Book Summary

Chapter 1: Business management Research.

Characteristics of research:

• Data are collected systematically.
• Data are interpreted systematically.
• There is a clear purpose: to find something.

Characteristics of Business research:

• It is how managers draw knowledge from other disciplines.
• Most managers only allow research when they see a commercial advantage.
• the research has to have a practical consequence (an action that can be done in the company based on the research).

Knowledge creation models:

• Model 1: academic, emphasizes fundamental rather than applied, focus on utilization of the research.
• Model 2: emphasizes relevant knowledge, that is usable in practice. Develops on top of model 1.
• Model 3: emphasizes the importance of broader issues of humanity in research.

Types of research:

Name	Purpose	Context	Results	Relevant For
(basic, fundamental, pure) research	expand knowledge of processes of business and management	University	universal principles	society
applied research	improve understanding of problem	organizations	solution to problem	manager(s)

Chapter 2.4: Turning ideas into research projects.

Writing research questions:

Goldilocks test: check if the key words used in the research are not too hard or too easy to research.

general focus research question: start with a more general question that you adjust: make more detailed.

Writing research objectives:

Research objectives are statements that explain what you want to accomplish with your research. Research objectives are more formal and specific.

Theory

Theory

a formulation regarding the cause and effect relationships between two or more variables, which may or may not have been tested. - (Gill and Johnson)

Ways of developing a theory:

• deductive approach: you develop a theory and then you test it with data.
• inductive approach: you have data and you build a theory on top of it.

Chapter 3: Critically reviewing the literature.

Critical Review

A critical review is reading the current scientific literature related to your research. Then you write the main theories and critique them.

It can help your research with:

• defining questions and objectives.
• highlight research possibilities.
• justify your research.
• avoiding repeating work.
• gain insight to research approaches.

Types of literature:

• primary: first occurrence of work.
• secondary: subsequent publication of primary literature.
• tertiary: provides primary and secondary literature: dictionaries

Chapter 4: Research Philosophies.

Chapter 5: Formulating the research design.

Chapter 6: Negotiating access and research ethics.

Chapter 12.1 - 12.4: Analyzing quantitative data.

quantitative data are basically measurements.

Things to consider while analyzing quantitative data:

• type of data (level of numerical measurement);
• format in which your data will be input to the analysis software;
• impact of data coding on subsequent analyses (for different data types);
• need to weight cases;
• methods you intend to use to check data for errors.

Data Types:

• Categorical data: not numerical, but values can be classified.
  • Descriptive data: cannot be ranked, count of the occurrences in each category.
  • Ranked data: values can be classified and ranked within a class or category.
• Quantifiable data: measured numerically as quantities.
  • Continuous data: data values can take any value.
  • Discrete data: can be measured precisely often integer.

Chapter 14: Writing and presenting your project report.

Suggested Structure:

• Abstract
• Introduction
• Literature review
• Method
• Results
• Conclusions
• References
• Appendices

Abstract:

short summary of the report. It should have 4 paragraphs.

the paragraphs should answer:

1. What were my research questions, and why were these important?
2. How did I go about answering the research questions?
3. What did I find out in response to my research questions?
4. What conclusions do I draw regarding my research questions?

Introductory Chapter:

Gives the reader an idea about the central issue of your research. It should include the research questions and research objectives