Assessment 1: Individual Portfolio You will produce an individual portfolio (2,500 words,
Each individual group member is expected to contribute evenly to the discussions and debate of the case studies. It is important that you keep record of your group discussion and case analysis on the WIKI tool week by week. When submitting the portfolio you are also required to submit on top of the portfolio a record of meeting minutes (see appendix 1 for a template of group discussion record), which may affect the grade of the individual group member. (Your tutor will explain this further during the class).You are required to include the printed WIKI records in the appendix of your final portfolio. To summarize your final portfolio should basically include the following components:

 Review and reflection on various research methods and related issues
 3 of the case study analyses (selected by the tutor)
 Appendix – printed WIKI content

Your final portfolio should be well presented and logically organized.

1. Review and reflection on three topics (not covered by the three case studies) in research methods and related issues (about 2,000 words altogether)

Headings that you might like to consider in compiling your report

 Why are these methods/techniques of interest?
 What are the key concepts of ideas behind these topics?
 Where would these techniques find application?
 What are the key strengths and weakness of these approaches?
 Are there any ethical issues associated with them?
 What were the key discussions and learning development by the group when reviewing these topics?
 What will be the implication of these issues to you when doing research?

All the 3 topics should be covered from the above information

The report will be assessed against the following criteria
 Understanding of theory
 Extended reading
 Critical reasoning/justification
 Presentation and comprehensiveness

Topic 1 – Nature of business and management research
 Issues to be reflected on could be:-
 Understanding of differences between business research and general research;
 Research skills needed by students to conduct business research;
 Potential issues related to business research, such as scope and scale of research, ethics, resource, accessibility, and safety.

Issues to consider
 The impact of your personal feelings, values, and beliefs
 Access to data
 Time and other resources
 Validity and reliability of the data
 Ethical issues

Topic 2 – Collecting primary data using semi-structured, in-depth interviews
Definition
‘An interview is a purposeful discussion between two or more people’
Kahn and Cannell (1957)

Types of interview used in research
 Structured
 Semi-structured
 Unstructured/In-depth
Saunders et al. (2009)

Different Forms of interviews
Standardised and non-standardised interviews
for example: one to one, face to face interviews, group interviews etc
Structured interviews, unstructured interviews, and semi structured interviews
Telephone interviews and internet mediated interviews

The importance of preparation – the 5 Ps
‘prior planning prevents poor performance’
Saunders et al. (2009)

The report will be assessed against the following criteria
 Understanding of theory
 Extended reading
 Critical reasoning/justification
 Presentation and comprehensiveness

Issues to consider
 Reliability
 Lack of standardization
 Forms of bias
 Interviewer bias
 Interviewee bias
 Validity and generalisability

Topic 3 – Collecting primary data through observation

Observation involves the systematic observation , recording, description analysis and interpretation of people’s behaviour’
Saunders et al. (2009)

The two main types
 Participant observation – emphasises the discovery of meaning attached to actions (qualitative)
 Structured observation – is concerned with frequency of actions
(quantitative)

Points to consider
 Used both as the principle research method and in combination with other methods
 Researchers become immersed in the research setting
 Researchers try to understand the process by which individual identity is constructed and reconstructed (attempting to learn the symbolic world of respondents)

Four key aspects
 Purpose of the research
 Significance of establishing personal contact
 Nature of the data collection questions
 Time required and completeness of process

Issues to consider
 Reliability
 Lack of standardization
 Forms of bias
 Interviewer bias
 Interviewee bias
 Validity and generalisability

Then this

Case Studies for Group Portfolio
Dear all,
Following 3 case studies need to be included in the final group portfolio (Assessment 1):
– Session 3 Critical literature review, Case study 2: The development of discount warehouse clubs
– Session 5 Using Secondary Data, Case study: The involvement of auditors in preliminary profit announcements
– Session 8 Group Interviews, Case study: Students’ use of work-based learning in their studies
Please make sure they are well polished and presented in your final portfolio. Your reflection and review (other 3 topics), therefore, should not cover any of these three topic areas, but focus on the rest of the sessions.

These are the case studies (200 words review each)

Case 10b Student’s use of work-based learning in their studies (200 words)

1. Why did Jim feel it necessary to analyze reflective material produced by students rather than just interview final-year students in his research?

Jim thought it would be necessary to use both ways of collecting data to make sure that he was able to see everything involved in his research due to the complexity of the topic. It’s a good measure that Jim chose interviews by reviewing the reflective data this also enabled him to get a better understanding and more in depth knowledge of the students. It also made sure he had broad results of the analysis as there were two target groups.

2. Why was it important to plan and manage the interview the way described?

It was good that he explained what his aim was and what his intentions were during the interview process which was stage 1. This also puts the interviewee at ease when being interviewed I believe as the information can be very personal, therefore stage 1 will prevent a bias interview. Stage 2 of the process is starting the interview and stage 3 is final discussion and debriefing. Furthermore it is important to plan and manage the interview so that things are a little more relaxed and become less formal and more informal as this puts people in their comfort zones, this also allows Jim to stay concentrated on the students.

3. How did Jim deal with the ethical issues in his research?

Jim had already explained what he was going to do and had permission from his tutors and of course the student that were being interviewed so this already removed the ethical issues. He set a date for the interview and made sure that the information was all confidential.

4. Why was it valid for Jim to decide to interview tutors when originally he had not intended to?
Because the students said that their tutors didn’t want them to do work based learning placements in their final year. Furthermore there was a lot of questions to be answered by the tutors due the results that were given from students.

5. Jim used literature from three distinct areas
a) What were they?
b) Why did he need to use each of them?
Books and research publications. These were used to refine his methods that he wanted to use and also to find way in collecting his data. He also used study journals this was so that he can reflect on his research and make conclusions based on that it also evident that he used previous studies and research publication so that he can find the best solutions and how to avoid disappointment.

6. What were the main strengths and weaknesses of this research?
Strengths:
• Jim applied theoretical knowledge to his experiences.
• He used a wide variety of sources in order to get the best from his research
• The interview process was good as the students were at ease.
Weaknesses:
• The research topic was really complex which led to issues
• There were certain limitations that were encountered during the research
• WBL was not entirely from placement in the student final year as evidenced int he final paragraph of the case study.

Case 8a The involvement of auditors in preliminary profit announcements (200 words)

1.
A) Identify data sources used by Tony and Jim in this research?
b) Which of these are secondary data and which are primary data?

A) Preliminary accounts, full annual reports and audit accounts(secondary data)
B) Preliminary profit announcements – secondary data
Full annual reports and audit accounts – secondary data

2. What other methods (if any) do you think Tony and Jim could have used to obtain the data they needed to test their hypothesis?

Since it’s mentioned that the prelims are used as information for trading. They could have obtained data from the trading of different shares of different companies from the time the prelims have been issued until the actual accounts have been published.

They could also have seen the prices had changed after the prelims have been published aswell as the effect of the accounts having been published.

Jim and Tony could’ve created a focus group. The members of the focus group could’ve included stock traders and financial analysis. The purpose of the method would have been to find out what the prelims are used for.

3. What were the problems faced by Tony and Jim in using these secondary data?

• Quality of research
The quality of their research is important as it may be scrutinised for various means. They need to know where the data has come from and whom and which purpose it was written for. The question that needs to be raised is does this research reflect our work. They also need to know this is a valid piece of research is it in date and how reliable is this research.
• Time consuming
Using secondary data can be time consuming as it will take some time to analyse the information for the research in order to make sure it’s valuable and reliable.
• Incomplete information
In order to make sure the information is valuable and accurate and is what is needed for the research incomplete information can lead to scrutiny. It can be costly is funds are low for a research project to get full versions of research.

4. What lessons can you learn from Tony and Jim’s experience?

• Relevancy of the source is important factor
• Suitability to the scope –cost vs. benefit
• Credibility of research
• Validity of research

Case 3a: The development of discount warehouse clubs
1. How might Jane have overcome the problems of only finding relevant articles in trade journals and newspapers?
The key issue here is the absence of academic literature in Jane’s first draft of her literature review. To overcome the lack of articles she could have
• searched a larger number of databases;
• consulted with people about likely relevant literature and sources for relevant literature;
• broadened the way in which she defined the parameters for her keywords.
As part of this answer it is useful to ask the students to define the parameters they think Jane might have considered using both narrow and broader terms as in the worked example (Section 3.4).

2. Why did Jane type all the items she had in her files into her word processor rather than just those she had referred to directly in the text?
There are a number of reasons why this might be the case. These include:
• Jane did not know which items she was going to use until she began to write and revise her literature review;
• by recording all the items she ensured that she had all the necessary information and so would (hopefully) not have to recreate any searches;
• Jane was required to provide a bibliography rather than a list of references.

3. What lessons can you learn from Jane’s experience?
Numerous lessons may be learnt from Jane’s experience. These include:
• start writing the review early; it always takes longer than you think;
• talk to the tutor regularly; send work in advance to allow plenty of time for the tutor to read it and listen to what the tutor has to say;
• do not rely on trade magazines and newspapers;
• include only a few pertinent quotations and then only if they add significantly to the argument;
• structure the review clearly and remember that it is a critical review;
• think in both narrow and broad terms when planning the literature search;
• expect to revise and redraft the literature review;
• ensure that all information required for the bibliography/references are noted down at the time of obtaining the item;
• make a note of where different items have been found (for example, which database);
• once the review is written, continue to browse both current periodicals and journal contents pages and update the review as necessary.

(200 words review)

If you have any problems please don’t hesitate to contact me…thank you

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