Complete Prospectus

To ascertain if a problem addresses a business issue or has Rubric creep/Rubric drift, please consider the following:

· An important indicator that a business related problem is a specific business problem is that the problem statement relates to a key business process that organizational leaders need to address and effectively meet the organization’s mission.

· A business problem relates to one or more critical success factors (CSFs). Business leaders use business processes to function effectively to complete one or more CSF’s needed to carry out their business mission.

· A business problem is one that a business manager/leader can solve.

Conduct a final check of the problem statement by putting the hook, anchor, general business problem, and specific business problem in bullet form and check for alignment among the four bullets. When you can ensure that the problem statement aligns throughout, write in scholarly narrative form (no bullets).

· Read the rubric requirements for a heading.

· Read what you wrote in the heading.

· Read the rubric requirements for a heading again.

· Read what you wrote in the section and highlight (in the proposal and the rubric) the rubric elements that you addressed in the heading.

· Revise the heading as needed to include the rubric elements that you missed and eliminate superfluous narrative.

· Start the process at the top again until you have mastered the rubric elements in the heading.

The specific business problem is the genesis of one’s study. It is vital that one has a clear and precise specific business problem. One will align the contents of the Research Question and Purpose Statement with the specific business problem.

The qualitative specific business problem. The qualitative specific business problem must be well defined and not contain multiple issues (variables in quantitative studies). The

following graphic depicts how to include the elements needed in a qualitative specific business problem.

The quantitative specific business problem. The quantitative specific business problem must be well defined and contain the key variables. The following graphic depicts how to include the elements needed in a qualitative specific business problem.

Make certain that the specific business problem, Purpose Statement, and Research Question (RQ) align. A good technique to use to enhance the alignment is to put the specific business problem, RQ, and first sentence of the Purpose Statement together on a blank document to ensure that you are using the same words. Notice the suggested order differs from the order the headings appear in the study.

Qualitative alignment example. The graphic below provides an example of alignment among the Specific Business Problem, Research Question, and first sentence of the Purpose Statement using the same key words. Pay attention to the words one uses in identifying the issue that the leader lacks or has in limited supply. The word determines how one can collect data.

· Some business leaders lack understanding… To ascertain what one understands will require a quantitative design.

· Some business leaders lack knowledge… To ascertain a business leader’s knowledge will require a quantitative design.

· Some business leaders lack strategies (or have limited plans, processes, procedures)… To ascertain a business leader’s strategies may involve interviews, focus groups, company archival records and documents, company policies and procedures, company intranet/Internet site, and direct/participant observation (in some cases) to collect data. Usually interviews or focus groups are the primary data collection method.

· Some business leaders lack skills… To ascertain a business leader’s skills will involve direct/participant observation as the primary data collection method.

Quantitative alignment example. Notice how the Specific Business Problem, Research Question, and first sentence of the Purpose Statement use the same key words with the exception that the research question and subsequent first sentence in the purpose statement do not address the business leader—this is a difference between qualitative and quantitative studies. The following is an example of alignment for a quantitative correlational study.

Hypothetical Example (Correlation Design) Problem Statement

Organizations place great emphasis on retention because of the strategic value of intellectual capital and the costs of replacing valued employees (cite)75. Research in this domain is potentially valuable because turnover costs U.S. businesses billions of dollars per year (cite), and practices that promote retention can save even small companies millions of dollars annually (cite)76. The general business problem is that turnover intention has been shown to be among the best predictors of turnover (cite)77. The specific business problem is that some microelectronic business owners do not understand the relationship between job satisfaction, motivation, and employee turnover intentions78.

Hypothetical Example (Causal-Comparative Design)

Problem Statement

Organizations place great emphasis on retention because of the strategic value of intellectual capital and the costs of replacing valued employees (cite). Research in this domain is potentially valuable because turnover costs U.S. businesses billions of dollars per year (cite), and practices that promote retention can save even small companies millions of dollars annually (cite). The general business problem is that turnover intention have been shown to have a significant impact on employee turnover (cite). The specific business problem is that some micro-electronic business owners do not understand the impact of job satisfaction, motivation, on employee turnover intentions.