¶ … reasoning has been guiding and dictating the scientific enterprise since the scientific revolution. This objective reasoning is also applicable to the business field. Research in business can be applied by following the following general seven steps method.
State a problem
Any idea or tentative explanation is the result of an existing problem. Research in business is an attempt at identifying new markets including the needs and wants of those markets. The research must pin point how these needs can be met, how customers and clients can best collaborate, and what can be the best pricing of given products among others.
(http://managementhelp.org/research/research.htm)
Present preliminary hypotheses
This is where the imagination and intuition of the business researcher come to work. He or she will attempt to derive any type of plausible explanations which will be latter weed out for bad hypothesis.
Collect data
Data collection in business research can be done by the use of focus groups, face-to-face questioning, questionnaires, case study design, and surveys among others. At this point, the facts and data are collected and a certain insight of the true hypothesis starts to emerge.
4) Focus on one hypothesis
With the help of the gathered data, there must be a focus on one hypothesis. Thus, the complexity of the problem is considerably reduced and investigated. The answer to that simplified problem will constitute a head start for a tentative explanation of an added degree of complexity to the...
The predictive power of the business researcher based on logic comes at play here.
6) Test the consequences through experiments or observations
In this step, the consequences are thrown to the test of experiments or observations to see if they do actually occur. Otherwise, new hypothesis will have to be elaborated.
7) Apply the hypothesis
This step constitutes the application of our hypothesis to our enunciated problem in its natural context by making predictions based on the tested hypotheses. It is also where the global business community weighs in and gives its opinion on the work at hand.
This research methodology is general in its steps and its applications are wide including non-business research centers. The methodology's commonality is the reasoning aspect involved. A case study of the above described method is Columbia Business School's Columbia Institute for Tele-Information (CITI). According to its web page description, CITI is a research center within Columbia Business School focusing on topics in management, strategies, telecommunication and electronic mass media among others. The research methodology at CITI revolves mainly around collaboration among academic, corporate, and public sector. This collaboration helps the analysis and resolution of complex issues in the business, media, and telecommunication industries. CITI employs a research methodology quite similar to…
