Small group military relationships in Canadian Forces deployments to Afghanistan

¶ … Canadian Forces, small group military relationships

Within the Canadian Forces, how are small group military relationships on operational deployments in Kabul, Afghanistan?

A group is mostly defined to be two or more people interacting together so they can achieve a common specific goal. The main purpose of the group would be towards a shared and desired outcome. With this in mind, Military groupings are formed to achieve a common interest like defeating a common foe, or lobbying for a specific cause. The group will have some form of leadership structure to ensure it is not mistaken for a crowd. The leadership for military groups is formal. Military groups report to one leader, and follow the orders or instructions given by their leader. For the effectiveness of the military groups, the group members should work together. Working closely together, and for long periods, the group members will form certain bonds, and relationships with each other. These relationships are always geared towards the group's overall objective, and they are formed through trust and cooperation with each other.

The research proposal focuses on the small group military relationships for the Canadian Forces deployed in Kabul, Afghanistan. The research proposal, will attempt to provide theoretical support for the question been asked. It will provide explanations and methods of conducting the research. The research proposal will also identify the intentions of the research, and provide the methodologies to be used during the research. For the research topic, academic reasons will be provided for and against Suri & Clarke, 2009.

Methodologies that will be employed for data collection will be discussed in this research proposal. The research design will be analyzed in the research study. The research will investigate, present, and provide summarized facts about the research topic.

Purpose of the research

This research proposal will deal with this topic, within the Canadian Forces, how are small group military relationships on operational deployments in Kabul, Afghanistan? The armed forces for any country are closely guarded secrets, and finding information regarding their groupings is not available. One has to research the specific forces they wish to analyze. In the case for this research proposal, it is the Canadian Forces based in Kabul, Afghanistan. The research proposal will attempt to identify the various military groupings available for the Canadian Forces, how many service men and women are in the groupings, the structure of leadership, each group's role, how each group is made up, and the relationships found within the groups Morgan, 1996.

How relationships are developed within the various military groupings, will also be researched.

The purpose of conducting the research will be to gain more insight on the small group military relationships. These relationships will be related to how they are formed, how the members of a group interact with each other during official and unofficial timings, are the relationships long lasting or are they easily broken in case of quarrels. The research will also try to establish how each group handles disagreements amongst its members, and do the disagreements lead to lose of trust which would affect the groups' relationships.

The research will provide a better understanding of the military to people, their groupings, leadership and the kind of relationships that are found in the military groups. This information will provide the public with more insight and they will better appreciate their country's military. The military can also use the research findings to improve on their groupings, coming up with better groupings, managing the groupings and ensuring that the group members have cordial relationships with each other and other groups found in the military.

The best type of research for this kind of research would be observatory study. This is because the subjects are not controlled, or they are out of the investigators control Rosenbaum, 1992.

Military groups cannot be controlled by the investigator as they are complex units formed using a lot of red tape. Nobody would be willing to subject a country's service men and women to a controlled experimentation especially when they are in war. Using observation also ensures that the subjects are not interfered with, which leads to better results.

The other reason for choosing observatory study is because of the nature of the respondents to be studied. Since the subjects are participating in war, it would be very difficult to conduct a randomized experiment. The subjects been in their natural groupings would also afford the investigator better information, and more understanding as the investigator will get to see the subjects in their real world scenarios. Moving the subjects into a controlled experiment would not provide the results expected, this is because the investigator will have to simulate real world scenarios in order to understand the military groupings relationships. To see the relationships as they are taking place, observation is the only method that would accord the investigator this opportunity. Though, it is argued that the subjects may act differently once they are aware they are been observed or researched, this fact would not have much effect on the subjects been observed for the research.

The variables to be used for the research question are dependent, and independent Cox & Snell, 1974.

The independent variable will be the operational deployments, and the dependent variable will be the relationships.

Research methodology

The research design to be used when conducting the study is descriptive research. Observational study is the perfect design for the research, because the military groups may not be able to answer questionnaires because of their schedules Johnson & Tsiatis, 2004.

The military is highly guarded and secretive, by observing how they relate and work in groups the researcher will gain more information that they could have had they used any other method. Due to the spreading of the groupings in different parts of Kabul, Afghanistan it would not be possible to interview all the group members from the chosen sample size. Observation is both fast in data collection and one get to witness the subjects in their comfort zones which makes them more at ease. The data collected will be explained by the investigator in detail.

The research will use the philosophical position of interpretivism Tushnet, 1983.

This position relies on the assumption that general conditions should be considered so as to understand fully the phenomena. In this case, the phenomenon is small military group relationships.

Choosing the military groups randomly, and observing each group for one week as they undertake their daily work will give the researcher ample data regarding the groups' relationships and how they are affected during and after deployments. The location for the research is Kabul, Afghanistan which is an extreme location. The location is a desert, and the temperatures are always on the extreme day or night. During the day, it is extremely hot, and the nights can get extremely cold. These conditions put a strain on the military group relationships.

These conditions make the area suitable for the research as the service men and women will have a lot to deal with and will not be bothered by the researcher's presence. The harsh weather conditions also bring out the true colors of a person, and it is easier to notice the changes in a person's interactions with others. The researcher should also keep a safe distance to ensure that the subjects do not react to his/her presence. This will ensure that the data collected has minimal errors.

Time schedule

The research study will run for three months approximately. Below is a detailed schedule for the research. The dates specified may change upon discussion with the supervisors.

1. 2nd week of October Research proposal is submitted

2. 3rd week of October Updating and further literature review is conducted

3. 1st week of November the research methodology is reviewed, and the research strategy agreed upon.

4. 2nd week of November The actual data collection begins

5. 1st week of December analysing of the data and beginning of the report writing

6. 2nd week of December preparation of the final draft

7. 3rd week of December submission of the final report

The research will be conducted from 0700 hrs -- 1500 hrs on a daily basis for a consecutive week per group. There might be scenarios which will demand for the research to be conducted during the night. In such cases, the research will commence 2000 hrs -- 0300 hrs.

Data collection

The data for the research will be collected from the field. This is because no data available for this research. Majority of the data will have to be from primary sources, this are the groups themselves by been observed by the researcher and various aspects, and behaviors been recorded. This is referred to as primary data. Primary data is the data collected directly from the test subjects Wang & Strong, 1996.

The second method for capturing data will be literature related to group relationship, other researches that have been conducted related to small group relationships, books, journals, articles, and websites. These sources are referred to as secondary data sources. This is because the sources are indirectly related to the research and they cannot have any influence on the final results. Secondary sources assist the researcher to understand the behaviors they notice on their subjects.

Using this methodology, there could be a likelihood of important factors not been recorded when using this method for data collection. The information gathered using observation can be interpreted differently by different researchers, and this is what makes it less acceptable as reliable data. There is also a likelihood of the recorded fact not having caused the output effects. These errors will need to be mitigated well to ensure the data collected is not biased.

Sample size

The chosen samples will be based on characteristics and how the groups are comprised. Selecting groups that have different roles will give the researcher better results. Also, selecting samples that have both sexes would allow the researcher have a unisex research report. The sample size will comprise of 1,000 service men and women, spread out in various military groups. This sample size will be enough for the research, and it will cover all areas that the Canadian Military are involved with in Kabul, Afghanistan.

This number will ensure that there are enough subjects to be researched, and there will be reduced chances of errors, which will ensure that the data is accurate Jiroutek, Muller, Kupper, & Stewart, 2003.

Having a high number of subjects is recommended for any research to allow for variable respondents. The subjects should be chosen randomly to reduce the error rates during the research. There should be preventive measures in place to ensure the research always has 1,000 subjects been studied during the period of research. Continuous evaluation of the procedures used for data collection is very important. The rationale behind the data collection methodology will provide an opportunity for generating ideas as the research is progressing, which can be used to analyze and formulated mathematically.

Data analysis

The data collected will be analyzed once the research is completed. Data analysis is the process of correcting and editing the data collected to remove any errors and ensure that data is in a manageable size, searching for patterns, summarizing the data, and applying statistical methods on the data Whitney et al., 2003.

The data will then be analyzed using statistical tools. Primary data will be tabulated. After tabulation analysis will involve computing the percentages. Relationships and differences for or against the research topic will then be subjected to significance testing. This testing will determine the data validity to indicate conclusions. The data should also be verified using different methods and source where possible. Recommendations will be given once data analysis is completed. Decisions based on the data will also be taken.

Justification for the study

This research study has many potential benefits. The research can provide a better understanding of how small group members interact with each other and the relationships formed. Dynamics and organization of a small group can also be learned from the research study. Academics can better understand how the operational deployments affect a group of people. The final research will assist other researchers to determine the position of small group leaderships. This research can be used by future researchers for data when they may be conducting a similar or related research. Military forces across the world can use the results of this result to form better and effective groups.

Limitations of the study

The military deployments are very different, and no two military deployments can be the same. These causes problems for the researcher as he/she will have to adapt themselves to the harsh conditions the servicemen and women are faced with daily. This research is limited on the amount of time the researcher can spend with a specific group. The main reason been the Canadian forces are already working on exiting the deployment area. Because of this fact there is some urgency in finalizing on the research, which might lead to errors during the data capturing. The subjects may also not participate willingly, which might cause errors or capturing of wrong information. Confidentiality of the subjects may be assured, but this been a military the subjects might think they are been observed with the aim of reprimanding.

Conclusion

The desire for proper management of any small group, to ensure the groups success cannot be overlooked worldwide. In the military forces, the failure of these small groupings can be catastrophic. Military commanders need to know that the groupings they have formed will be able to operate as expected and achieve the desired results. Using this research they can be able to make changes where they deem necessary and avert any major issues. The research findings may be applied by other to understand better the effects of small group relationships within their organizations. The best leadership methods can also be identified from the research, and the research can be used to discover natural leaders. Using a structured methodology and having more time to analyze the subjects would lead to more accurate data. The reduction of errors and biases has been reduced during the data analysis, but there might be slight occurrences where the information provided may not reflect the truth.