ASSIGNMENTSUBJECT CODE & NAME: MB0050 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Q1. How would you distinguish between a management decision problem and a management research problem? Do all decision problems require research? Explain and illustrate with examples.Ans.The problem recognition process starts when the decision maker faces some difficulty of decision dilemma. The broad decision problem has to be narrowed down to information-oriented problem, which focuses on the data or information required to arrive at any meaningful conclusion. Given in table a set of decision problems and the subsequent research problems that might address the. It is not essential that the decision maker will always go in for research as he may arrive at a decision without research also. Sometimes, the company might have so much experience in the business that they feel no additional information Can be obtained through research.DifferencesSine.DECISION PROBLEMRESEARCH PROBLEM

1What should be done to increase the consumers of organic food products in the domestic marketWhat is the awareness and purchase intention of health conscious consumers for organic food products

2How to reduce turnover rates in the BPO sectorWhat is the impact of shift duties on work exhaustion and turnover intentions of the BPO employees?

3Can the housing and real estate growth be accelerated?What is the current investment in real estate and housing? Can the demand in the sector be forecasted for the next six months?

Explanation:

1. Management decision problem: The entire process begins with the identification of the difficulty encountered by the business manager/researcher. The manager might decide to conduct the study himself or gives it to a researcher of a research agency. Thus this step requires that there must be absolute clarity about what is the purpose of getting a study done. When the work is to be done by an outsider it is very important that discussion is held with the business manager.

2. Management research problem: Once the audit process of secondary review and interviews and survey is over, the researcher is ready to focus and define the issues of concern that need to be investigated further, in the form of an unambiguous and clearly defined research problem. Here, it is important to remember that simply using the word problem does not mean that there is something wrong that has to be corrected, it simply indicates the gaps in information or knowledge base available to the researcher.Examples:1. How to reduce the turnover rate in a BPO company. This problem has to be translated to a simpler form of research question like, What are the management policies in other BPO companies? Why do the employees leave the company? What is the problem area? Are the shift duties creating a problem of work family conflict which is they leave. How can the company work on employee engagement so that he stays with the company?2. The lack of sales of a newly launched product could be due to consumer perceptions about the product, ineffective supply chain, gaps I the distribution network, competitor offerings or advertising ineffectiveness.Q2. How is research designs classified? What are the distinguishing features of each? Differentiate by giving appropriate examples.Ans. 1. Meaning of Research designs:Once you have established the What of the study, i.e., the research problem, the next step is the how of the study, which specifies the method of achieving the research objectives. In other words, this is the research design.-+Green et al. (2008) defines research design as the specification of methods and procedures for acquiring the information needed. It is the overall operational pattern or framework of the project that stipulates what information is to be collected from which sources by what procedures. If it is a good design, it will ensure that the information obtained is relevant to the research questions and that it was collected by objective and economical procedure.