Courses Master Display 2016-2017

Course Description To PDF
Course title Business Research Strategy
Course code EBC4070
ECTS credits 6,5
Assessment Whole/Half Grades
Period
Period Start End Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri
5 18-4-2017 9-6-2017 X X
Level Advanced
Coordinator Boris Blumberg
For more information: b.blumberg@maastrichtuniversity.nl
Language of instruction English
Goals
-Understand and learn how to design and conduct a research study by applying the appropriate methodology.
-Get acquainted with the different phases of research and the typical problems encountered in these phases.
-Understand interdependencies and trade-offs between choices in making a research design.
-Learn to critically read research from a methodological perspective.
Description
The course is structured in accordance with the phases of research: conceptualising, conceptual modelling, deriving propositions and hypotheses, making research designs, selecting measurement approaches, selecting appropriate analysis methods, sampling and data gathering, getting access to the field, conducting analyses, interpretation, selecting results for publication, drafting a research paper.
Articles from the research literature and case material are used to confront students with typical problems of conducting research. Group discussions and assignments are used to gain insights in these problems and to identify potential solutions. The course will emphasise the interdependencies and trade-offs in research decisions and help the student to learn making more realistic choices. In the end the student will have acquired the necessary knowledge and skills to set up and conduct a sound research study him/herself.
The emphasis of the course is on the logic of research and the requirements to be put regarding the research design. The main focus is quantitative research but some aspects of qualitative research are covered as well. Although the issues addressed are generic applications in this course mainly pertain to organisation studies.
Literature
- Boris F. Blumberg, Donald R. Cooper and Pamela S. Schindler. Business Research Methods. (2014), McGraw-Hill.
- A Selection of PhD Dissertations defended at Maastricht University
- A broad collection of Articles.
Prerequisites
Students should be familiar with methodological principles. Previous courses in organisational research methods or organisational assessment at the Bachelors level provide usually the expected pre-knowledge. As this course deals with methodological issues at the advanced level, we strongly recommend that students have followed courses in research methods and quantitative analysis previously. In particular, we expect that students are familiar with the quantitative as well as qualitative methods at an intermediate level in particular with philosophies of science, formulating research problems, sampling, measurement and scaling issues, survey research, experiments, case studies and observational studies.
Teaching methods (indicative; course manual is definitive) PBL / Presentation / Lecture / Assignment / Papers / Groupwork
Assessment methods (indicative; course manual is definitive) Final Paper
Evaluation in previous academic year For the complete evaluation of this course please click "here"
This course belongs to the following programmes / specialisations
Master Business Research Compulsory Courses