Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Chapter 2
Formulating and clarifying the research topic
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.2
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.4
Appropriateness: is it worthwhile?
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.5
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.6
Useful Techniques
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.7
Rational thinking
Examining your own strengths and interests
Looking at past project titles
Discussion
Searching the literature
Scanning the media
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.8
Creative thinking
Keeping a notebook of ideas
Exploring personal preferences using past
projects
Relevance trees
Brainstorming
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.9
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.10
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.11
Discussion
Colleagues, friends, university tutors,
practitioner and professional groups
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.13
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.14
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.15
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.16
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.17
Relevance tree
You start with a broad concept from which you
generate further (usually more specific) topics.
Each of these topics forms a separate branch from
which you can generate further, more detailed sub
branches. As you proceed down the sub branches
more ideas are generated and recorded. These can
then be examined and a number selected and
combined to provide a research idea
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.18
Brainstorming
Define your problem – that is, the sorts of ideas you are interested in –
as precisely as possible.
Ask for suggestions, relating to the problem
Record all suggestions, observing the following rules:
No suggestion should be criticized or evaluated in any way before all
ideas have been considered;
All suggestions, however wild, should be recorded and considered
As many suggestions as possible should be recorded.
Review all the suggestions and explore what is meant by each.
Analyze the list of suggestions and decide which appeal to you most as
research ideas why.
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.19
Integrating ideas
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.20
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.21
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.22
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.23
Table 2.2 Examples of research ideas and their derived focus research
questions
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.24
Useful techniques
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.25
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.26
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.27
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.28
Theory
“ A formulation regarding the cause and
effect relationship between two or more
variables, which may or may not have been
tested”
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.29
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.30
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.31
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009
Slide 2.32
Saunders, Lewis and Thornhill, Research Methods for Business Students, 5th Edition, © Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis and Adrian Thornhill 2009