data collection, you would expect less frequent meetings. We usually find that our students value contact with their supervisor in the early
and late stages of their project, when they are setting up and writing up. But do bear in
mind that in most universities, the onus is upon you to initiate meetings, although
your supervisor may contact you to arrange the first meeting. You should check with
your supervisor what the procedure is here.
At the end of each meeting with your supervisor, it is good practice to arrange the
time of the next meeting and to agree what you should have done by that meeting. You
then have the basis of an agenda for the next meeting. There may also be a procedure
where a record is kept of the content of the meeting.
Your supervisor should respond to the work that you have completed
If you have sent your supervisor written work, as agreed between you, it is reasonable to
expect that your supervisor will respond to this. You should expect to have helpful suggestions about how the work may be improved.
Your supervisor should point you in the direction of facilities
or research materials
Again, the onus is upon you to make arrangements to negotiate access to organisations, or
libraries where you need secondary data. But it’s reasonable to expect that your supervisor
will have some ideas as the sort of data that may be of help to you and where this may be
available. As you make progress in your research, you will probably find that you know
more than your supervisor about your research topic. However, in the early stages you are
hungry for ideas, and it’s to be expected that your supervisor will provide some of these.
3.6 Managing your supervisor 73
What your supervisor should expect from you
You should, in conjunction with your supervisor, develop a plan and
timetable for completion of the stages of your research project,
and meet all deadlines
Meet all deadlines, you say! Well, yes. But for all sorts of reasons which we touched on
earlier in this chapter, some delays may not be in your control. But your supervisor will
expect you to pay attention to the set deadlines and make your best attempt to meet
them. Treating deadlines in a trivial way is a sure path to a hurried and ineffective conclusion to the project. The more you have to rush at the end, the less value you can
expect from your supervisor’s comments at that vital late stage when you are drafting
your report.
You should meet with your supervisor when arranged and report fully
and regularly on progress and results
It would be good to say that it’s rare for students to not turn up for an arranged meeting,
or to show up having not done the work that was agreed at the last meeting. But, unfortunately, it’s not that rare. You will want to get the best out of your supervisor, so make
sure that you demonstrate that you are businesslike and do what you have agreed to do.
That way, your supervisor will respond in a similar way and a fruitful relationship will
develop.
You should give due consideration to the advice and criticisms received
from your supervisor
It would be foolish to ignore criticism from your supervisor. But that’s not the same as
saying that you should follow slavishly every word. Indeed, when your confidence
grows as your work progresses, you may choose to listen to criticism but decide, after
careful thought, to stick to your guns. After all, it’s your project and you will have to live
or die by the final outcome. But bear in mind that your supervisor has probably seen
many similar projects in the past and is likely to be one of the people assessing your
project report, so do consider carefully any critical comments you receive.
You should keep yourself up to date on the subject of your research topic
The likelihood is that you will write your critical literature review early in your project’s
lifecycle. Try to avoid the temptation of then closing your mind to this aspect of your
work. There may be important developments in your topic area during the course of
your work, so don’t miss out on these. Ignoring recent news in some highly topical subject areas, such as new technological developments, will damage the credibility of your
work and threaten the success of your final submission.
You should keep in touch with your supervisor and make yourself available
for regular meetings at mutually convenient times
Most lecturers will tell you that the students who keep in touch with their supervisor
are the ones who usually complete the research project successfully, while those they
74 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
rarely see are on course for failure! This may be because the more diligent students
usually are successful. But we like to think that research supervisors can pass on a wealth
of experience and know-how which you would be foolish to ignore.
At the beginning of your course, or research project, you should receive from your programme leader a guide which will specify such items as aims, objectives and learning
outcomes of the research project. The guide should also list the relevant regulations for
the completion of the project. These regulations will cover such topics as any requirements to attend seminars, meet specific deadlines, submit the written report in a specified style and, of course, the academic standards you should meet in order to be awarded
a pass for your project. It is this last aspect of the university’s requirements that we concentrate upon here.
The learning outcomes of any research project summarise much of what we cover in
this book as they emphasise the process of doing research. Table 3.3 is a good example
of a statement of such learning outcomes.
3.7 Managing your university
Table 3.3 Example of a statement of learning outcomes for research project module
Upon completion of this module, students will be able to:
(a) show resourcefulness in the sourcing and selection of material;
(b) demonstrate the ability to exercise sound judgement in the selection of material;
(c) engage critically with the chosen material;
(d) organise complex information in such a way that data collected is integrated with
pre-existing material;
(e) structure clearly and logically a substantial piece of work;
(f) produce a clearly defined and usable outcome within a specified timescale;
(g) demonstrate a level of expert knowledge in a particular subject or issue;
(h) manage their own efforts effectively.
At the end of the successful completion of the module, the student will have completed a submission in accordance with the course and thus fulfilled the aims outlined
above.
You should also pay particular attention to the assessment criteria, which should be
contained in your research project guide. Table 3.4 is a good example of clearly defined
criteria which you can use as a checklist as you work through the research process and,
in particular, write your final report.
The criteria specified in Table 3.4 should come as no surprise to you, as they may
well be similar to criteria you have come across earlier in other modules. But do use
3.8 The ethics of doing research 75
Table 3.4 Example of marking scheme guide for research project final report
Criterion Strong Weak
Definition of
aims and
objectives
Clear and informative definition of the
aims and objectives of the research or
study topic/problem to be investigated.
Absent or weak and cursory
description of research topic/
problem to be investigated.
Method and
methodology
Correct selection of and justification for
chosen method. Full understanding of
values and limitations of method. Clear
rationale and understanding of
limitations.
No justification for selected
method. Inadequate data collection.
No evidence of understanding of
method and limitations.
Understanding
and coverage of
the literature
Excellent understanding and insightful
knowledge of the subject matter.
Comprehensive expert account of
topic. Fully referenced using Harvard
referencing.
No understanding of the subject.
Confused thinking and inadequate
knowledge. Limited and inadequate
referencing.
Critical analysis,
examination and
presentation of
findings
High-level analysis using appropriate
techniques. Thorough examination of
results to present clear findings linked
to evidence.
Weak and unacceptable analysis.
No critical evaluation of results.
Findings presented not linked to
evidence.
Conclusions
and/or recommendations
Logical and insightful conclusions
based on findings presented.
Recommendations for action based on
conclusions and findings and relevant
to the context of the study.
No attempt to present conclusions
and/or recommendations.
Structure and
presentation
Excellent layout. Conforms to all stated
requirements. Clear, logical writing
style with correct use of English. Clear
presentation of all tables, figures, etc.
Unacceptable layout in terms of
structure and logical argument. Key
requirements ignored. Inappropriate
use of English. Serious deficiencies
in presentation.
Source: Developed from the University of Plymouth (2016).
Your university will expect you to conduct your research ethically and has hopefully
made you aware of the ethical responsibilities you have while conducting your research.
3.8 The ethics of doing research
these for your research project. We even urge you to have a session with your supervisor
as you approach the writing-up stage to discuss the precise meaning of these criteria in
relation to your written project report.
Definition
research ethics: the appropriateness of the researcher’s behaviour in relation to the rights of those
who become the subject of a research project, or who are affected by it.
76 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
Let’s be clear about what we mean by ethics. Generally, ethics means ‘standards of
behaviour that guide the moral choices we make which govern our behaviour and our relationships with others’. Since virtually all research using primary data, that is data which we
collect specifically for the purposes of our research, involves our relationships with others,
this is clearly something we shouldn’t ignore. Or can we? Well, even if you wanted to act in
an amoral way towards your research participants, the rules of your university will stress the
need for you to behave in an ethical way in the conduct of your research (see Table 3.5).
Table 3.5 Example of code of practice for ethical standards involving human
participants
•    No research should cause harm, and preferably it should benefit participants.
•    Potential participants normally have the right to receive clearly communicated information
from the researcher in advance.
•    Participants should be free from coercion of any kind and should not be pressured to
participate in a study.
•    Participants in a research study have the right to give their informed consent before participating.
•    Where third parties are affected by the research, informal consent should be obtained.
•    The consent of vulnerable participants (e.g. children) or their representatives’ assent should be
actively sought by researchers.
•    Honesty should be central to the relationship between researcher, participant and institutional
representatives.
•    Participants’ confidentiality and anonymity should be maintained.
•    The collection and storage of research data by researchers must comply with the Data
Protection Act 1998.
•    Researchers have a duty to disseminate their research findings to all appropriate parties.
Source: Oxford Brookes University (2016). Full version available at: www.brookes.ac.uk/Documents/Research/
Policies-and-codes-of-practice/ethics_codeofpractice/
In this section, we explore some of the ethical issues you may encounter through the
different stages of your research. Ethical considerations impact upon how you decide
upon your research topic; design your research and gain organisational and individual
respondent or participant access; collect your data; process, store and analyse your data
and write up your research findings. At all these stages you will need to ensure that the
way you design your research is both methodologically sound and morally defensible to
all those who are involved.
Here we consider the ethical issues at three main stages of the research process:
research design, data collection and reporting. Of course, these issues don’t fit neatly
into each of the main stages. Nonetheless, we cover some of the main ethical points
which we then summarise at the end of the section in Table 3.6.
What are the ethical questions you should consider at the research
design stage?
Getting participants’ and respondents’ informed consent
The main issue to consider at the design and access stage of your research involve the
issue of respondent or participant consent. Look again at Table 3.5. Following the
3.8 The ethics of doing research 77
principles here means that your respondents and participants should understand what
the research is about and what is expected of them, should be free from coercion of any
kind and should not be pressured to participate in a study. Coercion is unlikely to be
the issue when you are approaching a senior manager as an organisational gatekeeper,
but it may be relevant when the senior manager arranges for you to interview participants more junior than that manager. You should be particularly sensitive to this situation. It is extremely unlikely that such people will refuse to cooperate, even if a
feeling of being coerced by a senior manager exists. However, you will need full support from your participants rather than grudging acceptance. Full support is more
likely if you give assurances of confidentiality before the interview in a bid to secure
informal consent.
The ethical situation relating to data collected by questionnaire is rather more
straightforward. The return of a completed questionnaire by a respondent is such that
completion by itself implies consent. However, this is not the same as giving you consent to use the data collected in any way you think fit. You should bear in mind that
when respondents agree to participate, this does not necessarily imply consent about
the way in which the data provided are subsequently used. You should still tell them in
the introduction to the questionnaire how you will use the data. Don’t ignore another
of the principles in Table 3.5: that honesty should be central to the relationship between
you and your respondents. Consider the example of the phone caller who calls you at
the most inconvenient time posing as a researcher but who, in reality, is a salesperson.
This is infuriating, and quite the opposite of the standards you should be aiming at!
Consent – not coercion!
Conducting research in your own employing organisation presents different concerns.
You may be tempted to apply pressure to others (colleagues or subordinates) to cooperate. They may cooperate from a feeling of social obligation to you. But the same effort to
obtain informal consent applies as discussed before. And like all respondents and participants, you should emphasise their right to withdraw from your study at any time.
If you are being asked by the organisation to conduct your research project, you have
a right not to be forced to choose a research project in which you are uninterested. This
prejudices a valuable learning opportunity for you. It also threatens one of the most
important ethical obligations you have to all concerned – to produce research of the
highest possible quality.
Your ethical obligation to use the time you have been granted
by the organisation is a way that is of benefit to the organisation
If you are using an organisation as your research context, you will have an ethical obligation to use the time you have been granted by the organisation in a way that is useful
to the organisation. That is not to say that you will necessarily tell the managers what
they want to hear. But even if your conclusions are unfavourable, then the organisation
has a right to expect that you frame your conclusions in a positive and constructive
way. At the same time, you have a right not to be coerced by the organisation’s managers to misrepresent the data which you have uncovered so as to portray the organisation
positively.
78 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
Respondent and participant vulnerability
Clearly, some topics carry a greater risk of a breach of ethical standards than others. A
brief look at Table 3.5 shows that the standard of seeking the consent of vulnerable participants or their representatives is one that is potentially sensitive. On the face of it,
this may relate more closely to schoolchildren, medical patients or social services clients. Yet, vulnerability may apply to employees whose jobs are changing or being made
redundant; or it may relate to sensitive areas such as poor employee performance. If
your research topic has obviously sensitive implications, you will need to pay attention
to the ethical dimension in your research proposal.
What are the ethical questions you should consider
at the data collection stage?
The importance of confidentiality
Often confidentiality is an important condition that your research organisation makes
when granting you research access. Organisational gatekeepers often insist that you do
not disclose the organisation’s identity in any way. We deal with how to cope with this
in your report in the sub-section on ‘confidentiality and anonymity at the reporting
stage’ later in this section.
It is often more important to guarantee confidentiality to individual respondents
and respondents. This is particularly important in relation to names, addresses and personal data that may allow them to be identified. Not only is the issue of confidentiality
important, but harm may be done to individuals by information that you have obtained
being attributed to them. You may, for example, have gained the trust of a participant
to the extent where you are told the individual’s career plans, something that may be
better kept from management. Again, as with the organisation, do make sure that your
participants’ identities are not revealed accidentally in anything you write. You can use
the same ‘participant A’ method, or adopt a style such as ‘one participant told me . . .’
The key point here is not to break your promise of confidentiality.
It’s not just in reporting your data that you may reveal the identity of your participants. This can happen in interviews. As you collect more data, you may develop
themes which have emerged during the process. Developing these themes may mean
that your participants can guess what previous participants have said from the questions you are asking. This can lead to participants indirectly identifying the person
responsible for raising the earlier point that you now wish to discuss with them.
The confidentiality points mentioned earlier relate mainly to the collection and
reporting of qualitative data. Such issues are equally important when it comes to the
collection and reporting of quantitative data. Here your main concern is to report
aggregated data, in order to establish the patterns that emerge. So making quantitative
data anonymous is less problematic. However, you still need to take care. Presenting a
table that reports agreement with the questionnaire statement ‘This organisation is a
great place to work’ is not anonymous (and could cause problems) if it showed that the
two senior managers in a named department both ‘strongly disagreed’.
3.8 The ethics of doing research 79
Causing harm through the collection of primary data through interviewing
In addition to confidentiality, conducting interviews raises other ethical considerations. The potential to harm your respondents can arise in many ways. We deal with
three here.
First, it is important to be sensitive to any reluctance that your participant may have
to answer your questions. As your confidence in interviewing builds, it may be easy to
start pressing participants for answers without realising that what they are experiencing may be quite stressful for them. It’s important to make clear to participants that
they have a right to refuse to answer any question, for any reason. It doesn’t happen
often, particularly when you have built rapport with the interviewee, but it can.
Second, do be careful that the questions you ask are not likely to be harmful to your
participant. These may relate to personal circumstances or be of such a nature that they
humiliate your interviewee. Such questions may be quite unintentional. They may not
form part of your planned interview schedule. But it’s easy for a follow-up question to
come out in a way that had not planned.
Third, do be mindful of the circumstances of your participant. Simple things such as
setting a time, location and interview duration that is convenient to your participant is
important. If the interview participants are quite junior in the organisation, it’s important that you stick to agreed arrangements as they are likely to have less time flexibility.
Be on guard for signs of discomfort because, for example, you’re running over the agreed
time. Not only is this discourteous, but, once again, you may be causing stress and
inconvenience to your participants.
Causing harm through the collection of primary data by observation
Should you wish to collect some or all of your data by observation, you will face particular ethical problems. Let’s say, for example, that you want to observe the behaviour of
airline cabin crew members as they deal with customers, in order to establish the extent
of the engagement that they demonstrate. Central to this is the choice you have over
whether you should disclose your purpose to those crew members you intend to
observe. Given everything that has been said so far in this section, this seems a clear-cut
decision: you should disclose your research purpose.
However, you then face the problem of ‘reactivity’ (or ‘observer effect’), which is a
particular problem with observation. This happens when those you are observing adapt
their behaviour as a consequence of your observation. Obviously, this threatens the
reliability and validity of your data. So you have a choice: you disclose your purpose and
seek approval of the organisation and the crew members in the normal way, or you go
ahead and do your observation covertly.
Let’s say that you seek approval of the organisation and the crew members and then
you are refused access. You could carry on covertly, in your role as a customer, or
Definition
reactivity: reaction by research participants to any research intervention that affects data reliability.
80 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
abandon the plan. If you decide to carry on covertly, then those being observed may
discover your actions with the consequence that you must explain what they would see
as your deceit. It is our view that researchers should not practise deceit at any time as
this is a clear violation of the principles of ethical research.
Causing harm to through unauthorised use of secondary data
It’s not just through the collection of primary data that you can cause harm. The collection of secondary data also raises ethical issues. Say, for example, you want to establish a
sample of customers from whom you want to collect data on service satisfaction levels.
This may involve a study of customer databases to form the sample. From the databases
you may have personal details of many individuals who have not consented to you having this information. It’s important that you treat this information in the strictest confidence and don’t use it in any way that might cause harm to these individuals.
It’s also important that you are honest, stick to the declared purpose of your research
and not use secondary data in any way other than that which you originally intended.
Data collection and honesty
Having raised the topic of honesty in the previous sub-section, we touch here upon the
most apparent dishonest behaviour in data collection, that of making up the data. This
can be blatant, such as completing questionnaires yourself rather than delivering them
to intended respondents. On the other hand, it can be more subtle, where you decide to
include only responses which suit you for some reason and ignore those that do not suit
you. Not only do you have an ethical duty to report your findings honestly, but your data
will be unreliable and invalid if you have practised dishonesty in your data collection.
Ethical issues and data collection using the Internet
The emergence of the Internet has presented many new opportunities for conducting
research, including some in the business arena. The main ethical consideration is likely
to revolve around the issue of consent. The potential topics here are so varied that it is
well to check with your university’s research ethics guidelines if you think that your
research topic may breach any ethical guidelines. An example of the sort of topic which
may be involved is shown in Research in practice 3.3.
Ethical issues in research
Most organisations play an active part in helping the environment by making the decision to go green. One of the most visible ways of doing this is through an office recycling programme through which employees can help reduce environmental waste by
recycling office paper, cans, bottles and other materials.
Many organisations go beyond these basic recycling initiatives and encourage
employees to find other ways to save energy. Such initiatives may include such things as
Research in practice 3.3
3.8 The ethics of doing research 81
Compliance with the data protection legislation
If you are studying at a UK university, the principles of the Data Protection Act 1988
have implications for your research project if it involves the processing and storage of
personal data. If you are studying elsewhere, it is likely that similar data protection
legislation will exist that will have implications for your research project. It is therefore as well to be aware of these before you reach this stage of your research project. In
car-sharing for travel to work journeys, negotiation of deals with local motor suppliers to
supply cars with hybrid engines and the consumption of vegan food in the company
restaurant.
Ronnie was very enthusiastic about the green movement. It permeated many aspects
of her everyday life. So it was natural that she wanted to make this the subject of her
undergraduate research project. Ronnie had read that a leading maker of computers of
all sizes had told its employees that turning off their computers for one hour each day
could save the company $1 million per year in energy costs as well as help the environment. So she concluded that ensuring that all office computers were switched off at
night, when typically they would not be in use, would be similarly environmentally
friendly.
Ronnie was doing her student placement in a large pharmaceutical company. The
company had a sophisticated corporate responsibility policy which included a welldeveloped section on environmental action. The policy urged employees to switch off
their computers when they finished work at the end of the day. Consequently, Ronnie
devised a research design that involved discovering the extent to which employees were
committed to such an initiative and the degree to which the level of commitment was
translated in action.
The executive to whom Ronnie spoke about the matter was quite willing to offer
help, although she expressed some concern about the potential for ‘snooping’ which
such research may entail. She was in agreement with the testing of employee attitudes
but unhappy with the notion of ‘checking up’. Ronnie understood this concern but felt
that simply establishing employee attitudes to computers being switched off at night
was not enough: it was the sort of issue about which most people would indicate agreement that it was ‘a good thing to do’. But Ronnie was keen to discover whether such
agreement led to action; this, she thought, would be the true measure of commitment.
Ronnie explained this stumbling block to her research supervisor, who agreed with
her point about the potential difference between words and action, but he too sympathised with the company executive’s view about the potential for ‘snooping’ that such
research may involve. Checking whether computers were switched off at night may well
breach the university’s code of research ethics which stated that ‘participants in a
research study have the right to give their informed consent before participating.’
Ronnie thought hard and long about her supervisor’s strong recommendation to
think of another research design which would receive the company’s blessing and not
fall foul of the university research ethics committee. She was still committed to research
on an environmental topic, but reluctantly agreed to think of another research design
which would be consistent with ethical principles.
82 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
the United Kingdom, the principles mean that anyone collecting personal information must:
● fairly and lawfully process it;
● process it only for limited, specifically stated purposes;
● use the information in a way that is adequate, relevant and not excessive;
● use the information accurately;
● keep the information on file no longer than absolutely necessary;
● process the information in accordance with your legal rights;
● keep the information secure;
● never transfer the information outside the EEC without adequate protection.
Source: Gov.UK (2015).
What are the ethical questions you should consider
at the reporting stage?
Confidentiality and anonymity at the reporting stage
Earlier in this section we mentioned how organisational gatekeepers are often very
reluctant to allow the organisation to be named in anything you write as a result of your
research. You can overcome this by referring to the organisation as, for example,
‘Organisation A’, etc. But sometimes organisations are not so sensitive. If the research
topic is not controversial in any way, then confidentiality may not be an issue, and the
organisation can be named. If the organisation is particularly sensitive about being
identified, you must ensure there are no ‘clues’ in anything you write, so you will need
to conceal details such as the organisation’s location, products and market if these
details are likely to allow readers to guess the organisation’s identity.
If the organisation is named in your report, then it is almost certain that you will
need to let them read your work to understand the context within which they will be
named. Indeed, even if the organisation is made anonymous, managers still may want
to see the report to ensure that you have honoured any promise of confidentiality.
As well as the organisation, you have an ethical responsibility to protect individual
respondents’ right to anonymity in your project report, unless, of course, you have their
explicit permission to do otherwise.
Your ethical obligation not to report conclusions that would be harmful
to your participants
Earlier in this section we commented upon the ethical obligation you have to use the
time you have been granted by the organisation’s managers in a way that is of benefit to
the organisation.
Another ethical consideration is the use that may be made of the conclusions you
draw in your project report. Clearly you face a dilemma if information you have been
given freely by cooperative respondents is reported by you in such a way that it can be
used to harm them. This is particularly the case if you have their permission to name
them in your report. It may be less problematic if your respondents are made
Summary 83
anonymous. If you feel at the beginning of the data collection stage that your results
may point to conclusions that could result in actions which disadvantage your respondents, then it will be more honest to tell them this. It may mean that you are not given
access to all the data you wish for, but at least you will be behaving honestly.
Table 3.6 Guidelines for action to ensure you observe correct ethical standards
•    Use your university’s, or professional body’s, research ethics code of practice as a guide at all
stages of your research.
•    Anticipate potential ethical issues that will affect your proposed research and plan to
overcome problems.
•    Always get informed consent from your participants and respondents through the use of
openness and honesty at all times.
•    Don’t make dishonest promises about the likely benefits of your research.
•    Respect your participants’ and respondents’ rights to privacy at all stages of your research project.
•    Be honest and objective about your data, both in the way you collect them and their analysis.
•    Consider how you will use secondary data in order to protect the identities of those who
contributed to their collection or who are named within them.
•    Don’t forget that interviews mean that there is greater scope for ethical issues to arise.
•    Don’t refer to information gained from a particular participant when talking to other
participants, as this may allow identification of the individual with possibly harmful
consequences to that individual.
•    Be very careful about the conduct of covert research and consider its ethical implications.
•    Make sure that you honour the promises you give to all participants and respondents
regarding the confidentiality of the data obtained and their anonymity.
•    Ensure you comply with all of the data protection legal requirements.
•    Be aware of the complex ethical considerations in using the Internet and email to ensure
high ethical standards are maintained.
•    Make sure you preserve the anonymity of your participants and respondents in your project
report unless you have their permission to do otherwise.
● Organisations are less likely to grant you research access if you are from outside the
organisation.
● If you are from inside the organisation and wish to do research in that organisation,
you will face other problems such as those concerned with status.
● There are strategies you can adopt to ease the process of gaining access to organisations to do research. These include using existing contacts; anticipating the
responses of the organisation’s gatekeeper; ensuring you have sufficient time to
accommodate the inevitable delays; presenting a professional written request and
boosting your credibility through reducing concerns of the organisation.
● Strategies for managing yourself through the research process include managing
your time; maintaining your motivation and keeping in touch with individuals who
can help.
Summary
84 Chapter 3 Managing the research process
● Strategies for managing your supervisor through the research process include being
clear about your expectations from your supervisor and what your supervisor should
expect from you.
● Managing your relationship with your university involves being clear about the
standards expected from you, particularly the academic standards in the final written report.
● You must be very conscious of your ethical responsibilities while conducting your
research.
● The key ethical principles you should adopt are: not causing harm to research participants and respondents; ensuring people are not coerced into participating in
your research; seeking the consent of participants and respondents; maintaining
high standards of honesty and preserving confidentiality.
● Awareness of your ethical responsibilities applies to all stages of the research process.
➔ Think about the data you will need to answer your research question(s) and meet
your objectives. Assuming you need access to an organisation to get some or all of
these data, make a list of possible obstacles to gaining access. Then, using the checklist of points to follow to increase your chances of getting access in Table 3.1, plan
how these obstacles might be overcome.
➔ Draft a request for research access to be sent to your research organisation’s gatekeeper. Your request should focus upon the purpose of your research, the demands
being made of the participant and what you will do with the information you obtain.
➔ Draw up a ‘contract’ to discuss with your supervisor which should include the expectations you have of your supervisor and the expectations you think your supervisor
should have of you.
➔ Get hold of a copy of your university’s code of research ethics. Note those aspects of
the code you that you feel are relevant to your research and list the implications for
action you need to take to ensure the code is followed.
Thinking about your research process
Gov.UK (2015) Data protection. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/data-protection/the-dataprotection-act [Accessed 15 June 2016].
Oxford Brookes University (2016) Ethical Standards for Research Involving Human Participants:
Code of Practice. Available at: https://www.brookes.ac.uk/Documents/Research/Policies-andcodes-of-practice/ethics_codeofpractice/ [Accessed 11 November 2016].
Henley, J. (2016) Sweden leads the race to become cashless society. The Guardian, 4 June 2016.
University of Plymouth (2016) School of Marine Science and Engineering, Project Marking
Scheme. Available at: http://www.tech.plym.ac.uk/sme/mingproject/MScheme910.pdf
[Accessed 12 June 2016].
References
Chapter 4
Using secondary data
When you started to think about how you would obtain the data to answer your research question, you probably began by considering how to design your own questionnaire or the people
you were going to interview. While this is not unusual, it is a great shame, as it meant you
implicitly ignored the vast amount of data that have already been collected by other people for
other purposes, which could also be useful in answering your research question. In this chapter,
we look at using data that were originally collected for some other purpose, termed secondary
data, for your own research. Such secondary data can be contrasted with primary data, which
are data you collect specifically for your research project. We talk about this in Chapter 6.
The number of sources of potential secondary data and the ease of getting access to them
continues to expand rapidly alongside the growth of the Internet. Increasingly, university business schools have subscriptions to online market and financial databases providing access to a
wealth of data that have already been collected and collated from multiple sources. Many
national governments, non-governmental agencies and other organisations allow open access
to the data they have collected, making it available for anyone to use on the Internet. Such
data include the results from large-scale surveys such as national censuses as well as more
specific surveys and research reports. They include numeric data such as official statistics (often
in the form of downloadable tables) and non-numeric data such as government reports, interviews, documents, photographs and conversations. You can also find such data reproduced in
varying levels of detail in other published sources such as quality newspapers as well as on
associated websites. Quality newspapers, for example, contain a wealth of data on organisations and business and management issues in both numeric and non-numeric forms. You can
4.1 Why you should read this chapter
Definitions
secondary data: data used for a research project that were originally collected for some other
purpose.
primary data: data collected specifically for the research project being undertaken.
86 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
easily obtain up-to-date statistics such as share prices. They also sometimes contain transcripts
of interviews with business leaders and politicians (along with commentaries on the content of
the actual interview). When you re-analyse data reported in such media, you are using them
as secondary data, the media being the source where you found your data.
We believe that such secondary data can provide you with fantastic research opportunities, which would otherwise be outside your reach. For example, it is extremely unlikely
that you will have either the time or the financial resources to design and distribute a questionnaire to thousands of potential respondents to collect data for your research project.
Similarly, you’re unlikely to be granted access to interview the chief executive of a large
multinational company. However, through using secondary data such as that already collected through an existing large-scale survey or in the form of a published interview with a
chief executive, you will still be able to gain insights for your own research.
In this chapter, we begin by exploring the questions ‘What forms does secondary data take?’
and ‘Why should you use secondary data?’ We then discuss the pitfalls of using secondary data
and offer advice on how to assess the suitability of secondary data for your research project. We
finish with suggestions of where and how to find secondary data. However, before you decide
to use secondary data for a research project, we would urge you to check your research project
assessment regulations very carefully. For some research projects your university may expect you
to use only secondary data. For other projects you may be required to collect primary data or use
a combination of both primary and secondary data.
Secondary data comes in many forms. As we hinted in the introduction, these include
both quantitative data, consisting of numbers such as tables of figures, and qualitative
(non-numerical) data types. The latter include text materials such as organisations’ policies or minutes of meetings, and non-text materials such as video and voice recordings, and images such as photographs. Secondary data can include raw data that have
not been processed, such as actual responses to questionnaires available from a data
archive or the transcript of a television programme interview available on the television company’s website. These will have been originally collected and used for some
other purpose. Here the source of the data is the data archive or the television company’s website. Secondary data can also include as compiled data, where the data
4.2 Forms secondary data can take
Definitions
quantitative data: data consisting of numbers or data that have been quantified, such as tables of
figures.
qualitative data: non-numerical data or data that have not been quantified, such as text materials,
and non-text materials such as videos, voice recordings and images.
raw data: data for which no processing has taken place.
compiled data: data that have been processed, such as through some form of summarising
or selection.
4.2 Forms secondary data can take 87
presented have either been selected or summarised from the raw data such as a table of
data in a journal article. Here the table contains the secondary data and its source is
the journal article. We find it useful to group the forms of secondary data into three
broad types: survey, documentary (in some form) and multiple source (Saunders et al.,
2016), which are summarised along with examples in Figure 4.1.
Secondary data
Survey Document Multiple source
Snapshots
Examples:
Content of:
• Industry reports.
• Governments’/
European Union
publications
and open access
databases.
• News reports.
• Market and
financial
databases.
• Books.
• Journal articles.
Time series
Examples:
Content of:
• Industry reports.
• Governments’/
European Union
publications
and open access
databases.
• News reports.
• Market and
financial
databases.
• Books.
• Journal articles.
Text
materials
Examples:
• Organisations’
communications such as
emails, letters, tweets.
• Organisations’ websites.
• Reports and minutes of
committees.
• Magazine articles.
• News reports.
• Diary entries.
• Interview transcripts.
Non-text
materials
Examples:
• Media accounts including
television and radio.
• Audio recordings.
• Video recordings
• Images including
photographs, web pages.
Continuous
and regular
surveys
Examples:
• Governments’
surveys.
• Organisations’
surveys.
Ad hoc
surveys
Examples

• Governments’
surveys.
• Organisations’
surveys.
• Academics’
surveys.
Censuses
Examples:
• Governments’
censuses.
Figure 4.1 Forms of secondary data
Source: Developed from Saunders et al. (2016).
88 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
Survey secondary data
Our first form of secondary data was originally obtained through a survey strategy, usually a questionnaire. Such data are often made freely available (particularly by public
authorities) either as compiled data tables or, more frequently, as data sets which can be
downloaded and opened in a spreadsheet. Not surprisingly, such data sets are predominantly quantitative, and so you will need to analyse them using statistics and graphs
(section 7.3). These data will have already been obtained using one of three types of
survey strategy:
● Censuses are official counts usually conducted by a government or on behalf of a government to meet the needs of government departments, with the aim of collecting
data from every household in a country. Many governments have collected data
about their entire populations for more than a hundred years through a census: for
example, the United Kingdom’s decennial Census of Population, the most recent of
which took place in 2011. Because they are official, participation in censuses is usually obligatory and so the level of response is usually high. Census data are usually
collected using some form of questionnaire; the precise method and questions used
being clearly documented. You will find such data are widely available and easy to
obtain online and in printed reports.
● Continuous or regular surveys are those, other than censuses, that are repeated over
time but do not collect data from an entire population. They include surveys where
data have been collected both on behalf of governments and by non-governmental
bodies such as private organisations throughout the year or annually, often using a
questionnaire or structured interview. You will find that data collected by some of
these surveys, particularly those undertaken by or for government organisations, are
available online. Alternatively reports and associated presentations may be available
(Research in practice 4.1). However, where data have been collected for a commercial
purpose, or is of a sensitive nature, they are unlikely to be so easy to obtain. For example, although many organisations conduct ongoing surveys of their customers’ satisfaction as well as employee attitude surveys, it is unlikely you will find, or be allowed
access to, more than a brief summary of the associated findings to support your
research project.
● Ad hoc or ‘one off ’ surveys, as their name suggests, are one-off surveys. Like continuous or regular surveys, these surveys do not collect data from an entire population. Ad hoc surveys are likely to be far more specific than the other forms of
survey in their subject matter. They include questionnaires and structured interviews undertaken by organisations and by independent researchers such as your
lecturers for a specific purpose. However, invariably because of their ad hoc nature,
it is much more difficult for you to locate such surveys, let alone gain access to the
associated data. At best, you’re likely to be reliant on an associated summary
report or journal article.
4.2 Forms secondary data can take 89
Documentary secondary data
Documentary secondary data consist of both text and non-text materials that were
originally collected for some other purpose. As with survey secondary data, it is relatively easy for you to access such data online. This can be done particularly through the
websites of public bodies such as government departments and media corporations
such as the BBC and Sky as well as from video-sharing websites like YouTube®. Indeed,
Private organisation’s regular survey
Jemma’s research objective was to explore the influence of trust and distrust on people’s
behaviours regarding companies. In particular, she was interested in the extent to which
Millennials’ (people born between 1980 and 1995 (Pricewaterhouse Coopers, 2013))
behaviours differed between companies they trusted and companies they distrusted.
When reviewing the literature, she had discovered that a number of authors had referred
to the Edelman Trust Barometer so she had searched for it using Google. Her search had
revealed that the Barometer was based on a regular survey conducted annually by the PR
company Edelman. Edelman’s website included links to an archive of summary reports
dating back to 2001 as well to a 70-slide presentation of the global results for the 2016
survey (Edelman, 2016). Conducted in October and November 2015, the research surveyed over 33,000 respondents aged 25–64, asking questions about trust and credibility.
The global results slides included data about the percentage of people engaging in specified behaviours with companies they trusted and companies they distrusted. These percentages formed part of the secondary data for Jemma’s research project:
Behaviour with
distrusted companies
Behaviour with
trusted companies
Refused/chose to buy products/services 48% 68%
Criticised/recommended companies to
a friend/colleague
42% 59%
Shared negative/positive opinions 26% 41%
Disagreed with others/Defended the
company
35% 38%
Paid more than wanted to buy
products/services/paid more
20% 37%
Sold shares/bought shares 12% 18%
Behaviour relating to distrusted companies is in italics; behaviour relating to trusted companies is in bold.
Source: Edelman (2016).
Jemma combined these regular survey data with reports from quality newspapers about
the changing levels of trust in companies. Using these data and research findings reported
in the academic literature, she was able to argue that there were significant differences in
people’s behaviours when they trusted companies and when they distrusted companies.
Research in practice 4.1
90 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
although individuals upload much of the video content on YouTube, many organisations also upload material on this site. Whether or not such materials are considered
secondary data is dependent upon how you use them.
When you analyse such ‘documents’ directly as part of your research, you’re using
them as secondary data. However, you’re more likely to be simply using them as a place
to find secondary data. Let’s take an example of a BBC news report uploaded on
YouTube. If you want to use this to explore the media’s attitude to the government and
in particular how they have reported government policies, then the BBC news report
on YouTube is your secondary data. This is because the video clip itself is the subject of
your analysis. However, if you’re using this YouTube video clip as a place to find secondary data, say, a record of government figures for the number of people who are unemployed and seeking work, the video clip is only the source of your secondary data. Your
secondary data are the number of people who are unemployed and seeking work. This
is because you are treating the data which have been reported in the video clip as the
subject of your analysis, rather that the video clip itself. In other words, the YouTube
news report is simply where you found these data. It is a source in which the secondary
data on government figures for the number of people who are unemployed and seeking
work you’re using have been recorded subsequent to their being collected. Once
obtained, you can analyse secondary data using either or both quantitative and qualitative techniques (Chapter 7).
Documentary secondary data will have originally been collected as text, materials,
non-text materials or a combination (Research in practice 4.2):
● Text materials. This form of secondary data consists of a wide range of textual secondary data, including those documents held as administrative and public records such
as reports and minutes of meetings as well as diaries and transcripts of interviews
(including those originally broadcast on radio and television). Books and journal
articles are considered to be secondary data only when you are analysing them
directly as part of your research.
● Non-text materials. Non-text documentary secondary data include video and voice
recordings, podcasts, films, radio and television programmes, images such as photographs and drawings as well as materials stored in organisations’ databases. As before,
it is the video or photograph rather than its source (e.g. YouTube) that are the secondary data.
Using social networking sites
Han’s research was concerned with the impact of social media on brand awareness. He
was aware from the academic literature that social media was important in marketing
and could influence consumers’ perceptions of different festivals as brands (Hudson
et al., 2015). Aspects such as a festival’s image and atmosphere were particularly important to festival brand loyalty and equity (Leenders, 2010). Based on the academic
Research in practice 4.2
4.2 Forms secondary data can take 91
Multiple source secondary data
Our final type of secondary data, multiple source, consists of different data sets that
have been combined to form a new data set prior to your accessing the data. Such secondary data can be based entirely on documentary or survey secondary data, or a combination of the two. You almost certainly come across such data on a daily basis as
tables and listings in quality newspapers such as the Financial Times (and associated
websites). These are compiled from a variety of sources, an example that appears in the
Financial Times and on its associated website (http://www.ft.com) being the FT Global
500. This provides a snapshot of the world’s top 500 companies for that year, bringing
together data from different sources, to record their market capitalisation, sector, turnover, net income, total assets and number of employees. Such data can provide you
with extremely useful background material for your project when, for example,
researching a particular market sector.
Data are combined into a multiple source secondary data sets in one of two forms:
either as a snapshot or longitudinally as a time series.
Snapshot
Snapshot multiple source secondary data consist of data drawn from more than one
source which relates to a single time, much of it being accessible online. You will find
that these data are often combined geographically in country or region reports such as
the European Union’s Eurostat Yearbook and Eurostat Regional Yearbook (Eurostat, no
date). These online-only publications are updated on a rolling basis, each article being
updated as new data, both quantitative and qualitative, become available. Data may
also be combined for a particular industry or sector to create a snapshot. Many university libraries have online subscriptions allowing online access to business intelligence
companies’ reports and data. Key Note, for example, provides downloadable market
insights and analysis reports covering over 30 different industry sectors for UK,
European and international markets. For those sources where your university does not
have a subscription, you may well find the price prohibitive, although very occasionally a reference copy may be held in your university library.
literature on branding and social media, Hans argued that, to use social media most
effectively, festivals needed to follow a three-stage process of providing material of
interest, engaging people and using them as advocates for their festival.
Along with many other festivalgoers, Hans had ‘liked’ the Facebook pages of the
festivals he attended. These pages often contained festival organisers’ posts about the
festival as well as comments and other posts from festivalgoers comprising both text
and non-text materials. Although the data in these posts were not originally intended
for Han’s research, he considered they would provide data about the effective use of
social networking sites for festival marketing. Because many fesitvals’ Facebook pages
were open to everyone, Hans considered that the information was in the public domain
so he could use it for his research without seeking consent.
92 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
Time series
Time-series multiple source secondary data are created by combining comparable variables (we defined these in section 1.7) collected through different surveys at different
times, or through the same survey that has been repeated over time. These include
series of data such as number of people out of work, manufacturing output and, as illustrated in Research in practice 4.3, change in retail sales. You can also combine different
Definition
time-series data: data recorded over time for the same variable or variables, usually at regular
intervals.
UK government longitudinal data
As part of his research project examining trends in the retail industry over the past
five years, Muhammad was interested in how UK retail sales had altered. Searching the
Research in practice 4.3
Source: © Office for National Statistics (2016). Contains public sector information licensed under the Open
Government Licence v3.0.
4.3 The potential of secondary data 93
secondary data sets to create time-series data, such as changing attitudes to gender
discrimination. For many research projects, this will be the only way in which you
will be able to obtain longitudinal data because of the time constraints set by the
research process.
UK Office for National Statistics website www.ons.gov.uk, he initially found a graph of
retail sales for the period January 1996 to September 2016 with hyperlinks to both
downloadable publications and data sets. Muhammad clicked on the hyperlink to the
bulletin Retail Sales in Great Britain: September 2016 and read it carefully. The hyperlink ‘Data set’ linked to a downloadable spreadsheet comprising 27 tables of retail sales
data, for the period 2010 to September 2016. Muhammad subsequently reanalysed
these data as part of his research project.
We’ve already mentioned the potential of secondary data in terms of saving you time
and money by allowing you access to larger data sets than you could ever hope to collect
yourself. This huge variety of large, often high-quality data sets that are readily available
at no cost is one of the major opportunities offered by secondary data; as Mark says to
his students, ‘If someone else has already collected suitable high-quality data which
you’re allowed to use, why bother to collect the data yourself?’ The use of such data also
allows you to show that you can find and integrate valuable material into your arguments, giving your project an air of authority. However, in addition to access to larger
data sets than you could collect yourself, the authority such data sets can provide and
time and money savings, there are a number of other reasons for using secondary data
in your research project. These are listed in the following sub-sections.
Data are often already in the public domain
For many researchers, a key advantage of using secondary data is that much of these
data are already in the public domain. This means you do not need to negotiate access
to research participants (Chapter 3) or obtain permission to use the data. Indeed, many
public authorities include a statement explicitly granting all users permission in the
form of a licence to use the data, usually providing that you acknowledge the source
with an appropriate attribution statement such as ‘Contains public sector information
licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0’ (Research in practice 4.3). However,
for data that are not in the public domain, such as that contained in organisations’
databases or administrative records, you will still need to obtain permission.
Data are often available in software compatible formats
While secondary data are available in many forms (section 4.2), they are increasingly
available using the Internet in formats that can be read directly into spreadsheets and
4.3 The potential of secondary data
94 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
other analysis software such as IBM SPSS Statistics (Research in practice 4.4). Some public authority data sets also allow you to select and download the precise data you require
rather than downloading a large data set, much of which you will not need. This means
you can focus on what data you actually need while also saving considerable time by
not having to type your data into, for example, spreadsheets.
It is an unobtrusive method
Not surprisingly, as secondary data have already been collected, you will not need to
ask your potential respondents if you can collect the data from them! This means you
will be respecting their privacy and rights as individuals to be left alone. You will also
not be taking up any of their time in either seeking permission (where data are in the
public domain) or actually collecting data. Issues relating to confidentiality of participants are also reduced or avoided as the data have already been anonymised as part of
the original collection process. This means you’re unlikely to risk breaching your university’s code of ethical practice (Chapter 3). However, if you intend to use data held by
a particular organisation, such as one for which you work, you will need to ensure the
anonymity of that organisation is preserved and to obtain written permission to use
their data for your research project.
Data sets can be readily combined
Data from a range of secondary sources, such as different surveys, can be combined to
create one new data set. You will find this particularly helpful if you wish to undertake
a longitudinal study. For such studies, you can combine data from a series of surveys
where the same questions have been asked into one data set. Indeed, for many public
authority data sets, aggregation of variables or the combining of data from different
surveys has already been undertaken before the data are made available (Research in
practice 4.3 and 4.4). However, as you can see in Research in practice 4.4, to fully
understand such data, you need to be clear about the precise definitions used for each
variable. You can also combine data sets from different geographical areas such as
countries or regions to make comparisons between countries or regions. This can be
useful if, for example, you’re comparing changes in manufacturing output between
two countries.
Eurostat (European Union) downloadable data
Jasvinder had decided to pursue a research project on tourism and, in particular, why
some European Countries were more popular with tourists than others. She noticed the
European Union’s Eurostat website included a link to the Main Tables for Tourism data
(Eurostat, 2016).
Research in practice 4.4
4.3 The potential of secondary data 95
Data are more open to public scrutiny
Choosing to use secondary data can provide you with access to data of very high quality. For example, the surveys conducted by professional researchers working in government departments or private survey organisations have to meet exacting scrutiny
This had a series of further links to downloadable tables, including four providing
data for each member state, which he felt could be most useful:
● Nights spent at tourist accommodation establishments
● Nights spent at hotels and similar accommodation
● Nights spent at holiday and other short-stay accommodation
● Nights spent at camping grounds, recreational vehicle parks and trailer parks
These tables presented data collected from 2006 to 2015, highlighting massive differences in the number of nights spent at tourist accommodation establishments between
member states, the highest number of nights in 2015 being recorded for Germany,
Spain, France and Italy; data for the UK not being available for that year. The data also
indicated that certain forms of accommodation were used far more in some member
states; for example, more nights were spent at camping grounds, recreational vehicle
parks and trailer parks in France than any other member states.
However, before using these data, Jasvinder needed to be sure she understood precisely what the data meant. She therefore clicked on the hyperlink to the ‘Manuals and
Guidelines’ web pages and then downloaded the Methodological Manual for Tourism
Statistics (Eurostat, 2014). This defined each of the types of tourism accommodation in
considerable detail, outlying what each type included and excluded. For example, camping grounds, recreational vehicle parks and trailer parks included ‘provision of accommodation in campgrounds, trailer parks, recreational camps and fishing and hunting
camps for short stay visitors, provision of space and facilities for recreational vehicles . . .
but excludes mountain refuge, cabins and hostels’ (Eurostat, 2014: 59).
Source: Eurostat (2016) Copyright European Communities, 2016. Reproduced with permission.
96 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
standards in terms of rigour of the research method used. These data sets are therefore
likely to be larger and of better quality than any survey you can design and deliver yourself. The majority of them, in addition to the data collected, provide you with information about precisely how the data were collected, including sample size and selection,
response rates, a copy of the data collection instrument used (such as a questionnaire)
and an assessment of how representative the data are. This information can be used
by you and other users to judge the quality of the data and can, as we outline in
section 4.4, also help you to assess the suitability of the secondary data for your research.
Data can provide contextual background
If you’re collecting your own data, it is often useful to set the findings from your own
data within a broader context. For example, if you have collected data for your research
project through interviews with a particular service organisation’s potential customers,
you can use secondary data such as a market research report for that service to locate
your findings in the broader context of that particular industry. Alternatively, you
might wish to use recent government population estimates to assess the generalisability
of your findings by assessing whether your participants were representative, being present in the same proportions for each age group as in that population.
As you will have gathered from reading this chapter so far, we are fans of using secondary data in research. However, our enthusiasm, and hopefully yours, needs to be tempered with realism. While secondary data offers considerable potential for many
research projects, its very nature means that it is open to a variety of often valid criticisms. As our definition of secondary data indicates, it was collected for a different purpose. This means the data may not meet your research needs fully, and it may have been
manipulated in some way. You will not have undertaken data collection. You’re therefore very unlikely to know precisely how the data were collected or the impact this will
have on the actual data you are now going to use. Finally, although public authorities
make their data available free of charge, do keep in mind that the cost of actually
obtaining such data is high. For this reason, other organisations (such as market
research companies) may ask you to pay for it. In addition, the commercial sensitivity
of some data means organisations may refuse to allow you to use their data even if they
employ you. These criticisms represent potential pitfalls about which you need to be
aware and which we will now discuss in more detail.
Only meets the research needs partially
Unlike data you collect yourself to answer your research question, secondary data are
unlikely to have been collected for that same purpose. This means the data may be
inappropriate for your research question or, as is more likely, only partially relevant.
4.4 Possible pitfalls of using secondary data
4.4 Possible pitfalls of using secondary data 97
Reasons for this vary but include the data not being current, problems with definitions
used for particular secondary data variables, the way in which data have been aggregated not matching your needs and because the data contain clear errors.
Most quantitative secondary data are still only available in aggregated tabular form
(Research in practice 4.1 and 4.4). Where the tables into which data have been aggregated
do not meet your needs, perhaps due to the categories used being too broad, this may
cause problems. Similarly, it is also likely to be problematic where definitions used for the
data variables (Research in practice 4.4) in these tables differ from those in other tables or
are unclear. Invariably, the solution here depends upon the extent to which you judge the
secondary data to be inappropriate for your own research. Where the data do not meet
your needs at all, your only solution is to find alternative data. However, where the data
meet your needs partially, you will need to adapt and compromise. The extent to which
you compromise will depend upon what other secondary data are available and whether
you’re able to collect appropriate data yourself. If you do decide to compromise, you will
need to explain in your project report your concerns and the compromises you have
made, and why you still feel able to use these secondary data. For example, if you’re comparing data on satellite TV subscribers between countries in Europe, the most recent data
you will be able to obtain is likely to be available only for some countries and at least a few
years out of date. In your project report, therefore, you need to make clear these omissions
and when the data were collected, explaining it is the most recent data available.
Data are not always value-neutral
The original purpose for which secondary data were collected is invariably reflected in
the way they are presented and the interpretations of those who produced them. Data
are often used to support an argument or make a particular point and so may be presented in the way that best supports that argument. This is often apparent if you compare the data presented about the same topic by two newspapers with different political
affiliations. When you do, you will probably see that, although some of the data used
are the same, different data from the same original data set will also have been quoted
selectively by each newspaper to support their different interpretations.
Definitions used can also change within a single data set over time, impacting on the
meanings attributed to the data. For example, between 1979 and 1994, there were nine
significant changes in the calculation method used for the United Kingdom’s monthly
count of unemployment claimants, resulting in the overall number of claimants being
reduced by 481,000 (Fenwick and Denman, 1995). Not surprisingly, the claimant count
became widely criticised as a data source because it ‘seriously underestimated’ the number of people out of work, the definitional changes making any serious estimation of
changes in the unemployment rate over time ‘virtually useless’ (Levitas, 1996: 46). It is
therefore important that you remember secondary data may have been manipulated by
people to serve their own purposes, and therefore assess the likely impact of this on
actual data values. In particular, you should not accept any secondary data without first
understanding the precise definitions used and, for longitudinal data, whether these
have been altered over time.
98 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
Unlikely to know precisely how the data were collected
When using secondary data, you have no control over the quality of the data. You
therefore have to infer the likely quality from other information provided. Researchers
should always provide clear information about the method of data collection and the
variables about which questions were asked. This should be in sufficient detail for you
to infer the quality of the data in both reports and articles as well as for actual data sets.
Despite this, it is unlikely as a user of secondary data that you will ever know the precise
context in which each of a series of interviews took place or the nuances of the relationship between an interviewer and the participant. Whatever the level of detail provided
about the method, you will obviously know less than if you had collected the data yourself. For some secondary data sets, no information will be provided about how they
were collected. It is best to treat these data with caution, as often this information is not
provided because it would indicate that there are problems with these data. However,
this is not always the case. A number of excellent market research companies provide
very limited information about their data collection methods as they consider such
details commercially sensitive.
Can be costly to obtain
Where data have been collected for commercial reasons, you’re likely to find access
both difficult and costly. Market research reports such as those produced by the Mintel
International Group, although easy to identify and locate online, are expensive to purchase. This means, if they are not available in your university library or at another
library you can visit, you will be unable to access the data such reports contain.
When deciding whether to use secondary data, there are a number of things you need
to think about. Like many students, you may think that using secondary data is easy
because you do not need to design a data collection method or collect the data yourself.
This is not the case. The time you have saved will be used in ensuring you have access to
the data and that the data will enable you to answer your research question. Fortunately,
because the data already exist, you can assess their suitability before you begin your
analysis. Inevitably, the suitability is dependent upon the data being relevant to your
own research. However, if the data are relevant, suitability will also depend on the purpose for which the data were originally collected and the method that was used. Let’s
now discuss these in more detail.
The relevance of the data
The most important criterion regarding the suitability to you of any data set is that it
provides you with the information you need to answer your research question. This
means that the data collected, and the definitions used for the variables in which you’re
4.5 Assessing the suitability of secondary data
4.5 Assessing the suitability of secondary data 99
interested, must be a close match to the data you ideally require. Often you will find
that the data available and the definitions that were used are not exactly as you would
wish for in an ideal world. For example, you may ideally require data on the purchasing
power of children, defined as the under-18 demographic group. If the secondary data
defines this group as less than 17 years of age, these data will not match your requirements exactly. However, the world of secondary data is not perfect. You may therefore
decide to use these data and state in your project report that they do not include 17-yearolds, offering an indication of the likely impact of this on your subsequent analysis. In
doing this, you’re offering both an assessment of the suitability of these data to answering your research question and ensuring that those who read your project report are
aware of possible limitations and their likely implications.
When using secondary data, you will need to exclude those data that are not relevant to your research question. Data on the United Kingdom will need to be excluded if
your research is only concerned with a post-Brexit European Union. Alternatively, some
secondary data sources, in particular those collected by government surveys, may not
include all the data variables you would ideally require for your analysis. You will need
to make an assessment as to whether these missing variables are essential to answering
your research question. If they are, then the data that are available are not suitable, and
you need to look elsewhere.
The original reasons for collecting data
Assuming you have found what appears to be suitable secondary data, you need to look in
more detail regarding the reasons why the data were originally collected. A good place to
start when trying to establish the original purpose is to look for the objectives or research
questions. For research reports and articles, these are often stated in the introductory section or, for data accessed online, in the accompanying documentation or notes.
Alternatively, you can look at who commissioned the research. For example: were data collected for a public authority such as a government department, or by a private organisation
that employed a market research company or perhaps an academic to collect the data? The
answers to such questions will give you an idea of the original motivations behind collecting these data and, as a consequence, your analysis and interpretation. If, for example, the
research was undertaken for a trades union, it is likely that the focus of the data collected
and the associated report will be different than if it was undertaken for an employer or
employers’ organisation. You may consider the original focus of the research too narrow in
relation to your own research question, highlighting the need either to find additional secondary data or to collect your own primary data. Alternatively, you may feel that the data,
although useful, needs to be treated with caution because of the potential for bias caused
by the original purpose of the research. Whatever you decide, it is important that you
explain the reasons for your decision clearly in your project report.
The method used
Assessment of the method used is concerned with how the data were collected, including the actual questions used to obtain the data. When assessing the method, you need
100 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
to establish precisely how data were collected, including any personal interaction
between participants and the person collecting the data. Data collected using an
Internet questionnaire will inevitably constrain those who participate (and therefore
the data collected) to people who have Internet access and, in most cases, an email
address. Similarly, data collected using a telephone interview will restrict those who
participate to people who have access to a telephone. In both examples, the people who
respond may not be representative of the population as a whole or those you wish to
research. You therefore need to treat the data with care. Data collected using structured
interviews conducted by a professional interviewer either by telephone or face to face
are likely to have followed a set and detailed script, meaning that all participants are
likely to have been asked exactly the same questions in the same way. In contrast, questions asked by amateur interviewers might unwittingly have been reworded for some
participants, prompting a different response indicating that perhaps the data quality is
more variable. You therefore need to pay particularly careful attention to who conducted the interview.
The questions used
For data collected originally using interviews or questionnaires, question phrasing is
crucial. For large-scale questionnaire surveys, organisations spend a vast amount of
resources in trying to ensure that the questions asked would not be misinterpreted and
are neither biased nor leading. Despite this, it is still worthwhile examining carefully
the questions asked to ensure that the data collected is relevant to your own research
and, of equal importance, that you do not misinterpret responses in these data.
The breadth of forms of secondary data we’ve discussed in this chapter serve also to
emphasise the variety of places where you may find secondary data. Despite the Internet
and availability of general search engines such as Google and Bing, finding suitable
data still depends in part on your awareness of information gateways and potentially
useful secondary data sites. It is also important to recognise that not all secondary data
will be in electronic form or accessible online. Some will be paper-based and listed in
your own university library’s catalogue. Other paper-based secondary data will be in
reports that are held only in specialist libraries or organisations. The latter of these will
be the most difficult to locate and may involve you visiting a specialist library or, if permission is granted, an organisation to browse through publications or reports.
Remember, even if you intend to use data you know is held by an organisation for which
4.6 Where and how to find secondary data
Definition
information gateway: website that provides access to specific websites and pages, each site having
been evaluated prior to being added to the gateway.
Summary 101
you work, you will still need to seek written permission to reuse these data for your
research project.
For secondary data published by governments, finding the data online is relatively
easy compared to other sources. Precise references to particular government sources are
often given in journal articles and books, although often the associated web addresses
will have changed. Some governments and government departments provide guides or
lists of statistics they make available. However, like the majority of other secondary providers, most governments expect you to use either a combination of menus and web
links or the search engines within their own information gateway to find data that are
available. It is therefore important that you have a reasonable idea of the sort of data
you’re looking for and the search terms and phrases that are likely to have been used to
describe it. Providing you then know the web address of an appropriate information
gateway (Table 4.1), it is relatively straightforward to search for specific secondary data
published by governments.
You will find data held by non-governmental organisations more difficult to
locate. For data that are available online, there are a number of other information
gateways that are of use (Table 4.1). If you find that these do not eventually produce
useful data, general search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo can help you
locate potential data sources. In some cases, these data will be held in reports that
can be downloaded from sites hosted by professional and trade associations. In others, there will be only a reference to an internal report for a private company, and it
will be necessary for you to request the document and seek written permission before
the data can be used.
Table 4.1 Selected information gateways to secondary data sources
Name Internet address Content
UK Office for
National Statistics
http://www.ons.gov.uk/ UK national statistics
Direct.gov http://www.gov.uk/ UK government information service
Eurostat http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat European Union and member states
statistics
Europa http://europa.eu European Union information service
Morningstar http://www.morningstar.co.uk/ Financial information on companies,
trusts and markets
USA.gov http://www.usa.gov/ USA government information service
● Secondary data are data that were originally collected for some other purpose. They
can be contrasted with primary data, which are collected for the specified research
purpose.
Summary
102 Chapter 4 Using secondary data
● Secondary data comes in many forms including both quantitative (numerical) data
and qualitative (non-numerical) data. These can be grouped using the actual source
or sources of the data into survey, documentary and multiple-source secondary
data.
● Secondary data can provide you with fantastic research opportunities that would
otherwise be outside your reach, by allowing you access to larger data sets than you
could ever hope to collect yourself and by saving you time and money.
● Other reasons for you using secondary data include:
● the data are already in the public domain, thereby often avoiding concerns about
access and permission to use the data;
● the data are often available in software-compatible formats, allowing easy
analysis;
● the data provide an unobtrusive method, respecting individuals’ rights to privacy
and being left alone;
● the data can be readily combined with other data sets, allowing, for example, longitudinal studies;
● the data can provide contextual background to a research project.
● However, using secondary data has a number of possible pitfalls, including:
● the data may only meet your research needs partially;
● the data may have been manipulated in some way and so not be value-neutral;
● the definitions used within the data may have changed over time;
● the data can be costly to obtain.
● The suitability of secondary data to your research project is dependent upon:
● the relevance of the actual data to your research question;
● the original reason for collecting the data;
● the methods used to collect the data and the actual questions asked.
● Increasing provision of online open-access data by governments has increased the
availability of secondary data considerably.
● Not all secondary data will be available online. Some will be paper-based and available in your own university’s library. Other secondary data will be in reports that are
held only in specialist libraries or organisations.
➔ Think about how you might use secondary data to answer your research question(s)
and meet your objectives. If you consider secondary data would be helpful, or its use
is a criterion for your assessment, make a list of the data variables you think you’re
likely to require, being as precise as possible in the terms you use.
Thinking about using secondary data
References 103
➔ Initially, use the information gateways listed in Table 4.1 to search the Internet for
secondary data information sources that contain these variables. If these result in
no suitable data, try using general search engines such as Google, Bing or Yahoo, or
other sources.
➔ Evaluate the relevance of the data variables in each of these sources against the data
variables you require (section 4.5). Remember, it is unlikely that you will find secondary data that matches your requirements exactly.
➔ Evaluate the suitability of each secondary data source by considering the original purpose
of the research, the methods used and the questions used as outlined in section 4.5.
➔ If the data are suitable, where appropriate seek and gain permission to use the data
before obtaining a copy.
Edelman (2016) 2016 Edelman Trust Barometer Global Report. Available at: http://www.edelman.
com/insights/intellectual-property/2016-edelman-trust-barometer/global-results/ [Accessed
28 October 2016].
Eurostat (no date) Europe in Figures. Available at: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statisticsexplained/index.php/Europe_in_figures_-_Eurostat_yearbook [Accessed 1 November 2016].
Eurostat (2014) Methodological Manual for Tourism Statistics Version 3.1. Luxembourg:
Publications Office of the European Union.
Eurostat (2016) Tourism: Main Tables. Available at: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/tourism/
data/main-tables [Accessed 1 November 2016].
Fenwick, D. and Denman, J. (1995) The monthly unemployment count: change and consistency,
Labour Market Trends, November, 397–400.
Hudson, S., Roth, M.S., Madden, J.T. and Hudson, R. (2015) The effect of social media on emotions, brand relationship quality and word of mouth: An empirical study of music festival
attendees. Tourism Management, 47(1), 68–76.
Leenders, M.A.A.M, (2010) The relative importance of the brand of music festivals: a customer
equity perspective. Journal of Strategic Marketing, 18(4), 291–301.
Levitas, R. (1996) Interpreting Official Statistics. London: Routledge.
Office for National Statistics (2016) Retail Industry. Available at: http://www.ons.gov.uk/
businessindustryandtrade/retailindustry#datasets4 [Accessed 31 October 2016].
Pricewaterhouse Coopers, University of Southern California and the London Business School
(2013) PwC’s NextGen: A Global Generational Study. Available at: http://www.pwc.com/
us/en/people-management/publications/nextgen-global-generational-study.html [Accessed
27 October 2016].
Saunders, M., Lewis, P. and Thornhill, A. (2016) Research Methods for Business Students (7th ed.).
Harlow: Pearson.
References
Chapter 5
Choosing your research design
Perhaps when you first started thinking about your research project, you thought about
collecting the data, maybe through a questionnaire. This is perfectly normal, as it is an
exciting part of any research project. But as on any journey, the research journey may take
a number of routes and be accomplished by a variety of methods. The most obvious option
is not always the best, whether deciding which route to use when travelling from one city
to another or on the method for researching the reasons why consumers prefer recording
television programmes rather than watching them live. So it will not surprise you to learn
that you have many options when designing your research project. What will be a major
factor in determining the quality of your research proposal is the extent to which you have
considered these various options, and the clarity of thought which you have displayed in
coming to a decision as to which design to adopt. The main part of this chapter is concerned with the different options you face when designing your research. We examine the
differing purposes of projects which we call exploratory, descriptive and explanatory
research. These project purposes may be thought of as the overall umbrella under which
more detailed research strategies shelter. We then go on to detail these research strategies:
the general ways in which to set about answering the research questions, the writing of
which we examined in Chapter 1. There is a choice to be made regarding the use of quantitative and/or qualitative methods in a research design. Consequently, we consider the
methodological choices of using one or more quantitative methods, one or more qualitative methods or combining them in a so-called mixed-method design. Our practical examination of research design and strategies ends with a consideration of the time frame
applying to the research. It may be that the research questions you have set dictate that
the research be carried out over an extended period of time. Alternatively, a snapshot may
be perfectly acceptable.
The chapter begins and ends with two other issues which impart quality to your research
design. The first of these is the subject of research philosophy. A consideration of your own
research philosophy helps you to examine your fundamental ideas about research: those
5.1 Why you should read this chapter
5.1 Why you should read this chapter 105
ideas that will underpin your research and which you may not have even thought about! In
other words, it starts you thinking about your thinking. The second research issue is that of
research credibility. Here we address the question of whether you have taken the steps in
your research design to ensure that your findings and conclusions are believable. Obviously,
this is crucially important. If the reader has doubts about the credibility of your research,
then you may have wasted your time and that of others. In addition, you may suffer practical consequences such as failing the research module!
The research onion
At this point, let us introduce our research onion (Figure 5.1). This serves as a route map to
chart our way through this chapter. In addition, the onion is a metaphor for describing the
layers of the research process. The outer two layers of the onion contain thinking about
research philosophies and approaches to developing theory. The next three (central) layers
reflect the need to consider methodological choices, research strategies and the time horizon. The centre of the onion, data collection and analysis, are the subjects of Chapters 6
and 7, respectively.
Data
collection and
data analysis
Cross-sectional
Action
research
Action
research
Grounded
theory
Multi-method
qualitative
Mixed-method
simple
Pragmatism
Positivism
Philosophy
Approach to
theory
development
Methodological
Time horizon Strategy(ies) choice
Techniques and
procedures
Critical realism
Postmodernism
Interpretivism
Deduction
Induction
Abduction
Multi-method
quantitative
Mono
method
qualitative
Longitudinal
Archival
Narrative research
inquiry
Survey
Experiment
Case study
Mono method
quantitative
Mixed-method
complex
Figure 5.1 The research onion here
Source: © 2015 Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill.
106 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
What is meant by the term ‘research philosophy’?
The term research philosophy refers to a system of beliefs and assumptions about the
development and nature of knowledge. This sounds rather profound, but that’s just
what you will be doing when you conduct your research; developing knowledge in a
particular field. Your knowledge development may not be as fundamental as changing
the way we think about how organisations develop, but even establishing why customers prefer ice-cream cones to wafers from a particular ice-cream vendor is developing
new knowledge.
You almost certainly won’t think about your research philosophy at every stage in
your research, but you will make a number of types of assumptions which will influence
the way in which you set about your research. These assumptions fall into three main
categories, which are called ontological assumptions, epistemological assumptions and
axiological assumptions. Let’s have a look at what these mean and the implications
they have for your research.
Ontological assumptions are about the nature of reality. Your ontological assumptions shape the way in which you see and study your research objects. In business and
management these objects include organisations, management, individuals’ working
lives and particular organisational events. Your ontology, therefore, determines how
you see the world of business and management and, therefore, the direction your
research project will take.
For example, take the case of organisational change, in particular resistance to that
change. Traditionally, the ontological assumption made by managers and researchers
has been that resistance to change hinders the change process. So the focus of research
has usually been on how resistance to change could be eliminated. The emphasis has
been on the sources of that resistance, the reasons for it and how it may be overcome. But
recently, some practitioners’ and researchers’ ontological assumptions about change have
altered. They have begun to think about resistance to change as inevitable – something
that happens all the time whenever organisational change is initiated. Indeed, resistance
can be seen as beneficial as it can highlight problematic aspects of change programmes
and help to generate different ways of solving organisational problems.
Epistemological assumptions are about knowledge – what constitutes acceptable,
valid and legitimate knowledge, and how we can communicate knowledge to others. In
business and management a wide range of knowledge sources may be relevant. These
may include numerical data, written texts, visual data (e.g. photos and videos) and
personal diaries. These can all be considered legitimate. Consequently, your choice of
research methods may be heavily influenced by your epistemological assumptions. For
5.2 The importance of research philosophy
Definition
research philosophy: overall term that relates to the development of knowledge and the nature of
that knowledge in relation to research.
5.2 The importance of research philosophy 107
example, the positivist (see the next section) assumption that objective facts offer the
best scientific evidence is likely to result in the choice of quantitative research methods,
leading to research findings which are likely to be considered objective and generalisable. But, for a person with a different epistemological view, such as an interpretivist,
such methods are less likely to offer a rich and nuanced view of organisational life.
Axiological assumptions emphasise the importance of values and ethics within the
research process. The values that we are referring to here are our own as researchers, and
those of our research participants. There is no doubt our values play a tremendously
important part in what research project we choose and the way in which we go about
collecting our data. For example, choosing to collect data by interview suggests that
you place greater value in personal interaction with your respondents than were you to
decide to collect their views through an Internet questionnaire.
You may find it helpful to write your own statement of personal values in relation to
the topic you are studying. For example, if you are studying an organisation’s policy on
corporate social responsibility, your own values may have had a telling influence on the
choice of this topic and the way in which you design your research. In addition, reference
to your statement of personal values will help heighten your awareness of the value judgements you are making in drawing conclusions from your data. It would be perfectly normal had you not considered your own beliefs about the nature of the world around you,
what constitutes acceptable and desirable knowledge or the extent to you which your
values influence your choice of research topic and data collection techniques. But as a
researcher, it’s very helpful to develop the skill of reflecting upon such issues. Many
examiners will want to understand why you decided to go down a particular route.
We now turn our attention to the five research philosophies that form the outer
layer of our research onion.
Five research philosophies
Positivism
Positivism relates to the philosophical stance of the natural scientist. Here you study
observable social realities (e.g. organisations, managers) to produce law-like generalisations. Positivism promises unambiguous and accurate knowledge using methods
designed to yield pure data and facts uninfluenced by human interpretation or bias.
If you were to adopt an extreme positivist position, you would:
● see the social realities you are studying as real in the same way as physical objects and
natural phenomena are real;
● focus on discovering observable and measurable facts and regularities, and only phenomena that you can observe and measure would lead to the production of credible
and meaningful data;
Definition
positivism: a research philosophy similar to those used in the physical and natural sciences. Highly
structured methods are employed to facilitate replication, resulting in law-like generalisations.
108 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
● look for causal relationships in your data to create law-like generalisations similar to
those produced by scientists;
● use these universal rules and laws to help you to explain and predict behaviour and
events in organisations.
In adopting a positivist philosophy, you may well use existing theory to develop
hypotheses. You would test these hypotheses in the expectation that they would be
confirmed, in whole or part, or refuted, leading to the further development of theory that could then be tested by further research. But it doesn’t necessarily mean
that, as a positivist, you have to start with existing theory. You could develop
hypotheses which would lead to the gathering of facts (rather than impressions),
which would provide the basis for subsequent hypothesis testing. As a positivist,
you would also try to remain neutral and detached from your research and data in
order to avoid influencing your findings. This means that you would undertake
research, as far as possible, in a value-free way. Positivists claim to be external to the
process of data collection as there is little that can be done to alter the substance of
the data collected. Positivist researchers are likely to use a highly structured methodology, such as questionnaires or structured observation, in order to facilitate replication. Furthermore, the emphasis will be on quantifiable data that lend
themselves to statistical analysis.
(Critical) realism
Like positivism, realism relates to scientific inquiry. It has two distinct strands. That
which concerns us most as business and management researchers is called critical realism. But first, let’s clarify what is a more extreme form of realism, termed direct realism.
Put simply, direct realism says that what you see is what you get: what we experience
through our senses portrays the world accurately. By contrast, the philosophy of critical
realism focuses on explaining what we see and experience, in terms of the underlying
structures of reality that shape the observable events. Critical realists argue that we
experience the world in two stages. First, there is the object itself and the sensations
conveyed by the object. Second, there is the subjective processing that is present in our
minds after that sensation meets our senses. Direct realists hold that the first step of
processing is sufficient.
Once again, we can hear you saying ‘What has all this to do with business and management research?’ The answer is that the distinction between direct and critical realism is important for much business and management research. We are often concerned
with first describing complex business situations in order to understand what is going
on. So we need to study not only what is immediately apparent but also what lies behind
what is immediately apparent. We need to understand the deeper structures and
Definition
critical realism: a philosophy which focuses on explaining what we see and experience with the
emphasis on understanding the underlying structures of reality that shape the observable events.
5.2 The importance of research philosophy 109
relations that are not directly observable but lie beneath the surface of social reality.
Let’s say you had to study a major organisational problem, such as that faced by
Samsung when the battery caught fire in its new Galaxy Note 7 mobile phone shortly
after its introduction in 2016. In order to arrive at a conclusion for the causes of such a
debacle from which others may learn, you would need to understand a good deal about
the context of the event. For example, you would need to know about the relationship
between product marketing managers and technical executives. Presumably the marketeers would wish the product to get to market with the minimum of delay, whereas
the technicians would be more concerned with getting the product right. Such a tension would not be immediately apparent to the researcher but would necessitate understanding the structures and relationships that were beneath the surface of what was
immediately evident.
Interpretivism
The concern of the critical realist with greater organisational complexity points the
way towards interpretivism. Interpretivism relates to the study of social phenomena in
their natural environment. So a wish to understand what is going on in a work organisation, for example, would make it necessary to conduct research in that organisation
among its ‘social actors’. The term ‘social actors’ suggests the metaphor of a theatre.
As humans, we play a part on the stage of social life. Theatre actors have specific roles
which they each interpret in a particular way (it may be their own or that of the director), playing these roles in accordance with their interpretations. Similarly, as social
actors we interpret our everyday social roles in accordance with the meaning we give
to these roles. The way in which you quickly have to move from the role of student to
that of employee means a process of social adaptation on your part, which reflects
your interpretation of which behaviours are appropriate for this new role. If we interpret the roles that we play according to our definition of what is appropriate, then we
also interpret the social roles of others in accordance with our definition. This suggests that, as researchers, our values play a part in the research process. This is inevitable. It would be naive to think that our own personal values play no part in our
research. Even the choice of research topic, as well as the decision about the research
methods to adopt, reflects our values. Clearly, the skilled researcher needs to be wary
of this. Understanding the social world of our research subjects from their point of
view is the key here.
For business and management research, the interpretivist perspective is very relevant, particularly in such fields as organisational behaviour, marketing and human
resource management. Not only are business situations complex, but they are also
unique. They represent a particular set of circumstances and individuals coming
together at a specific time to create a unique social phenomenon.
Definition
interpretivism: a philosophy which advocates the necessity to understand differences between
humans in their role as social actors.
110 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
Postmodernism
Postmodernism emphasises the role of language and power relations, seeking to question accepted ways of thinking and to give voice to alternative marginalised views.
Postmodernists go even further than interpretivists in their critique of positivism,
attributing even more importance to the role of language. Postmodernist business and
management researchers emphasise the importance of flux and change in organisational life. They believe that any sense of order is provisional and without foundation,
and can only be brought about through our language with its categories and classifications. At the same time, they recognise that language is always partial and inadequate.
In particular, it marginalises and excludes aspects of what it claims to describe, whilst
prioritising and emphasising other aspects.
Postmodernists argue that what is generally considered to be ‘right’ and ‘true’ is
decided collectively by powerful alliances in organisations. For example, in some organisations, what is right may be decided by accountants whose power derives from the
dominance of the organisation’s financial resources. This does not mean that, in this
example, the accountants’ way of thinking is necessarily the ‘best’ – only that it is seen
as such at a particular point in time by particular groups, such as shareholders. Other
perspectives that are suppressed are potentially just as valuable and have the power to
create alternative ‘truths’.
Postmodernist researchers seek to expose and question the power relations that
sustain such dominant realities. The goal of postmodern research is therefore to
radically challenge the established ways of thinking and to give voice and legitimacy to the suppressed and marginalised ways of perceiving issues that have been
previously excluded. Let us look at another example. As a postmodernist researcher,
you would, instead of accepting the concept of ‘management’ as a given, focus on
the ongoing processes of managing. You would challenge the accepted concepts
and theory of management and try to demonstrate what perspectives and realities
they exclude and leave silent, and whose interests they serve. This is likely to be the
position of the trade union researcher, who will see management, ideally, as a collective process involving employees as well as managers, both parties having a legitimate role to play in the process of management. As a postmodernist, you would be
using all forms of data – texts, images, conversations, voices and numbers – and
similar to interpretivists, you would undertake in-depth investigations of phenomena. A vital part of postmodernist research is the recognition that power relations
between the researcher and research subjects shape the knowledge created as part of
the research process.
Definition
postmodernism: a philosophy which emphasises the role of language and power relations that seeks
to challenge accepted ways of thinking and give voice to alternative views.
5.3 Differing approaches to theory development: deduction, induction and abduction 111
Pragmatism
Although our choice of research methods may reflect our values, it would be wrong to
think that the differing philosophies we have outlined above should be thought of as a
‘shopping list’ from which to choose a philosophy. In practice, you are far more likely
to be guided by what is possible. Indeed, if a research problem does not suggest unambiguously that one particular type of knowledge or method should be adopted, this
only confirms the pragmatist’s view that it is perfectly possible to work with different
types of knowledge and methods. This is the pragmatist’s position. Pragmatists considers that the most important determinants of the research philosophy you adopt are
your research question(s) and objectives. Often, the pragmatist researcher starts with a
problem, their research aiming to contribute practical solutions that inform future
practice. The pragmatist would argue that it is quite possible to work with methods
that indicate, for example, a quantitative approach, say a questionnaire, alongside a
more qualitative stance, through interviewing the key participants at meetings about
their interactions. This echoes an argument that runs throughout this text: that mixing methods, both qualitative and quantitative, are possible, and may be highly appropriate, within one study.
Definition
pragmatism: a philosophy which argues that the most important determinant of the research design
adopted are the research question(s) and objectives, the aim often being to contribute practical solutions.
We now move to the next layer of the onion to examine three different approaches to
theory development: deduction, induction and abduction. We mentioned the topic
of theory in Chapter 1, and you will remember that theory is broadly defined as an
explanation of the relationship between two or more concepts or variables. The role
of theory will loom large in your study, as all research projects will need to link to
theory in some way. The most likely link will be to an existing theory explained in
the literature relevant to your research topic. For example, you may wish to explore
the theory in a different context, say, in your own employing organization or in a
different cultural context. The purpose will be to explore the extent to which the
theory applies or to suggest a modification to the theory based on your own findings
and conclusions.
The distinction between deduction and induction in particular takes us back a stage
to the development of the theory which you may be using from the literature. Although,
as we said, you may be using existing theory, it is useful to see how that theory may
have been developed.
Differing approaches to theory development:
5.3 deduction, induction and abduction
112 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
Deduction: clarifying theory at the beginning of the study
Deduction is a research approach which involves the testing of a theoretical proposition
by using a research strategy designed to perform this test. There are five sequential
stages in deductive research. These are:
1 defining research questions from the general theory that exists;
2 operationalising these questions in a way that enables what is occurring to be
established (i.e. specifying the way in which the questions may be answered). This
may be in the form of a testable proposition (hypothesis) about the relationship
between two or more concepts or variables, or set of hypotheses, to form a
theory;
3 collecting data to answer the operationalized questions or test the hypotheses;
4 analysing the data collected to determine whether it supports the existing general
theory or suggests the need for its modification;
5 confirming the initial general theory or modifying it if the findings do not confirm
the existing general theory. (In the event of step 5 resulting in a modified theory, the
five sequential stages can be repeated to test the new theory.)
The key characteristics of deduction are, first, to explain causal relationships between
variables. For example, you may wish to establish the reasons for too many errors
being made by call centre operatives in giving information to customers. Having
studied the error patterns, it seems to you that there may be a relationship between
the number of errors and the length of the initial training programme received by
operatives. You define your research questions (stage 1) which explore the proposition that those operatives receiving the shorter version of the initial training programme are more error-prone than those who undergo the longer version. Secondly,
you need to operationalise the questions as testable propositions (stage 2). These
questions, therefore, need to be expressed in a way that enables what is occurring to
be established. In the call centre example mentioned earlier, the two key concepts in
the questions are error levels and training-programme length. The second concept
may be more straightforward than the first. For example, you would need to be clear
about what constitutes an error and distinguish between the seriousness of errors.
The third characteristic of deduction is the need to collect and analyse data to answer
the research questions (stages 3 and 4) and to see whether or not the existing theory
is confirmed (stage 5). The fourth characteristic is the use of a clearly structured
methodology to facilitate replication. This is important to achieve reliability, as we
see later in this chapter.
Definition
deduction: a research approach which involves the testing of a theoretical proposition by using a
research strategy specifically designed to collect data for the purpose of its testing.
5.3 Differing approaches to theory development: deduction, induction and abduction 113
Induction: conducting and developing theory from
the explanations that arise
If deduction has a ‘top-down’ flavour, then induction suggests a ‘bottom-up’ approach to
theory development. Inductive reasoning moves from specific observations to broader generalisations and theories. With inductive reasoning, we begin with specific observations and
measures, by observing patterns and repeated occurrences of phenomena and formulating
some speculative hypotheses or propositions from what has been observed which can be
investigated. All this is with a view to developing some general conclusions or theories.
When using the inductive approach, you are often trying to gain an understanding
of the meanings humans attach to events. Let’s consider again the example of the errorprone call centre operatives. An important impression you would want to gain is
whether the operatives actually like their jobs. The literature on call centres you have
reviewed suggests that it is possible to distinguish between those jobs that are intrinsically interesting and those that are simply dead boring! Some jobs may be more
demanding and stressful than others. Some operatives may simply not be cut out for
this type of work. Already you can see that alternative explanations are beginning to
form for the differential levels of operative errors. It may be that the explanation is
more complex than the amount of training that the operatives receive.
With induction, the emphasis is on a close understanding of the research context.
We raised the point earlier about the necessity to conduct research in more than one
call centre in the ability to generalise a theory across all call centres. From an inductive
stance, we are more likely to want to get a detailed picture of the experience of working
in one, or perhaps two call centres that have different environmental characteristics.
Induction possesses a more flexible structure to permit changes of research emphasis as
the research progresses. It may be that the stress in the call centre operatives you are studying
becomes a major issue in your data collection. This may present itself as an alternative explanation for high error levels to that suggested by insufficient training. In that case, it may be
sensible to build much more attention to stress experience into your research questions.
Abduction: combining deduction and induction
Instead of moving from theory to data (as in deduction) or from data to theory (as in
induction), an abductive approach moves back and forth, in effect combining deduction and induction. In essence, this matches what many business and management
researchers actually do. Abduction begins with the observation of an unexpected
Definitions
induction: a research approach which involves the building of theory from analysing data already
collected.
abduction: approach to theory development involving the collection of data to explore a phenomenon, identify themes and explain patterns to generate a new – or modify an existing – theory which
is subsequently tested.
114 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
occurrence and then works out a plausible theory of how this could have occurred.
Some plausible theories can account for what is observed better than others (Van
Maanen et al., 2007), and it is these theories that will help uncover more unexpected
observations. Surprising discoveries can occur at any stage in the research process,
including when writing your project report!
Using an abductive approach to our research on the reasons for too many errors
being made by call centre operatives would mean obtaining data that were sufficiently
detailed and rich to allow us to explore the phenomenon and identify and explain
themes and patterns regarding error incidence. We would then try to integrate these
explanations in an overall conceptual framework, thereby building up a theory of error
rate explanation. This we would test using evidence provided by existing data and new
data modifying our theory as necessary.
Combining research approaches
In the discussion of induction and deduction, you have probably gained the impression that there are rigid divisions between deduction and induction. This is not so. As
we have seen in our discussion of abduction, is it possible to combine deduction and
induction within the same piece of research. It is also, in our experience, often advantageous to do so although often one approach or another is dominant. It would be quite
usual, for example, to start with an exploratory study in order to arrive at a tentative
theory inductively before testing that theory in a deductive piece of quantitative work.
In our example of error-prone call centre operatives, a few focus groups may give some
clear indications as to the reason for some staff making more errors than others. These
indications may then form the basis for questionnaire design and administration. We
cover mixed-methods research later in the chapter.
Whether your reasoning will be predominantly deductive, inductive or abductive
depends on a number of factors – in particular, the emphasis of the research and the
nature of the research topic. If your topic enjoys the support of a lot of literature from
which you can define a theoretical framework, then it may be more suitable for a deductive approach. For a new topic about which there is little existing literature, it may be
more appropriate to adopt an inductive approach by collecting and analysing data and
reflecting upon what theoretical themes the data suggest. Alternatively, if your topic is
rich in information in one context but in the context in which you are researching
there is little information, this may persuade you to adopt an abductive approach, enabling you to modify an existing theory.
In addition, the time available to you may influence your decision about which
approach to adopt. The timescale for a piece of deductive research can be shorter,
although time will be needed to set up the study prior to data collection and analysis.
As data collection is often based on ‘one take’, it should be possible to predict the timescale. But inductive and abductive research can take much longer, and the timescale
can be more difficult to predict as the ideas have to emerge gradually.
Two other factors may determine which research approach you adopt. First is the
extent to which you are prepared to indulge in risk. Deduction can be a lower-risk
5.4 Differing purposes: exploratory, descriptive and explanatory studies 115
strategy, but with induction and abduction you have to live with the fear that no useful
data patterns and theory will emerge. Second, you have to consider your audience.
Most managers are familiar with deductive research methods and may doubt the reliability of data collected inductively.
Exploratory studies
Exploratory research is about discovering information about a topic that is not understood clearly by the researcher. This lends itself particularly well to new phenomena
where you may not be prepared to launch into a piece of full-scale research but want to
gain some insights that will inform your research design. The marketeer, for example,
may be aware that there is a change in the consumers’ preference away from organic
food after the initial enthusiasm for such food. But the marketeer may not fully appreciate what form that preference is taking and why the phenomenon is happening. An
exploratory study may well provide tentative answers to these initial questions, which
need to be followed up with more detailed research to provide more dependable answers.
The most usual ways of conducting exploratory research are:
● searching the academic literature;
● using unstructured observations;
● using semi- and unstructured interviews.
The Internet is particularly useful for doing some basic literature search work in an
exploratory study. This may help in pointing you towards relevant academic journal
articles to be found on academic journal databases in your library such as Emerald
Insight and Business Source Premier. Of course, non-academic articles from the
Internet, such as those in newspapers or produced by commercial enterprises, should
not be thought of as an alternative to academic articles.
As well as literature searching, exploratory studies are well suited to qualitative methods such as semi- and unstructured interviewing or unstructured observation. For
example, informal discussions with consumers, organic food growers and supermarket
executives may provide useful insights into changing preferences for organic food.
Consumer focus groups are a well-known method of establishing consumer views
which may be valuable as a piece of exploratory research. Case studies of families’ food
consumption may be helpful in an explanatory study, as may small-scale pilot studies.
Differing purposes: exploratory, descriptive
5.4 and explanatory studies
Definition
exploratory study: research that aims to seek new insights, ask new questions and assess topics in a
new light.
116 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
Although the methods used in exploratory research indicate a good deal of flexibility, they do not mean absence of direction to the inquiry. It means that the focus is initially broad and becomes progressively narrower as the research progresses.
While exploratory research provides insights into, and a fuller understanding of, an
issue or situation, definitive conclusions should be drawn only with extreme caution.
Yet it is very valuable in helping you to decide the best research design, data collection
method and selection of subjects. Of course, it may point to the fact that the issue which
you thought was of great importance is in fact a non-issue. In that case, you will have
saved yourself going up a blind alley and delivering a meaningless piece of research!
Descriptive studies
You may have received comments on your assessed assignments from lecturers, which
say something like, ‘It’s good as far as it goes, but it tends to be too descriptive’. This
means that they wanted you to analyse and explain what was going on with a given
topic. The question ‘Why did the situation occur?’ is the question to which they wanted
the answer – not the answer you supplied, which was likely to have been a description of
the situation. However good your description, the point remains that describing a phenomenon is much easier than explaining why it occurred. That said, descriptive research
certainly has an important role to play, often as the forerunner of explanatory research.
Descriptive study or research seeks to describe accurately persons, events or situations.
It is appropriate for asking such ‘what’, ‘when’, ‘who’, ‘where’ and ‘how’ questions as:
● What is the employee absentee rate in particular departments?
● When are employees most likely to be absent in those same departments?
● Who are the employees who are most frequently absent?
Look again at the three questions above. You will note that they each require responses
than can be quantified. They each involve the collection of measurable, quantifiable
data. So, the data collection methods typically used in descriptive research are:
● questionnaires;
● structured interviews;
● structured observation;
● reanalysis of secondary data.
Descriptive research should be thought of as a means to an end rather than an end in
itself. This means that if your research project utilises description, it is likely to be a
forerunner to explanation. However, descriptive research can tell us a lot about the
world around us, which is very valuable in its own right, as the example in Research in
practice 5.1 indicates.
Definition
descriptive study: research designed to produce an accurate representation of persons, events or
situations.
5.4 Differing purposes: exploratory, descriptive and explanatory studies 117
The emergence of shopping ‘serial returners’ hinders growth
of UK businesses
Research in 2016 from payments company Barclaycard reveals that consumer demand
for free and easy returns when shopping online is placing increased pressure on retailers
and impacting their bottom line. The report notes the emergence of the ‘serial returner’ –
the online shopper who habitually over-orders and takes advantage of free returns.
Barclaycard found that:
● Six in 10 retailers report that they are negatively impacted by consumers’ propensity
to return unwanted items.
● Online-only businesses are hardest hit as three in 10 say managing returns is affecting profit margins.
● One in five businesses have increased price of items to cover the cost of managing
and processing customer returns.
● Four in 10 shoppers say standardising clothing and shoe sizes could help retailers
reduce their level of returns.
The findings indicate that in the previous 12 months, the increasing rate of returns has
presented a number of challenges for online retailers, with 31% claiming that managing the
returns process has an impact on their profit margin. This comes as online shopping continues to grow in popularity, with spending in digital channels rising 14.1% year-on-year in
2015, compared to just 1.1% in-store.
‘Serial returners’ regularly order more than they need with no intention of keeping
every item. Three in ten shoppers deliberately over-purchase and subsequently return
unwanted items, with 19% admitting to ordering multiple versions of the same item to
make up their mind at home – safe in the knowledge they can choose from the evergrowing number of ways to quickly and easily send items back, such as hourly courier
services and local drop-off points.
Six shoppers in ten say a retailer’s returns policy impacts their decision to make a
purchase online, and almost half (47%) of these would not order an item if they had to
fund the cost of sending it back from their own pocket. Consequently, web-based retailers are caught between trying to attract customers and remaining competitive while also
ensuring they protect their bottom line.
Fifty-seven per cent of retailers say that dealing with returns has a negative impact on
the day-to-day running of their business, leaving many with no choice but to find
another way to recover the cost incurred. A third of online retailers offer free returns but
offset the balance by charging for delivery, while one in five increase the price of items
to cover the cost of returns.
Concern about being able to afford the costs of managing the delivery and returns
process led to 22% of bricks-and-mortar retailers choosing not to sell online.
Thirty-eight per cent of returners said they would send back fewer purchases if businesses were to standardise clothing and shoe sizes, which can vary between and even
within retailers. Eighteen per cent said a better in-store experience, such as shortened
queues for clothing store fitting rooms so they can try on sizes without the wait, would
Research in practice 5.1
➔
118 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
The data in Research in practice 5.1 is valuable to online retailers in particular in giving them an idea of the scale of a problem. It also points to an explanation of why the
phenomenon may be occurring. But the strength of this piece of research is giving
retailers the basis upon which to formulate action to solve the problem of returns
while still retaining the goodwill of their customers and trading within the restrictions of consumer law.
Explanatory studies
Explanatory studies takes descriptive research a stage further by looking for an explanation behind a particular occurrence through the discovery of causal relationships
between key variables. As we saw in Research in practice 5.1, the question moves from
just ‘to what extent do customers return goods to retailers?’ to include ‘and why this is
happening?’ Answering such questions can use quantitative, qualitative or both types
of data. The methods you use to collect your data, therefore, depend to a large extent on
the focus of the research.
The methods typically used in explanatory research can typically include:
● questionnaires;
● interviews;
● observations;
● reanalysis of secondary data.
If the focus is on explaining the impact of different factors, such as the ease with which
returns can be made, quantitative values can be attached to the variables, and they can
be subjected to statistical tests such as correlation in order to get a clearer view of the
relationship (section 7.3). Alternatively, the focus may be on other possible explanatory factors, such as the reasons why product returns may vary by customer age and
location. Much of the explanation may centre upon differing attitudes or beliefs of
customers which may be difficult to quantify (section 7.4). Even if your feeling is that
qualitative research may be appropriate for your research questions and objectives,
remember, qualitative research may benefit at some stage from an element of quantitative processing of data.
also reduce the number of returns they make. In addition, 18% said they would like
retailers to introduce technology to help them better visualise an item when shopping
online, such as the ability to ‘try on’ clothing after uploading an image of themselves.
Source: Barclaycard (2016).
Definition
explanatory study: research that focuses on studying a situation or a problem in order to explain the
relationships between variables.
5.5 Differing strategies 119
Now we concentrate on the research strategies you may use. Let’s make it clear at the
beginning of this section that the label that is attached to a particular strategy is relatively
unimportant. What is important is that the strategy you choose will enable you to answer
your particular research question(s) and meet your research objectives. Nonetheless, the
labels are a useful way of categorising the different strategies available to you.
Each of the strategies can be used for exploratory, descriptive and explanatory
research. Some of these more clearly belong more closely to the deductive approach,
others to an inductive or abductive approach. But, as with the attachment of labels, it is
not helpful to allocate strategies to one approach or the other. We emphasise that your
research strategy will be guided by your research question(s) and objectives as well as
the extent of your existing knowledge, the amount of time and other resources you
have available, as well as your own philosophical leanings. Finally, we must point out
that these strategies are not mutually exclusive. So, for example, a case study may
include a survey and archival research.
The order in which we explain the strategies below is simply that which they appear
in the research onion (Figure 5.1). It does not imply that those explained earlier are any
more important than those below them in the list.
Experiment
The purpose of an experiment is to study causal links between variables; to establish
whether a change in one independent variable (e.g. the running of a sales promotion)
produces a change in another dependent variable (e.g. the level of sales). The essential
components of an experiment are the following:
1 Manipulating the independent variable. To assess the effect of a sales promotion on
the level of sales, the sales promotion may be manipulated by differentiating the
offer, altering the time period over which it runs or changing the level of advertising.
2 Controlling the experiment by holding all other independent variables constant.
Therefore, the sales experiment would be held at the same time of year, in the same
(or similar) location.
3 Observing the effect of the manipulation of the independent variable on the
dependent variable.
4 Predicting the events that will occur in the experimental setting.
5.5 Differing strategies
Definition
experiment: a research strategy that involves the definition of a theoretical hypothesis; the selection
of samples of individuals from known populations; the allocation of samples to different experimental
conditions; the introduction of planned change on one or more of the variables; and measurement on
a small number of variables and control of other variables.
120 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
The steps in the experiment are the following:
1 Identify and define the issue that is to be studied (e.g. the effect upon sales of
promotions).
2 Formulate research hypotheses (e.g. the sales revenue of yogurt will double when a
‘Buy 2, get 1 free’ offer is run).
3 Design the experiment by:
(a) selecting the relevant product and sales promotion;
(b) identifying and controlling the factors which may affect the outcomes (e.g.
time, location);
(c) choosing the way in which the outcomes will be measured;
(d) conducting a pilot study to test the effectiveness of the experiment and predict
any problems which may be overcome by adjusting the experiment design.
4 Run the experiment and collect the data.
5 Assemble the data and apply relevant tests to ensure statistical significance of the
findings.
Although our sales promotion example is a situation where an experimental strategy
may apply in business, the strategy is not applicable to many business and management research questions. This may be for a number of practical reasons. For example, it
may be seen as unfair to apply certain disadvantageous working conditions to one
group of employees and not the other. Moreover, it would be unethical if the disadvantaged employees were not told of the experiment and the way it would involve them.
Seeking volunteers may be problematic, as some people are unwilling to participate in
experiments and so those who volunteer may not be representative of the population
you wish to study. This is why the experiment strategy is often used only on captive
populations such as university students! In addition, if the results are to be statistically
valid, then an experiment that involves a large group of subjects may be necessary with
all this implies in terms of cost and complexity.
Survey
When you mention the term ‘research’ to most people, it is often the survey strategy, usually using a questionnaire, that springs most readily to mind. Few days pass without the
news reporting the results of a new ‘survey’ that indicates a snapshot of social and economic life. Indeed, the notion of the researcher selecting a sample of respondents from a
population and administering a standardised questionnaire is the image with which you
may be most familiar. The survey strategy is popular in business and management research.
Definition
survey: a research strategy which involves the structured collection of data from a sizeable population. Data collection may take the form of questionnaires or structured interviews.
5.5 Differing strategies 121
Because it is so widespread, managers find it easy to understand and place a good deal of
faith in the results which flow from surveys. The survey strategy is particularly suitable for
asking questions such as: ‘Who?’ ‘What?’ ‘Where?’ ‘How much?’ and ‘How many?’ These
types of questions make them useful for exploratory and descriptive research. One of the
reasons the survey strategy is so popular is that it allows the collection of data about the
same things from a large number of people in a cost-effective manner. This is because sampling (section 6.2) makes it possible to generate findings that are representative statistically
of the whole population at a lower cost than collecting the data for the whole population.
The most common method for collecting data using a survey strategy is the questionnaire. The questionnaire comprises a set of standardised questions. It may be completed by the respondent or an interviewer in a face-to-face situation. Alternatively, it
may be completed online or by telephone. The standardised questions make it possible
to easily compare responses across different locations or time frames.
It would be wrong to think that administering a questionnaire is quick and easy.
Ensuring that your sample is representative, designing and piloting your data collection instrument and trying to ensure a good response rate are all very time consuming.
So is the analysis of the data, even though you will undoubtedly use a spreadsheet or
statistical analysis software. But from a practical viewpoint, the survey strategy does
offer you certain advantages. These come largely from the feeling of being in control of
the process. With more qualitative strategies, for example interviewing, you are often
dependent upon others for their time. The fact that you will be more in control of your
time schedule in the survey strategy makes it an attractive proposition for students who
usually have a set period of time, often an academic year, to complete a piece of research.
One of the drawbacks of the survey is that the data collected are unlikely to be as detailed
as those collected by other research strategies. Clearly, it is not advisable to ask a large number of questions of a large number of people, so comprehensiveness is bound to be limited.
We have all switched off when faced with the fourth page of a questionnaire, not a reaction
which will lead to credible research results! But perhaps the biggest disadvantage with the
questionnaire method is the attraction that it seems an easy option. Be warned: designing
a questionnaire is very easy; designing a good one is enormously difficult.
It would be misleading if we did not mention that the survey strategy is also associated with structured observation and structured interviews (see Chapter 6), both of
which are based on the principle of standardisation.
Case study
We noted in the previous sub-section that the survey method is suitable for asking questions such as ‘Who?’ ‘What?’ ‘Where?’ ‘How much?’ and ‘How many?’ In contrast, the
case study strategy is more appropriate for asking the question ‘Why?’ (although the
Definition
case study: a research strategy which involves the investigation of a particular contemporary topic
within its real-life context, using multiple sources of evidence (data).
122 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
questions ‘What?’ and ‘How?’ are also relevant). Consequently, the case study strategy
is most often used in exploratory and explanatory research.
Case studies are particularly good at enabling the researcher to get a detailed understanding of the context of the research and the activity taking place within that context. So, if you are concerned with understanding why managers make decisions in
certain ways rather than an analysis of the decisions that are made, who makes them,
the frequency of decisions and their perceived importance, the case study may be the
best choice. The key word, of course, is ‘context’. Often the key to explaining social phenomena is context. For example, managerial decisions taken in an environment where
senior managers are highly supportive of their managers and reasonably tolerant of
their failure are likely to be much more adventurous than in an unsupportive climate.
Data collection techniques used in a case study may be varied and include a combination of interviews, observation and documentary analysis as well as questionnaires.
Case studies normally use a variety of methods along with secondary data, so you are
likely to need to triangulate multiple sources of data, a principle which we explain in
the last section (5.6) of this chapter.
The question arises as to whether a single case or a number of cases is most suitable
for your research. As with many other decisions related to strategy, this is likely to be
governed by what is ideal as a strategy for answering your research questions and what
is possible in terms of practical considerations such as access and resources. Like many
students, you may choose the organisation in which you work. This is often going to be
a practical option. Yet there are likely to be limitations on the extent to which you can
call your organisation typical of all similar organisations. For this reason, a case study
strategy can also incorporate more than one case. You may choose to use more than one
case if you need to generalise from your findings.
Some criticise the case study strategy because they feel that one case, or even a
small number of cases, is no basis for placing faith in the findings. They also argue
that close exposure to the study of the case biases the findings. For this reason, they
dismiss case study research as useful only as an exploratory tool. But a well-designed
and skilfully executed study of real-life issues will yield insights not possible in more
descriptive strategies.
Action research
In one application of the case study strategy, you may be working in one organisation
in order to gain insights into an aspect of that organisation’s life from which you may
draw conclusions. Similarly, with action research, you may be working in one organisation. But with the case study, the likelihood is that you are ‘on the outside looking
in’ (although you may be a part of that organisation). With action research, the
Definition
action research: research strategy concerned with the management of a change and involving close
collaboration between practitioners and researchers.
5.5 Differing strategies 123
emphasis is on you taking an involved role as a participant in teasing out the issues,
understanding the organization and the project and acting upon what has been
found out (Figure 5.2); you are very much the insider. Here you are conducting experiments and acting upon them by making changes and observing the results. Your role
is decidedly active rather than passive.
There are four common themes within action research which make its practical
application, and value, much clearer:
1 As noted above, the purpose of the research is to be part of and study research in
action rather than to conduct research about action. A typical emphasis for the
research may be the change process in an organisation.
2 The joint working of organisational members, for example managers and other key
workers, and researchers in the action research project. The researchers may be pursuing academic research, or they may be consultants from within or outside the
organisation. So the researcher is part of the organisation and the change process.
This contrasts with more normal research or consultancy where participants are
objects of study.
3 The cyclical nature of the process of action research which consists of diagnosing,
planning action, taking action and evaluating action (see Figure 5.2). The diagnostic
stage will begin with the establishment of a clear project purpose and continue with
fact-finding and analysis on the situation under study. The core of the cycle involves
the planning, implementation and evaluation of the changes themselves.
Cycle 1:
Teasing out
the issues
Evaluating action Planning action
Context and
purpose
Diagnosing
Taking action
Cycle 2:
Understanding
the organisation
and project
Evaluating action Planning action
Diagnosing
Taking action
Cycle 3:
Acting on
knowledge
Evaluating action Planning action
Diagnosing
Taking action
Figure 5.2 The action research spiral
Source: © Saunders et al. (2016), reproduced with permission.
124 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
4 The final stage in the cycle is the key one if you are using the action research strategy as
an academic project. This is the evaluative stage, where you will draw from the research
the lessons which may be learned. These lessons may have a practical dimension (for
example, the pitfalls that managers should avoid when introducing a new pay system)
or a more theoretical perspective (say, the development of a model of employee behaviours in the pay change process). It is clear here that action research should have implications beyond the immediate project. It must have a wider application.
You will see that action research differs from other research strategies because it is
concerned with action, in particular the promotion of organisational change. So it
is particularly useful for ‘How’ questions. A project using action research promises
excellent insights into organisational change processes as well as an absorbing project
report which, because few student projects use this strategy, will have a distinct novelty
value! You may ask why few students pursue action research. The answer is that it is
demanding both in terms of hours that need to be devoted to a project, and the length
of time needed to progress the action research cycle. It also demands a high level of
researcher skill and maturity.
Grounded theory
Grounded theory, usually associated with Corbin and Strauss (2008), belongs principally
to the inductive approach to research because you develop theory from data generated
by a series of observations or interviews. However, there is an element of deduction
(remember – theory to data) in this strategy.
Unlike the deductive approach, data collection starts without the formation of your
initial theory, as you would in a deductive approach. Theory is developed from data
generated by a series of observations, discussions and interviews. The element of deduction is introduced when these data lead to the generation of predictions which are then
tested in further observations. These further observations may confirm, or otherwise,
the predictions. A continual process of testing leads to the development of theory.
This all becomes a bit clearer with a practical explanation of how grounded theory
works, as you will see in the Research in practice 5.2 example.
Ethnography
Ethnography is concerned with understanding another way of life from the perspective
of those pursuing that way of life. Its traditional roots are in the anthropological study of
primitive societies. The key concern is learning from people rather than studying them.
Definitions
grounded theory: research strategy in which theory is developed from data generated by a series of
observations or interviews principally involving an inductive approach.
Ethnography: research strategy that focuses on describing and interpreting the social world through
first-hand field study.
5.5 Differing strategies 125
The use of grounded theory in a study of consumer behaviour
Jessica was a full-time marketing student who was doing a placement in a major retail
group where she performed a range of different duties. The group was conducting a
marketing trial with the objective of generating higher turnover of their more expensive
(and more profitable) food items. This was part of a wider strategy to achieve a more
exclusive market position for their brand.
One of the activities which formed part of the marketing trial was to offer customers
samples of the range of food items (e.g. luxury chocolates) while they were doing their
normal shopping. Having sampled the item in question, the customers were then invited
to purchase it at a ‘special opening offer’ price. The range of behaviours exhibited by the
customers who sampled the items ranged from indifference, resulting in a refusal to
buy, to enthusiasm and a purchase of the offer.
The managers in charge of the marketing trial thought that the difference in sales
success level of the trial food items was due to the items themselves, a clear pattern having emerged where some items were more successful than others. However, Jessica was
not so sure that this was the sole answer. At university she was particularly interested in
consumer behaviour, and she thought that the explanation of the different success levels of the trial items was more complicated than the intrinsic attractiveness of the product. She kept a diary throughout the trial and noted, for example, that some products
were received with mild enthusiasm by customers, but nonetheless a sale resulted. On
other occasions, an item was received with great keenness but no sale followed.
As the trial progressed, she talked with all the staff involved in sampling the customers and developed her notes to the point where a number of patterns began to emerge.
One of these related to consumer decision-making theory, in particular that of impulse
buying. As the trial neared its end, Jessica developed a tentative explanation of the differing success levels of the food items based upon the idea that some lent themselves to
impulse buying more than others, but just as importantly, some customers were more
inclined to make pure impulse purchasing decisions (‘Oh, why not?’) while others were
much more likely to make planned impulse decisions (‘I had in mind to buy some of
these . . .’).
In the final stages of the trial, Jessica took more detailed notes of the behaviour of
the customers with her developed theory in mind, and returned to university at the
end of the placement with a clear theoretical position to take into the final stages of
her project.
Research in practice 5.2
Such studies in business research are unusual. But one stands out as one of the most
famous of the late twentieth century. It was published in a book called Working for Ford
by Huw Beynon (1973). Beynon spent much of 1967 in Ford’s Halewood plant on
Merseyside talking to workers, trade union officials and management. The picture
Beynon paints of life on the production line stems largely from the words of the workers themselves: an approach which really brings Beynon’s writing to life. Beynon concluded that the work was dull and boring and the whole experience pretty bleak. In his
126 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
view, Ford was still then run on the principles established by its founder, Henry Ford –
principles which emphasised that man is sub-servient to the machine.
Ethnography is obviously very time consuming, since it takes place over an extended
time period, so it tends not to be used extensively in business research. Indeed, Beynon
started his research in the pursuit of a PhD, but had to abandon the plan simply because
he had so much data. He decided to write a book instead.
Although ethnography is time consuming, the grounded theory example in
Research in practice 5.2 has some similarities with ethnography. If you are conducting
research similar to that in this example, you may wish to look at the ethnographic strategy in more detail.
Archival research
Archival research uses administrative records and documents as the principal source of
data. These may, for example, be minutes of meetings, memos or emails containing
information or instructions, accounts, contracts or letters. For example, you may wish
to study the way in which key messages about company performance are communicated to staff.
Such research concentrates on past events and may allow changes over time to be
charted. But the extent to which you use the archival strategy will depend on the availability of key documents. Of course, even if relevant documents exist and you are
allowed access to them, they may not meet your precise research needs.
Archival research may not be appropriate for many business research projects as the
main research strategy. But it may play a useful supporting role at some stage in many
projects if you wish to supplement other data collection methods.
Narrative inquiry
A narrative is a story; a personal account which interprets an event or sequence of
events. Qualitative research interviews can involve a participant in ‘storytelling’. So
the term ‘narrative’ can be applied to describe the nature or outcome of a qualitative interview. But as a research strategy, narrative inquiry has a more specific meaning and purpose. It may be that your research context leads you to believe that the
experiences of your participants are best revealed by collecting and analysing their
contributions as complete stories, rather than discrete bits of data that are the result
of specific interview questions which you then treat as bits of data in your subsequent analysis.
Definitions
archival research: research strategy which analyses administrative records and documents as the
principal source of data.
narrative: account of an experience that is told in a sequenced way, indicating a flow of related
events that, taken together, are significant for the narrator and which convey meaning to the
researcher.
5.5 Differing strategies 127
The aim of narrative inquiry is to gain a deeper understanding of organisational realities, closely linked to their members’ experiences. As such, the role you, the researcher,
adopt in narrative inquiry is that of the listener facilitating the process of storytelling
by the participant (or group of participants – it is quite legitimate to have more than
one narrator) who is the narrator. The narrative which results may be a short story
about a specific event, a more extended story (for example, about a work project) or a
career history.
In-depth interviews are the main way of collecting narratives. But there may be other
ways: for example, participant observation, autobiographies, authored biographies or
diaries. This raises the issue of the narrative researcher adopting the role of narrator in
particular circumstances, which we will consider further later.
As with other research strategies, narrative inquiry may be used as the sole research
strategy, or it may be used in conjunction with other strategies to lend richness to your
data.
Combining research strategies
We made the point earlier that it is perfectly possible to combine research approaches
and strategies within the same study. You may wish to do some preparatory work in an
exploratory phase before you firm up your research questions and objectives. This may
involve informal discussion or interviews with key personnel. This could be supplemented with an element of scanning of organisational documentation. The exploratory strategy could then be continued with survey work using both questionnaire and
structured interviews. A final stage may utilise the explanatory strategy by attempting
to gain greater meaning to the exploratory work through, for example, a case study
approach. The important point to bear in mind is that different strategies may work at
different stages in the study, depending, of course, on their suitability to answer your
research questions and objectives.
Single, multiple or mixed research methods?
Within your overall strategy, as you can see from the research onion in Figure 5.1, you
will face a choice of whether to choose a single method approach to your work or use a
multiplicity of methods. For example, a quantitative research design may use a single
data collection technique, such as a questionnaire (mono method quantitative study)
or combine a questionnaire with structured observation (a multi-method quantitative
study). Alternatively, you may choose to base all your data collection on focus groups
(mono method qualitative) or combine focus groups with follow- up single interviews
(multi-method qualitative). You might also choose to start with semi-structured interviews and use the data collected from these interviews to help design a questionnaire
(mixed methods). Mixed methods may be simple (e.g. within a narrow time frame) or
complex (over a longer time frame) – see later in this chapter for a discussion of crosssectional and longitudinal research.
Business and management research lends itself to the use of multiple and mixed
methodological choices because these can overcome the drawbacks of using a single
128 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
method. In addition, they promise deeper and richer data than may result from use of a
single method.
Combining approaches and strategies in the pursuit of an answer to your research
questions and objectives will usually involve the mixing of research methods. The preceding section on combining research strategies indicates that certain approaches and
strategies are better suited to particular stages of the research than others. In the same
way, using a variety of data collection methods may present advantages for the following four reasons.
Reason 1: Some data collection methods are more suited to particular tasks
than others
If you wish to establish the extent to which children use Snapchat, this can be done by a
questionnaire survey to a sample of children; if you want to understand why some teams
work better than others, it is better to use qualitative discussions and interviews. Those
two examples are, of course, separate projects. But the same argument applies when you
are thinking about one project. Your research objectives may be: ‘To what extent do
Internet-based suppliers use a multiplicity of carriers for shipping goods?’ and ‘What are
the reasons for the use of multiple carriers?’ The first question may collect data through
an Internet-based scan by you of leading supplier websites, followed by a questionnaire
of a sample of suppliers. You may follow this up with some interviews with the distribution managers of suppliers in order to get a grasp of the reasons for multiple-carrier
usage. The different methods are then integrated into a single research design.
Reason 2: Focusing on different aspects of the study
It may well be that different data collection methods may be better at different research
tasks within the study. So you may want to gain an overall view about the way in which
companies outsource aspects of their business from studying secondary sources, or
even from a quantitative survey. This will probably not give you a sufficient grasp of the
reasons why some companies are more likely to be more enthusiastic about outsourcing
than others. Nor will it tell you why some functions are greater candidates for outsourcing than others. This may need some interviews with key executives.
Reason 3: Corroborating your research findings within a study using two or
more independent sources of data or data collection methods
When you have finished this chapter, we hope you will have a very clear understanding
of the importance of establishing the credibility of your research findings. This topic is
dealt with in this chapter’s final section (5.6). One way you can do this is through the
process of triangulation. Triangulation is the use of two or more independent sources of
data or data collection methods within one study in order to help ensure that the data
are telling you what you think they are telling you. In an ideal world, a questionnaire,
say, will yield highly credible data, particularly if the guidelines to effective survey
design and implementation are followed. But if you have triangulated your questionnaire findings with some semi-structured interviews and find that these findings have
been confirmed, then you will feel more content in the knowledge that you have done
5.5 Differing strategies 129
all you can to provide credible results. Of course, it may be that both sets of data are
questionable, so even triangulation does not provide final confirmation.
As well as using two or more data collection methods to triangulate your findings, it
is possible to vary aspects of the data collection while using the same method. These
aspects may be the populations from which you are collecting the data, the time at
which the data are collected and the location of the data collection. For example, if you
are studying the behaviour of consumers in a supermarket, data collected through
observation may differ from town to town, or between mornings and afternoons. If
data are broadly the same, this suggests that the findings are robust. Differences may
point to the need for more research. If, say, consumers spend more time making buying
decisions in the afternoons, this may suggest less busy consumers. Alternatively, it may
be that there are fewer customers in the afternoon, which in itself prompts more time
to be taken by consumers. So triangulation in this case may not only cause concern
over initial findings; it may also indicate the need for a revision of initial conclusions.
It may also be fruitful to triangulate the research by using the same data collection
methods and sources of data but changing the data gatherer. So if you are the research
manager of a large market research company employing many interviewers, and you
notice that one set of data is seriously inconsistent with the others, this may tell you
more about the interviewer than sources of the data. It is not unheard of for some data
to be invented! But, more usually, two individual researchers conducting semi-structured interviews with similar subjects may generate slightly different data, at least in
emphasis, because of, say, the stress put on certain questions or the way in which
answers have been followed up.
Reason 4: Using qualitative methods to explain relationships between
quantitative variables
Think again about the sort of research findings you hear in the news every day. We
often hear that people in Northern Europe are heavier consumers of alcoholic drinks
than those in the South of Europe. This statistic may be of interest as far as it goes, but it
doesn’t go far enough. What is it about living in Northern Europe that leads to greater
alcohol consumption? Is it colder? Are alcoholic drinks cheaper? We don’t know from
the broad statistics. We need to ask some searching questions to find out what is leading
to this particular phenomenon.
Differing time horizons: cross-sectional or longitudinal?
If you are like most of our readers, you will be time-constrained in the completion of
your research project. For this reason, you will probably opt for a piece of cross-sectional
research. This is a ‘snapshot’ of a particular research setting at a particular time. On the
other hand, a research design which tracks events over time is called a ‘longitudinal’
design. The main difference between the two designs is the ability of the longitudinal
design to note change. Which you choose will probably depend on practical considerations. However, we will show that an element of longitudinal design is perfectly possible within the constraints of one academic year.
130 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
Cross-sectional studies
In a cross-sectional research design you would collect data from participants at only
one period in time in what is often termed a ‘snapshot’. The data are typically collected
from multiple groups or types of people in cross-sectional research. For example, data
in a cross-sectional study might be collected from male and female consumers, from
those of different ages, from people in different socio-economic classes or from consumers with different levels of educational achievement. A classic example of the
cross-sectional research design is the opinion poll. It is a way of taking the ‘snapshot’
of current thinking.
In an opinion poll, the cross-sectional study would usually employ the survey strategy and use a questionnaire to collect quantitative data. As well as describing the incidence of a phenomenon, you can explain statistically the relationship between certain
variables: for example, the relationship between expenditure on sales promotions and
sales revenue. But a cross-sectional study may also use qualitative methods. For example, interviews conducted over a short time period, either as the sole data collection
method or as one of a mixture of methods, may be equally useful.
Longitudinal studies
As we mentioned earlier, the main advantage of a longitudinal study or research design
is the capacity that it has to study change and development over time. This may conjure up images of annual visits to managers to track their progress as part of a coaching programme. It could also be that the manager keeps a diary of relevant thoughts
and actions, much the same as the personal development journal that you may have
come across. These may be powerful ways of collecting data to chart change. But they
may be impractical for the student researcher, given time (and, possibly, access) constraints. However, what may be useful is to introduce a longitudinal element to your
research by using one of the secondary data sources produced by longitudinal surveys
that are available on the Internet, such as the Family Expenditure Survey (see Research
in practice 5.3).
Definitions
cross-sectional research: study of a particular topic at a particular time, i.e. a ‘snapshot’.
longitudinal study: study of a particular topic over an extended period of time.
The UK Labour Force Survey
The Labour Force Survey (LFS) is a survey of households living at private addresses in
the United Kingdom. Its purpose is to provide information on the UK labour market
which can then be used to develop, manage, evaluate and report on labour market
Research in practice 5.3
5.6 Making sure your research conclusions are believable 131
policies. The survey is managed by the Office for National Statistics in Great Britain and
by the Central Survey Unit of the Department of Finance and Personnel in Northern
Ireland on behalf of the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETINI).
Since 1992, the LFS in Great Britain has run as a quarterly survey (1994–95 for
Northern Ireland). The quarterly surveys have until spring 2006 operated on a seasonal
quarterly basis. However, mostly due to a European Union requirement, in May 2006
the LFS moved to calendar quarters. The 2006–7 data is the first set of HSE data based
on the LFS to be affected by this change.
The LFS is intended to be representative of the whole population of the United
Kingdom, and the sample design currently consists of around 41,000 responding households in every quarter. The quarterly survey has a panel design whereby households stay
in the sample for five consecutive quarters (or waves), with a fifth of the sample replaced
each quarter. Thus there is an 80% overlap in the samples for each successive survey.
An extract of the summary of the data for the United Kingdom presented in the
October 2016 LFS report is given below:
● Between March to May 2016 and June to August 2016 the number of people in
work and the number of unemployed people increased. The number of people not
working and not seeking or available to work (economically inactive) fell.
● There were 31.81 million people in work, 106,000 more than for March to May 2016
and 560,000 more than for a year earlier.
● There were 23.23 million people working full-time, 362,000 more than for a year
earlier. There were 8.58 million people working part-time, 198,000 more than for a
year earlier.
● The employment rate (the proportion of people aged from 16 to 64 who were in
work) was 74.5%, the joint highest since comparable records began in 1971.
● The unemployment rate was 4.9%, unchanged compared with March to May 2016
but down from 5.4% for a year earlier. The unemployment rate is the proportion of
the labour force (those in work plus those unemployed) that were unemployed.
● The inactivity rate (the proportion of people aged from 16 to 64 who were economically inactive) was 21.5%, the joint lowest since comparable records began in 1971.
● Average weekly earnings for employees in Great Britain in nominal terms (that is, not
adjusted for price inflation) increased by 2.3% both including and excluding bonuses
compared with a year earlier.
Source, and more details from: https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/uklabourmarket/october2016
When your supervisor or examiner sits back and fixes you with an inscrutable gaze and
asks you, ‘Why should I believe your theory and/or conclusions?’ you should know that
all the careful thought you have put into designing your research strategy is going to
5.6 Making sure your research conclusions are believable
132 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
pay off! All the research design sophistication in the world is of no significance unless
you can say with calm authority, ‘I have done all I can to ensure that my conclusions are
valid’. Well, you cannot guarantee that your conclusions will be valid, but you can do all
you can to limit their invalidity.
One way we have used to help people to think about the validity of their research
conclusions is to perform the ‘reverse test’ in examining their validity. This starts with
questioning the validity of the theory developed and/or conclusions in relation to the
findings that gave rise to them and working backwards from there. So, the key questions are the following:
● Does the theory developed, or do the conclusions, flow logically from the findings?
● Are the summarised findings consistent with the data collected and presented?
● Is it plausible to assume that the data are such that they would have been collected
by the methods stated?
● Are the methods employed those that you would expect to find in the research strategy that has been articulated?
● Is there coherence between the research strategy and the research questions and
objectives?
Let’s examine each of these questions in turn.
Does the theory developed, or do the conclusions, flow logically from the
findings?
You may not end your research with an overall theory. This may not be required.
Even if it is not, it may be implicit in what you have written. Let’s say that your overall conclusion is that the quality of service in fast food restaurants is the result of
effective staff supervision. This sounds reasonable enough. But one of your key conclusions may be that restaurants with high levels of consumer satisfaction reported
in consumer surveys are those that have the most experienced supervisory staff, as
measured by length of service. Does it necessarily follow that service quality is the
result of effective staff supervision? Here you are equating ‘length of supervisor service’ with ‘effective staff supervision’. It may be a valid assumption if those ineffective supervisors have been weeded out and only effective supervisors remain. But
you cannot assume it.
Are the summarised findings consistent with the data collected and
presented?
Your presentation of data may lean heavily towards lots of tables and graphs
depicting the quantitative data, which you have collected. If this is so, the findings about data representing consumer satisfaction and length of supervisor service must be correlated by the restaurant to support the findings that suggest a
link between the two. This implies the need for appropriate statistical techniques,
which are covered in section 7.3. In the case of qualitative data, the need for a
clear relationship between data and findings suggests the need for skilful and
5.6 Making sure your research conclusions are believable 133
convincing argument. This will ensure that the findings are supported by a narrative which persuades the reader that you have the data to substantiate the
findings.
Is it plausible to assume that the data is such that they would have been
collected by the methods stated?
Overstatement is a sin punishable by failure! This is particularly an issue with regard
to qualitative data collection. For example, it is easy to fall into the trap of making
extravagant claims about the data collected when it is based on a very small number
of interviews. Let’s go back to the example of effective supervision in fast food restaurants. If you have made claims for this as one of your findings, it does raise questions such as ‘What is effective supervision in this context?’ ‘What methods were
used to assess the extent to which it is practised?’ It is difficult to see how a small
number of interviews would enable you to collect data on effective supervision.
Some first-hand observation may be required. But even if interviewees are used, it
raises questions such as ‘Who was interviewed?’ ‘What were the interviewees asked?’
and ‘Did the interviewees have sufficient knowledge to be able to answer the questions credibly?’
Are the methods employed those that you would expect to find in the
research strategy that has been articulated?
So, you have said in the early part of your research methodology chapter that you are
going to pursue a piece of qualitative research using the inductive approach. When
your readers look at what you have done, or what you propose to do, they see quantitative questionnaire data or results based on tightly structured observation. This does not
mean that what you have done in employing these methods is wrong. But it does suggest presentational incoherence and, worse, muddled thinking.
Is there coherence between the research strategy and the research questions
and objectives?
This is the fundamental question and underpins all of this chapter’s content. It is a
question of ‘fit for purpose’. In this case, the purpose is ‘credible research findings and
conclusions’. If the consumers of your research cannot have faith in what you have
said, then what you have done will be of poor quality and questionable utility. So, the
question becomes ‘Which research strategy will enable me to answer my research
questions and meet my research objectives in a way which will yield results that can be
depended upon?’
Validity and reliability: what is the difference between the two?
Above, we use the term ‘validity’ in relation to the credibility of research findings and
conclusions. It is an important concept in designing a research strategy. So is reliability.
We now explain what we mean by these terms and what practical dangers exist in
research strategy design which may threaten the credibility of your research.
134 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
Table 5.1 Principal factors which threaten the validity of research findings
and conclusions
Factor Refers to
Subject selection The biases that may result in selection of particular research
subjects which may be unrepresentative of the research
population.
History Specific events which occur in the history of the project (for
example, between first and second phases of the research)
which have an important effect on findings.
Testing Any effects that the data collection process itself may have on
the subjects (e.g. participants keen to impress the interviewer).
Mortality The loss of subjects during the research: this is a particularly
important issue for the conduct of longitudinal research.
Ambiguity about causal
direction
Confusion over the direction in which the flow of cause and
effect runs: for example, are poor call centre operator
performance ratings caused by a negative attitude towards the
way their performance was rated, or were the poor ratings
causing the negative attitude?
Definition
validity: extent to which (a) data collection method or methods accurately measure what they were
intended to measure and (b) the research findings are really about what they profess to be about.
Validity
Put at its simplest, validity is concerned with whether the findings are really about
what they appear to be about. Obviously, it is a crucial factor in research strategy
design. This is because any research can be affected by different kinds of factors which
can render your findings invalid. The practical message here is that you must eliminate all factors that threaten the validity of the research. The principal factors are
listed in Table 5.1.
Table 5.1 refers to ‘internal’ validity. Another type of validity is ‘external’ validity.
This refers to the extent to which your conclusions are generalisable to other
research settings. So, for example, if your research is set in one organisation, there
is obviously a question about the degree to which your conclusions are generalisable to other organisations. The simple response to this possible problem is to
increase the number of organisations in which you are conducting your research.
However, your concern may not be to produce a theory that is generalisable to all
populations but to try and explain what is going on in your particular research setting. This is fine, providing that you do not claim that your results, conclusions or
theory can be generalised.
Summary 135
Reliability
If your research is to be reliable, it must employ data collection methods and analysis
procedures which produce consistent findings. Such consistency refers to the degree to
which:
● the measures you use will produce the same results if used on other occasions;
● other researchers, when using the same methods and procedures in the same way,
will produce similar results;
● those interpreting your research can see clearly how you came to your conclusions
from the data you collected.
As with validity, there are factors which threaten the reliability of your research findings
and conclusions. These are listed in Table 5.2.
Table 5.2 Principal factors which threaten the reliability of research findings
and conclusions
Factor Refers to
Subject error Measurement which may take place at different times: for example, a
questionnaire administered to night-shift workers may produce
significantly different results to day-shift workers.
Subject bias Research subjects giving you unreliable information because they think
that telling the truth may, for example, show them in a bad light.
Observer error The way in which different researchers may, for example, ask the same
questions in different ways, thus biasing the results.
Observer bias The way in which different researchers may interpret the same data in
different ways, thus biasing the findings and conclusions.
Definition
reliability: extent to which data collection methods and analysis procedures will produce consistent
findings.
● Considering your research philosophy helps you to ‘think about thinking’.
● The main research philosophies are positivism, critical realism, interpretivism, postmodernism and pragmatism.
● The principal approaches to theory development are deduction, induction and
abduction.
● Three main purposes of research are exploratory, descriptive and explanatory.
● The main types of research strategy are experiment, survey, case study, action
research, grounded theory, ethnography, archival and narrative inquiry.
Summary
136 Chapter 5 Choosing your research design
● There can be significant advantages in combining methods in research design.
● Research studies may be cross-sectional or longitudinal, or combine an element of
both.
● Applying the ‘reverse test’ to the main theory and/or conclusions of the research
report is a way of thinking about the research’s credibility.
● There are a variety of threats to research validity and reliability which need to be
controlled.
➔ Look again at the material on deduction induction and abduction in this chapter.
Which of these approaches do you feel (a) appeals to you most, and (b) fits your
research question(s) and objectives?
➔ Go back to your research question(s) and objectives and think about which of the
research strategies is most appropriate. Look again at any studies which are similar to
yours and see which strategies they have used and the reasons the authors have given
for their choice.
➔ Think of your methodological choices. In what way may you combine different
research methods in your study? What advantages may there be in using multiple or
mixed methods?
➔ How might longitudinal and/or cross-sectional time dimensions be used in your
design?
➔ Make a note of all the threats to reliability and validity contained in your research
design.
Thinking about your research design
Barclaycard (2016). The emergence of ‘serial returners’ – online shoppers who habitually over
order and take advantage of free returns – hinders growth of UK businesses. Available at:
https://www.home.barclaycard/media-centre/press-releases/emergence-of-serial-returnershinders-growth-of-UK-businesses.html [Accessed 20 October 2016].
Beynon, H. (1973). Working for Ford. London: Allen Lane.
Corbin, J. and Strauss, A. (2008). Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for
Developing Grounded Theory, (3rd ed.). London: Sage.
Office for National Statistics (2016). Labour Force Survey. Available at: https://www.ons.gov.
uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/
uklabourmarket/october2016 [Accessed 20 October 2016].
Saunders, M., Lewis, P. and Thornhill, A. (2016) Research Methods for Business Students (7th ed.).
Harlow: Pearson Education.
Van Maanen, J., Sørensen, J.B. and Mitchell, T.R. (2007). The interplay between theory and
method. Academy of Management Review, 32(4), 1145–54.
References
Chapter 6
Collecting data
You may be thinking, ‘I don’t need to read this chapter’ or ‘I can read this chapter later
when I need to collect my data’. It might be, as we mentioned in Chapter 4, that your
university expects you to use only secondary data for your project and so you feel there is
little point in reading this chapter. Alternatively, your university may only require you to
write an extended essay or literature review, and so you believe reading a chapter on collecting data will be of limited, if any, use. Or, you might be thinking that, as you have only
just started reviewing the literature for your project, it is too early to start learning about
collecting data. However, if you are thinking that you don’t need to read this chapter on
collecting data now, this is not the case.
To assess the suitability of secondary data for your own research project, you need to
understand the methods that were used to collect it (section 4.5). Even if your project is
an extended essay or literature review, you still need to read this chapter and learn about
different methods of collecting data as early as possible. Without this knowledge, you
will not be able to evaluate fully the journal articles, reports and book chapters you
review (section 2.6). This will reduce your ability to assess the quality of the data used. It
will also lessen your ability to evaluate the quality of the findings and conclusions. Even
if you are not collecting your own data, you need to know about methods for collecting
data. This will help you to infer the quality of potential secondary data for your project,
the quality of research reported in the literature you read and the value of both to your
own project.
The overall purpose of this chapter is to enable you to answer the question ‘Do these
data enable the research question to be answered?’ By being able to answer this question,
you will be able to do the following:
● Assess the value of secondary data to meeting your own research question and
objectives.
6.1 Why you should read this chapter
138 Chapter 6 Collecting data
● Assess the suitability of data used in research you read about in the literature and form
judgements about the quality of that research.
● Ensure that you use appropriate data collection methods to collect data to meet your
own research question and objectives.
In this chapter, we start by talking about different ways of selecting samples from which
data will be collected. We then discuss how particular methods are suited to collecting different sorts of data, considering three frequently used methods of collecting primary data
in more detail. In this we look at how to design and distribute questionnaires, including the
use of Internet questionnaires; how to design and conduct face-to-face, telephone and
Internet-mediated interviews; and how to undertake structured and unstructured
observations.
Throughout your life, you have been selecting samples. Before you download a whole
album of songs from iTunes or purchase an MP3 download from Amazon, you will
probably listen to one or two tracks from that album to see if you like them. When you
were applying to your university for your course, you probably listened to opinions
from some current students and lecturers about that course before making your application. You were basing your decision to purchase on feelings after listening to a few
rather than all of the tracks on the album, and your decision to apply on the opinions
of some rather than all students and lecturers for that course. Each of your decisions
was based on a sample (sub-group) of the population (complete set) that was likely to be
available to you. Yet it is unlikely that you spent much time considering your reasons
for using these samples rather than different samples, or even the whole population.
You also probably did not spend much time thinking about whether the sample you
selected was the most appropriate to help you make your decision. These aspects are
crucial for all research projects. You need to consider the appropriateness of the sample
used in each research article or report you read in relation to the research question
being answered. You also need to do this whether you are assessing the usefulness of
secondary data, or planning how to collect your own data to answer your own research
question. In this section, we look briefly at reasons for selecting a sample rather than
collecting data from the whole population, before talking about different ways of
selecting samples and their use.
6.2 Selecting samples
Definitions
sample: a sub-group of all group members or the whole population. The sub-group need not necessarily be a subset of people or employees: it can, for example, be a subset of organisations, places or
some of the tracks listed for a music CD.
population: the complete set of group members. The population need not necessarily be people or
employees: it can, for example, be organisations, places or the complete track listing for a music CD.
6.2 Selecting samples 139
Reasons for selecting samples
Researchers usually collect data from a sample rather than the whole population simply
because it is not practicable to collect data from the whole population. This may be
because you do not know what the whole population is, because it is difficult to make
contact with the whole population or because time or financial constraints prevent you
from collecting data from the whole population. However, you should not assume that
collecting data from the whole population is always better than just collecting data
from a sample.
You have a fixed amount of time to complete your research project because of
the submission deadline and your need to complete other work for your course.
Within the time you give to your research project, you may have to collect your
own data. This means that, like other researchers, if you spend a long time collecting data from a large population, you will have less time to work on the other parts
of your project report. Collecting data from a sample of this population will give
you more time for the other parts of your project. Some of this time can even be
used to test that the methods you use to collect the data will work, providing you
collect precisely the data you need to answer your research question and meet your
objectives.
Ways of selecting samples
The way a sample is selected depends, at least in part, on the research question being
answered and whether or not you know what the total population is and can get a full
list of all its members. This complete list of the population’s members is called the
sampling frame. Let’s say an organisation you work for has asked you to use data collected from a sample of all their employees to answer questions that relate to their
employees. Your organisation is able to give you a list of all these employees, using their
payroll system. Not surprisingly, this list is up to date and complete as employees are
keen to ensure they are paid. Using data you collect from the sample selected from this
list, you will, providing your sample is selected at random, be able to statistically estimate answers to questions for all employees. This is called using the sample to make
statistical inferences about the population. In contrast, it is unlikely that you will get a
full list of a supermarket’s customers. While the supermarket will record names and
contact details of those who have a loyalty card, this includes only some of their customers. In addition, even if you work for the supermarket, it is unlikely that you, as a
student, will be given access to the list of loyalty card customers for both commercial
and data protection reasons. Consequently, you will, as we discuss later, have to select
the sample in a different way.
Definition
sampling frame: complete list of all members of the population. You select the sample from this list
when using probability sampling.
140 Chapter 6 Collecting data
For populations where you are able to obtain a complete list, such as an organisation’s employees, you can select your sample using one or more sampling techniques
that use ‘probability sampling’ (Table 6.1). Because you have a complete list, you can
select employees at random from your list. You can therefore state the statistical
chance or probability that each of these employees has of being selected for your
sample from this list. If your complete list contains 200 employees and you select a
sample of 100 employees using a probability sampling technique, then, as the sample is selected at random, each employee has a 50% chance of being selected. If you
select 50 employees from your complete list of 200 employees using a probability
sampling technique, then each employee has a 25% chance of being selected.
Providing you have selected your sample using a probability sampling technique,
your sample will represent your population statistically, and so you will be able to
make statistical inferences about the population. The level of certainty – also known
as confidence – with which you can say your sample represents your population and
the accuracy of any estimates you make are dependent upon the size of your sample
and of your population. Researchers normally work to a 95% level of certainty with a
margin of error of plus or minus 5%, or of plus or minus 2%. For a population of 200
employees, you would need to collect data from a sample of 132 employees to be 95%
certain that your sample represented that population statistically with a margin of
error of 5% (Table 6.2). As you can see in this table, the larger the sample, the more
certain you can be that it represents the population precisely. You therefore need to
collect data from as large a sample as possible. Like all researchers, you will need to
select a probability sample if you want to statistically estimate the characteristics of
the population. When you read section 7.3, you will discover that statistical tests also
require a sample of at least a certain size to minimise spurious results. In general, this
means your data needs to be collected from a probability sample of at least thirty
respondents.
Definition
probability sampling: variety of sampling techniques for selecting a sample at random from a complete list of the population. Because you have a complete list and select at random, you know the
chance or probability of each member of your population being selected.
Table 6.1 Probability and non-probability sampling techniques
Probability Non-probability
Simple random sampling Quota sampling
Systematic random sampling Purposive sampling
Stratified random sampling Volunteer sampling
Convenience sampling
6.2 Selecting samples 141
Often the data we and other researchers require cannot be collected using a probability sample. Let’s look at your supermarket customers again. As you cannot get a complete list of customers, you do not know how many there are and so will not be able to
work out the chance of each customer being selected for your sample. You will therefore
have to use one or more of a different group of sampling techniques that do not require
a complete list of the population. These are called ‘non-probability sampling’ techniques
(Table 6.1) and, if you select your sample using these, you cannot say it represents your
population statistically. Consequently, you will not be able to make statistical inferences from your data. Rather, you will be normally be using your judgement to select a
sample that best enables your research question to be answered. Non-probability samples are often used in conjunction with qualitative data collection techniques such as
semi-structured interviews and unstructured observation.
As you read section 6.4, you will discover that, other than for quota samples (normally used with quantitative data collection techniques such as questionnaires), these
techniques usually require smaller samples. The actual sample size when collecting qualitative data will also depend in part on your research question. While for some research
questions such as those asking whether something exists or requiring a single illustrative
exemplar, a sample of one may be sufficient. However, for most research projects, a larger
sample will be needed. Following an analysis of the number of interviews used in
research published in top organisation and workplace journals, Mark and a colleague
noted that while between 15 and 60 interviews are likely to be considered sufficient, the
actual number of interviews is dependent on the research purpose and the nature of
data collected (Saunders and Townsend, 2016). However, this range refers to research
that has been published in top journals, not student projects, and it is unlikely you will
have time to undertake so many interviews. Building on advice of others, we therefore
Table 6.2 Probability sample sizes required for a 95% confidence level with
a 5% margin of error
Population size Sample size Population size Sample size
50 44 500 217
100 79 1,000 278
150 108 5,000 357
200 132 10,000 370
250 151 100,000 383
Source: Saunders et al. (2016).
Definition
non-probability sampling: a variety of sampling techniques for selecting a sample when you do not
have a complete list of the population. Because you do not have a complete list of the population,
you cannot select your sample from this population at random. This also means you do not know
the chance or probability of each member of your population being selected.
142 Chapter 6 Collecting data
suggest for questions requiring a sample selected from a population that is homogeneous (similar), such as male UK-born business studies students aged 21 at your university, a non-probability sample size of between 4 and 12 participants is likely to be
sufficient. In contrast, where questions need a sample selected from a heterogeneous
(more varied) populations, such as male and female students of all ages studying any
programme at your university, the sample size is likely to be larger, say between 12 and 30
(Saunders 2011).
Probability sampling techniques
Having given you a general overview of the difference between probability and nonprobability sampling techniques, let’s look first at the probability sampling techniques
listed in Table 6.1 in more detail.
Simple random sampling
If you have ever bought a lottery ticket, you will have experienced the results of simple
random sampling. Simple random sampling uses a series of random numbers, such as
those generated by the =RAND function in Microsoft Excel, to select a sample of members from a population. Like the lottery balls, each member of the population in your
list (sampling frame) is given a unique number. Random numbers are then used to
select the numbers of those members of your population from the sampling frame who
will be in your sample.
Five sets of numbers drawn at random recently for the United Kingdom’s National
Lottery Lotto game (selected from the numbers 1 through 59) are:
14 16 23 24 25 57
4 15 19 44 45 49
20 21 22 24 27 50
4 10 18 41 42 47
11 30 38 45 46 49
Although each draw of six numbers has been selected at random, you can see that these
numbers are not spread evenly between 1 and 59. Rather, some numbers (such as 23, 24
and 25 in the first draw) are close together and then there are large gaps (for example, 25
and 57 in the first draw). This is a property of random numbers that often occurs when
you use them to select a sample of less than a few hundred members. It means that
researchers, including you, should not use simple random sampling to select a sample
of less than a few hundred if your sampling frame has been sorted in some way. For
example, if your sampling frame is sorted in order of employees’ seniority, although
Definition
simple random sampling: type of probability sampling in which each member of the population has
an equal chance of being selected at random and included in the sample. Each member is usually
selected using random numbers.
6.2 Selecting samples 143
your sample of employees will have been selected at random, the occurrence of random
patterns such as those illustrated by the five lottery draws may mean that certain levels
of seniority in your population are underrepresented and others are overrepresented.
Systematic sampling
For a systematic sample, members of the sample are selected from the sampling frame at
regular intervals. To ensure your sample is entirely random, your first sample member is
selected using a random number before subsequent members of your sample are selected
systematically. If we return to the example of an organisation’s employees and the sampling frame that you got from payroll, we can see how this sampling technique works.
The list you have been given by payroll is in descending order of salary, the organisation’s chief executive being listed first, followed by the most senior managers. The last
employee on your list is a newly appointed school leaver who earns the lowest salary. To
select a sample of one-fifth of employees (20%), you need to perform the following steps:
1 Select your first employee from the sampling frame at random using a random number, between one and five for a 20% sample, in this example employee number two.
2 As your sample is a fifth (20%) of employees, you then select the 7th, 12th, 17th,
22nd and 27th employee in your sampling frame, continuing to select every fifth
employee until you reach the end of the list.
By selecting the first sample employee using a random number, the rest of your sample
will also have been selected at random. This technique works well, providing there are
no regular patterns in the sampling frame. Let’s say your sampling frame consists of UK
Premier League football club first-team players who started the match for their team
last Saturday. These players are listed in your sampling frame by team starting with the
captain of each team, and ending with the goalkeeper. If you were to select a sample of
1 in 11 players (approximately 9%) and the first player you selected at random was the
11th player, then you would subsequently select the 22nd, 33rd, 44th and 55th player
until you reached the end of your list. However, your sample would consist entirely of
goalkeepers! Providing there are no regular patterns in your sampling frame, this technique usually works well and also has the advantage of being relatively easy to explain.
Stratified random sampling
Not surprisingly, given its name, stratified random sampling is a modified version of random sampling. When using this sampling technique, the sampling frame is divided
Definitions
systematic sampling: type of probability sampling in which the first sample member is selected from
the sampling frame at random, using a random number. Remaining sample members are selected
subsequently at regular intervals from the sampling frame.
stratified random sampling: type of probability sampling, in which the sampling frame is first divided
into relevant strata. Sample members are then selected at random from within each stratum, using
either simple random or systematic random sampling.
144 Chapter 6 Collecting data
into strata or layers that are relevant to your research question, your sample being
selected separately from each stratum or layer using either simple random sampling or
systematic sampling. Let’s say you are selecting a sample of web-based customers for a
small web-based retailer, using their complete list of customers as your sampling frame.
This alphabetical list includes each customer’s name and their postal region (United
Kingdom, mainland Europe, North America, rest of the world). You therefore perform
the following steps:
1 Split your sampling frame into relevant separate strata or groups (using the four separate postal regions as your strata).
2 Select a random sample from within each stratum or group using either:
(a) simple random; or
(b) systematic sampling.
By doing this, each postal region or stratum will be represented in the same proportion
in your sample as they are in your complete population.
Non-probability sampling techniques
As you read at the start of this section, researchers, including you, are often unable to
obtain a list of their population. This means that probability sampling cannot be used
as there is no sampling frame. Fortunately, there are a variety of non-probability sampling techniques that can be used. We will now look at those we listed in Table 6.1.
Quota sampling
You have probably been selected for a quota sample at some time in your life. Sometimes
when you are shopping, a person with a clipboard asks you if you would be willing to
answer a few questions. If you answer ‘Yes’, the next question you are asked is something
like, ‘Which one of the following age groups are you in?’ after which a number of different age groups are read out to you. This is often followed by a question about your occupation or, perhaps, the newspaper you read (which may be used to indicate your social
class). The person asking the questions (interviewer) has been given a number or quota
of people to interview, such as ‘3 working class males aged 25–55’ and ‘2 female students aged 24 or under’, and so on. If the interviewer has already filled the quota for the
group your answers place you in, you will not be asked any further questions. However,
if the interviewer continues to ask you questions from the questionnaire, you will
become part of the quota.
Quota samples are used as a substitute for a probability sample to select participants
when a sampling frame is not available. This means the sample size is similar to those
Definition
quota sampling: type of non-probability sampling that ensures the sample selected represents certain characteristics in the population that the researcher has chosen.
6.2 Selecting samples 145
used for probability samples (Table 6.1), and the data are likely to be analysed using statistical techniques (section 7.3). However, while data used to be collected from the sample by a team of interviewers, each of whom has a quota to fill, this is becoming less
common. Rather, as you will read in Research in practice 6.1, the quota samples used by
large commercial polling organisations are increasingly selected from an online panel
of volunteers, who then agree to take part in answering questions online.
Quota sampling
As a major polling organisation, YouGov conducts online polls about politics, brands and
consumer trends. The sample for each poll it conducts is selected from a diverse panel of
over five million volunteers from across 38 countries, including over 800,000 in the
United Kingdom. YouGov has selected their panel of registered volunteers to represent
all groups in society, although not in the same proportions as in the population as a
whole. For each poll, an active sample is selected, made up of a number of demographic
groups. These groups are specified in much the same way as a quota sample group
would be, using data such as volunteers’ age, gender, social class and region where they
live. This method of sampling is closer to quota sampling than random sampling, email
invitations to take part being sent to those who are selected for the active sample. Those
who actually take part form part of the responses for a particular demographic group,
answering the questions online.
Source: Developed from YouGov (2016).
Research in practice 6.1
Purposive sampling
Purposive sampling is the most frequently used form of non-probability sampling. It is
used particularly to select a small sample when collecting qualitative data. When a
researcher selects a purposive sample, the researcher is using their judgement to actively
choose those who will best be able to help answer the research question and meet the
objectives. Some of the population will have a chance of being chosen by the researcher
while others will not.
Let’s say you have read a journal article where the researcher has selected two major
banks to explore the performance of individual banks after the global financial crisis of
2007–8. These two banks have been selected purposively because they represent the
extremes of what happened to banks in one country. The bank at one extreme was
nationalised by the government; the bank at the other extreme received no support
from the government. The author of the article argues that, when contrasting the
Definition
purposive sampling: type of non-probability sampling in which the researcher’s judgement is used
to select the sample members based on a range of possible reasons and premises.
146 Chapter 6 Collecting data
findings from these extreme cases, differences will be more obvious and that her findings are relevant in understanding or explaining the performance of other banks. On
reading the article, you feel this is an appropriate reason for selecting the sample, which
allows her research question to be answered fully. You also feel the generalisations she
has made about other banks’ performance on which the impact has been less extreme
are logical.
You use purposive sampling when you need to understand what is happening so you
can make logical generalisations. This means that you, like other researchers who select
a purposive sample, need to explain clearly the criteria you have used to select your
sample, the reasons for this and the underlying premise on which these are based. Your
selection can involve a variety of different purposive sampling techniques, which we
have summarised in Table 6.3, along with reasons why you might use them and the
underlying premises on which your reasons are based.
Table 6.3 Varieties of purposive sampling
Purposive
sampling variety Reasons for use Underlying premise
Typical case Sample will be illustrative and considered
representative, albeit not statistically.
Sample is typical of the
population.
Critical case Sample will either make a point
dramatically or be crucial to addressing
the research aim and objectives.
Topic of interest is most likely to
occur in the sample selected, or
sample selected is essential to the
operation of the process.
Extreme case Sample consisting of unusual or special
participants will enable you to find out
the most.
Findings from extreme cases will
be relevant in understanding or
explaining more typical cases.
Heterogeneous Sample will have sufficiently diverse
characteristics to provide the maximum
variation possible in the data collected.
Any patterns that emerge are
likely to be of particular interest
and value, representing key
themes.
Homogeneous Sample consisting of one particular
sub-group will provide minimum variation
in possible data collected.
Will allow characteristics to be
explored in greater depth and
minor differences to be more
apparent.
Volunteer sampling
Volunteer sampling is when potential sample members are either volunteered by someone else or volunteer themselves to take part in the research. It is used particularly when
potential sample members are either difficult to identify of difficult to reach.
Definition
volunteer sampling: type of non-probability sampling in which the potential sample member either
volunteers or is volunteered to be a sample member.
6.2 Selecting samples 147
Snowball sampling is used when it is difficult to identify members of your population. Let’s say that you wish to research people who are working in the informal economy while claiming welfare and unemployment benefits. As these people are difficult
to reach, snowball sampling may provide the only possibility for finding potential
participants. Alternatively, your population may be like chief executives of Fortune
500 companies, easy to identify but difficult to access. Once again, by using snowball
sampling, you may be able to reach such people. To obtain your snowball sample of
chief executives of Fortune 500 companies, you would need to do the following:
1 Make contact and collect data from an initial chief executive of a Fortune 500
company.
2 Use the initial chief executive to identify and volunteer a number of other chief executives of Fortune 500 companies and to support your gaining access.
3 Use these chief executives to identify and volunteer further chief executives of
Fortune 500 companies and to support your gaining access, so the sample increases
in size like a snowball that is rolled.
Remember, those who are volunteered for a snowball sample are most likely to identify and volunteer others who are similar to themselves, resulting in a homogeneous
sample.
In contrast, if you ask your sample members to identify and volunteer themselves,
say, by putting an advertisement in appropriate media inviting them to take part in
your research, you are using self-selection sampling. Increasingly, researchers are inviting potential participants using a variety of electronic media such as intranets, blogs
and bulletin boards alongside invitations through general letters or all user emails
(Saunders, 2011). However, when using self-selection sampling, you need to be careful.
Those who self-select and volunteer to be members of your sample often do so because
they have strong feelings or opinions about your research topic and consider it sufficiently important or interesting to give it some of their time. This means they are likely
to be different from people who do not offer to be involved in some way and so are not
representative of the population.
Definitions
snowball sampling: type of non-probability sampling in which, after the first sample member,
subsequent members are identified and volunteered by earlier sample members.
self-selection sampling: type of non-probability sampling in which possible sample members are
asked to identify themselves and volunteer to take part in the research.
convenience sampling: type of non-probability sampling in which the sample the researcher uses is
those who are easy to obtain rather than because of their appropriateness.
Convenience sampling
The last variety of non-probability sampling which we talk about, convenience
sampling, is rarely used by researchers and is one, we hope, you will not use for your own
148 Chapter 6 Collecting data
research! It simply involves ‘using’ (‘selecting’ is too positive a word!) those who are
easiest to get hold of for your sample. Say you have to find out managers’ views about
something. We know you won’t do this, but let’s pretend that you decide to collect your
data from part-time students in your class. These people are only in your sample because
of the ease of getting hold of them and have little, if any, relevance to your research.
Like most convenience samples, they are likely to be of limited use in answering your
research question and meeting your objectives.
Questionnaires are used widely to collect data, and we have no doubt that you have
completed questionnaires and used data that were collected by questionnaires. Your
lecturers will have asked you to complete module evaluation questionnaires so they can
find out your, and your classmates’, opinions about their modules. You will also have
used the results of questionnaires in your assignments, discussing journal articles in
which research findings were based on data collected by questionnaires.
The term ‘questionnaire’ refers to all methods of data collection in which each
potential respondent is asked to answer the same set of questions in the same order. It
therefore includes questionnaires that are used to collect data:
● by the Internet, each respondent reading the questions and recording their own
answers;
● by post, each respondent reading the questions and recording their own answers;
● by hand, each respondent reading the questions and recording their own answers;
● by telephone, where an interviewer also records each respondent’s answers;
● face to face, where an interviewer also records each respondent’s answers.
When a questionnaire is used by an interviewer to collect data, it is often called a
structured interview.
Questionnaires are a good method for collecting data about the same things from
large numbers of respondents. Questionnaires allow you to ask the same set of standardised questions to a large number of respondents. Because the questions are standardised, the data collected by questionnaires are often used either for descriptive research,
such as students’ opinions of a module they have just taken, or for explanatory research
6.3 Collecting data using questionnaires
Definitions
questionnaire: general term that includes all methods of data collection in which each person is
asked to answer the same set of questions in the same order. Questionnaires can be distributed face
to face by an interviewer, by telephone, by hand, by post and using the Internet.
respondent: person who answers the questions in a questionnaire.
structured interview: method of data collection using a questionnaire in which each person is asked
the same set of questions in the same order by an interviewer who also records the responses.
6.3 Collecting data using questionnaires 149
to test a theory. These data are usually analysed statistically (section 7.3). Let’s say you
have a theory that the more time students spend working on their projects, the more
they will enjoy the work. In explanatory research, you use the data you collect to examine and explain such relationships statistically: in our example, to see whether or not
students’ enjoyment of their work is statistically related to the amount of time they
spend working on their projects.
In this section, we will look at how to:
1 design individual questions;
2 design the questionnaire;
3 write the covering letter or email;
4 conduct pilot testing;
5 distribute the questionnaire to a sample of potential respondents using each of the
distribution methods listed above.
How to design questions
A questionnaire is useful only if:
● it collects data that are needed to answer the research question and meet the
objectives;
● it collects data from a large enough number of respondents to answer the research
question and meet the objectives;
● the questions asked are understood and interpreted by respondents in the way the
researcher wanted them to be understood and interpreted.
This means you need to be very clear about the data you need to collect and to design
your questions to collect these data, minimising the chances of questions being misinterpreted. In making sure that your questions (and so your questionnaire) will provide
you with enough data to answer your research question and meet all your objectives,
you are ensuring what researchers call ‘content validity’. By designing your questions
carefully and ensuring that they actually collect data about what you intend them to
measure rather than something different, you are ensuring what researchers call
‘construct validity’. When you are reading about other researchers’ research that has used
questionnaires, you will need to look at the actual questions that were asked to see if
they are valid. This will allow you to better understand and assess the conclusions these
researchers reached, based on the answers their respondents gave to these questions.
Definitions
content validity: the extent to which a data collection tool, such as a questionnaire, provides enough
data to answer the research question and meet all the objectives.
construct validity: the extent to which the questions asked actually collect data about what they are
intended to measure.
150 Chapter 6 Collecting data
When you design your questionnaire, your first stage will be to design individual
questions to collect the data you need to answer your research question and meet your
objectives (Ekinci, 2015). When you do this, you can:
● use questions from other researchers’ questionnaires (providing you reference the
source and obtain permission where necessary);
● adapt questions from other researchers’ questionnaires (providing you explain how
you adapted them, reference the source and obtain permission where necessary);
● design your own questions.
However, before you decide to use someone else’s questions, beware. There are a
lot of poor questions and badly designed questionnaires available! You also need to be
certain of the wording of each question will be suitable for your intended respondents
and the context in which they will complete the questionnaire. If your questions are
going to be answered only by accountants, you will be able to use far more specialist
language than if they are going to be answered by people in general.
Saunders et al. (2016) highlight seven types of question that can be used in questionnaires. These are listed in Table 6.4, along with a brief description of when to use them
and examples.
Table 6.4 Types of question for use in questionnaires