Prerequisite: BUS 700 (also listed as INFO 700)
Instructor: Professor Allen S. Lee, AllenSLee@alum.mit.edu
Office hours: required and by appointment

The objective of this course is to initiate the pre-dissertation business doctoral student in the nuts-and-bolts experience of doing qualitative research. In learning by doing, the successful student will, upon completion of the course, be prepared to attempt full-scale qualitative field work for his or her dissertation.

Students may draw upon the qualitative approaches and methods covered in BUS 700. Students will seek out their own research sites (which may include VCU itself). Students are expected to prepare a research proposal (including a researchable question), to prepare a research plan (including tasks and dates), to send a letter of introduction to people at one or more potential field sites, and to conduct interviews and/or collect documents. A student must take the initiative in developing his or her own modus operandi in learning how to do and then actually doing his or her qualitative research, rather than expecting merely to apply lecture notes in a formulaic way. Except for the first three weeks of the course, there will be no regularly scheduled class meetings (but other class meetings might be called). After the third week, each student will meet individually with the instructor periodically (as often as every week for a half hour, but no less frequently than every three weeks); generally, a student should schedule appointments for these one-on-one meetings on Wednesdays after 2pm.

Because the objective of the course is primarily to initiate the student into the nuts-and-bolts experience of doing qualitative field work, it is important to limit the field work to something doable within a semester. For this reason, a student will be required (unless the student strongly desires otherwise) to begin his or her field work with an established theory from the literature (i.e., a deductive study), rather than to conduct field work for the purpose off formulating or building theory (i.e., an inductive study). In beginning with a theory, the purpose of the research would be to illustrate, test, or refine existing theory. (NOTE: a student will have the option of receiving an "incomplete" for the course if (1) he or she has been making substantial progress and (2) more field work is needed over the summer -- whereupon the final grade for the course could be awarded at the end of the summer.)

Required Deliverables

1. Research proposal. This will include the "researchable question" and an explanation of the research significance of the research question.
2. Research plan. This will include a timeline of the nuts-and-bolts tasks to be completed. It will necessarily be tentative and will necessarily be revised periodically.
3. Letter of self-introduction to people at potential field sites. Robert Yin’s book, Case Study Research, provides a model for such a letter.
4. Interview plan and interview questions. In a deductive study (one that begins with theory), the interview questions are specific to the theory and aspects of the theory being tested or illustrated.
5. Periodic progress reports. A student will send such a report (via e-mail or e-mail attachments) to the instructor no later than the morning of the day when the student is having one of the required periodic meetings with the instructor.
6. Drafts of the final study. The first draft will be expected by March 1.
7. The final study.

The final study will contribute 50% to a student's final grade for the course; the first draft (due on March 1), 25%; the research proposal, 10%; interview plan and interview questions, 10%; letter of self-introduction, 5%.

January 12, 2000

• Introduction to and logistics of the course
• Ad hoc presentation of either general research interest or specific research topic
• No written deliverables required

• Discussion of two deductive studies as models of how to do deductive research: Christopher M. Hess and Chris F. Kemerer, "Computerized Loan Origination Systems," MIS Quarterly, Volume 18, Number 3, 1994, pp. 251-275), and M. Lynne Markus, "Power, Politics, and MIS Implementation," Communications of the ACM, Volume 26, Number 6, June 1983, pp. 430-444.
• A written assignment on "Similarities and Differences in the Research Methods in Use by Hess & Kemerer and by Markus"

• Discussion of an insider’s account of doing field work: Ulrike Schultze, "A Confessional Account of an Ethnography About Knowledge Work," forthcoming in MIS Quarterly and available at <http://www.misq.org/archivist/forthcoming/accepted.html>.
• Required deliverable: a tentative researchable question from every student, with an explanation of the question’s significance.

• Required periodic meetings with the instructor (as often as every week for a half hour, but no less frequently than every three weeks), by appointment on Wednesdays after 2pm.
• Occasional class meetings (to be scheduled as needed, on Wednesdays, 2pm-4:45pm) for students to give progress reports and to share experiences.