This summary contains all info necessary to study for the endterm of the course Business Research Techniques for the Pre-master marketing management at Tilburg University. This summary is based on all the lectures, online learning modules, and knowledge clips given during the course.
Business Research Techniques Summary:
Business Research OLM 1:
Why business research:
Business Research= a systematic process of testing hypotheses through carefully executed
data analyses that are aimed to help a manager solve or minimize a problem.
- Systematic process: BR consists of several distinct but highly interrelated stages and
these stages are universally agreed upon.
- Test hypotheses: BR involves making testable hypotheses. However, it is also possible
to do BR without hypotheses but then the findings are a coincidence.
- Entails collecting and analysing data: BR is realistic. Thus, data can be collected in
various ways.
- Helps managers make better decisions: Decisions are evidence-based and rely on an
assessment of empirical data.
Intuition should never be a substitute for research because intuition leads to less effective
decisions.
Cognitive biases= unconscious thinking errors that are an attempt of our brain to simplify
the complex world and speed up decision-making. These biases lead managers to
misinterpretations of information.
3 most common cognitive biases:
1. Confirmation bias:
Tendency to only consider information that agrees our existing beliefs. We look for only the
evidence that supports what we are already thinking and ignore any information that
contradicts these believes.
Overcome this confirmation bias by always trying to prove yourself wrong and see your
beliefs from an opposite perspective.
2. Availability bias:
We decide based on readily available information, even though it may not be the best
information to inform our decision. Information that is easily recalled is assumed to reflect
more frequent and probable events, while information that is more difficult to bring to mind
is assumed to reflect less frequent and less probable events.
Normally we recall more frequent events than less frequent events in which there would be
no bias. However, some situations less frequent events are easier to recall. Thus, we
,perceive highlighted rare events (e.g., news, social media) as common frequent events
causing an availability bias.
3. What-You-See-Is-All-There-Is (WYSIATI) bias
We tend to notice what is present, but we often forget to consider what is absent. This
results in managers adopt opinions and make decisions without examining all the data,
which leads to suboptimal decisions. So, they rely on only what they see and not what all
there is.
Judging academic journal quality:
Predatory journals= sole purpose of making money and publish for a fee without having a
peer review.
How to evaluate a journal to be worthy:
- Check whether the articles in the journal are peer-reviewed.
- Look up the impact factor (not a perfect measure), an impact factor of at least 1.0 is
less likely to be predatory.
- Consult the list of quality journals compiled by TISEM.
Highlights:
- To be able to Evaluate business research:
You should be able to judge to which extent academic and popular press articles can be
trusted as a basis for your decisions.
- To be able to Delegate business research:
You should be able to interact effectively with your firm’s research department or external
researcher. Otherwise, you will end up with great answers from research but to the wrong
questions.
- To be able to Perform business research:
You should be able to solve problems yourself to solve smaller problems you will encounter.
The stages of the research process:
Inductive research= first collect data, try to find a pattern in this data after which a
theoretical framework will be developed based on this pattern. Data Theory
Deductive research= first hypothesize relationships between variables based on theory.
These hypotheses are then tested using data. Theory Data
,Inductive research aims at developing a theory and Deductive research aims at testing a
theory. These are not mutually competing and can sometimes be used in combination.
The 7-step deductive research process:
1. Defining a problem
2. Formulating research questions
3. Developing a theoretical framework
4. Choosing a research strategy
5. Collecting the data
6. Analysing the data
7. Writing a report
Business Research OLM2:
A demarcated business problem:
A business problem occurs when a company encounters a threat (a difficulty to be
eliminated) or an opportunity (a situation that might be improved).
- A business problem needs to be demarcated or narrowed before it can be
researched.
- Most business problems are highly complex, so no single study can examine
everything.
- The purpose of demarcating a business problem is to focus on a clearly defined
portion of the bigger problem.
- A well demarcated business problem always has included how and what (focus)
something will be researched and the desired end-result. So, means + result.
- Who would like to know to what extent X is related to Y to come to a result.
Example:
Business problem= Pfizer would like to increase its profits. (Very broad, many ways to
increase sales, it’s impossible to research all possibilities)
Demarcated business problem= Pfizer would like to know whether soft-selling new drugs to
doctors leads to more prescriptions than hard-selling.
Problem relevance:
Research is far too costly and time-consuming for a business if the problem is not relevant.
Thus, a business problem must only be researched if it is relevant and well-demarcated.
Two types of relevance:
, 1. Academic relevance
2. Managerial relevance
Academic relevance:
When a business problem already has been researched in prior research studies, then the
answer is already out there. So, a new study into the same problem has little added value
and may not be worth the investment.
- Relevant if, the research contributes to the current state of knowledge, so the
problem has not been researched before
Four types of contributions:
- New topic: No prior research exists, although the topic is important (drones)
- New context: Prior research exists but in a different context (online stores -> physical)
- Integrate scattered findings: Prior studies focus on different variables in isolation,
hence the relative impact of these variables is unclear (combine and analyse)
- Reconcile conflicting findings: Prior studies report different findings (small vs large,
positive vs negative) and the conditions under which these finding hold are unclear.
(Analyse the different conditions/variables/factors in the research)
Bottom line is to not reinvent the wheel, so come up with new research!
Managerial relevance:
Someone should actually benefit from the problem researched. Example, company, society,
government, set of companies, consumers. (managers, end users, public policymakers
- Relevant if, one or more parties benefit from having the problem researched
Research questions:
Problem statement= central question a research study aims to answer. It captures everything
that will be researched in a single question.
- Open-ended question
- Identifies the study’s unit of analysis
- Expressed in terms of variables and relationships
Open-ended question= question that cannot be answered by yes or no. Which requires the
problem statement to conduct research to avoid jumping to conclusions. Starting an open-
ended question can be done by: What, How, To what extent.
Examples:
- What is the relationship between … and …?
- How are … and … associated?
- To what extent does … relate to …?
Identities the study’s unit of analysis= the entity that the study wishes to say something
about, considered the focus of the study. These entities are referred to as the subjects.
Examples of unit of analysis:
- Individuals, consumers, investors, CEO’s
- Firms, PLC’s, SME’s, multinationals
- Groups, industries, board of directors, alliances
- Things, products, brands, shares
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