Third Topic of \"Compatibility Problems

¶ … third topic of "Compatibility problems in my company's network" was deemed to be an inappropriate topic for a couple of reasons. The first was bias in that one should not study their own company. The second was the topic is too vague -- "compatibility problems" could mean a lot of different things. In order to turn this into an acceptable topic, those two issues need to be addressed.

The first issue can simply be addressed by finding another company. It does not matter which company. I could be a class of company's, for example, SMEs in Wisconsin. Selecting a class of companies would allow greater flexibility in designing the study. Multiple companies allows for more data points to be collected, lending the study more relevance. Ideally the study would mitigate the impact of firm-specific factors on the results, so a class of company would be appropriate. If "my company" is an advertising firm, the study could be about advertising firms. "My company" would not be used, but other companies in the industry would be. This would allow the researcher to take advantage of industry knowledge while avoiding bias.

Compatibility issues can be framed as an organizational issue. Technological compatibility can be an issue that affects the success of merger and acquisition activity. The study could therefore be something along the lines of "Assessing the impacts of technological compatibility on the success of mergers in the (blank) industry." Choose an industry with which you have some familiarity and where companies are publicly held. This study would be focused on providing insight for managers as to the compatibility issues that arise and how best to manage the organizational change process as it relates to integrating the acquired company's technology into the existing systems at the acquiring company.

The fourth topic "The effect of bonus schemes on staff turnover rates in the countries in which my company operates" is a good topic, as long as the countries are specified. This topic relates directly to the Managing People course as it brings together two human resources fundamentals -- motivation and retention. The linkages between motivation schemes and retention should have a lot of literature.

Since multiple countries are going to be used in this study, the other variables should be kept relatively simple. Presumably one company is going to be studied -- it cannot be your own. A company will need to work with you on a project like this, since motivation schemes and turnover rates are not often made public. If the company is consistent with its motivational strategies, that would make for a better review. Under that scenario the title would be something like "The effect of performance-based bonus schemes on turnover rates in the pharmaceutical industry: A latitudinal study across multiple nations."