PhD: The Pursuit of Excellence

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PhD The Pursuit of Excellence

Kamarul Zaman Bin Ahmad University of Malaya BA (Hons.) Law (Leeds) Bar-at-Law, Lincoln’s Inn, London MBA (University of Malaya) ICSA PhD (University of Manchester, UK)

Australia • Brazil • Japan • Korea • Mexico • Singapore • Spain • United Kingdom • United States

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PhD: The Pursuit of Excellence by Kamarul Zaman Bin Ahmad Copyright © 2007 by (a division of ). ™ is a trademark used herein under license. For more information, please contact: (a dvision of ) 5 Shenton Way #01-01 UIC Building Singapore 068808 Or visit our Internet site at http://www..com

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED No part of this work covered by the copyright hereon may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means—graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, web distribution or information storage and retrieval systems—without the written permission of the publisher.

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offices in Asia: Bangkok, Beijing, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, Seoul, Singapore, Taipei, Tokyo.

Printed in Singapore by Seng Lee Press 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 — 11 10 09 08 07 ISBN-13: 978-981-265-616-2 ISBN-10: 981-265-616-2

Contents

Acknowledgements Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: What is a PhD? Very important development To do or not to do a PhD The difference between a PhD thesis and an MBA thesis The difference between a PhD thesis and a consultancy research report The relationship between a PhD and a journal article The difference between a PhD and a DBA The difference between UK PhDs and US PhDs Chapter 3: Getting into the System Choosing the topic of research Choosing the institution or the supervisor Changing your topic Changing your supervisor Having more than one supervisor Should you do research locally or overseas, full-time or part-time? Chapter 4: Critical Issues to Consider in Research Methodology Errors in research

vii 1 5 6 7 11 14 15 15 17 21 21 24 26 27 28 29

35 35

iv

Contents

Survey methods Tactics to increase response rate in surveys Data collection by observation Experimental research Types of scales Reliability and validity of questionnaires and psychometric tests The art of drafting questionnaires Problems unique to interview schedules Sampling methods

39 41 43 46 48

Chapter 5: The Structure of the PhD What does a PhD thesis actually look like? Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Literature review Chapter 3: Research methodology Chapter 4: Results Chapter 5: Conclusion Other sections

77 77 79 80 81 87 88 89

Chapter 6: The PhD Process What the PhD process is like When to start writing The importance of having multiple back-up copies of your work Managing your relationship with your supervisor My experience as a PhD supervisor

93 93 97

Chapter 7: The Seven Strategies of Excellence Strategy 1: Successful PhD students constantly manage their emotional states and motivate themselves Strategy 2: Successful PhD students decide Strategy 3: Successful PhD students believe having a PhD is a must

49 60 70 72

100 101 102 109 109 111 111

Contents

v

Strategy 4: Successful PhD students sincerely believe that it is possible to complete their PhDs Strategy 5: Successful PhD students accept responsibility for their own destinies Strategy 6: Successful PhD students model on those who have successfully completed their PhDs Strategy 7: Successful PhD students adopt the PDCA approach in TQM Additional tips for success

115 117

Chapter 8: The Viva (Oral Examination) Giving notice of submission The appointment of examiners Preparing for the viva Presenting findings in a conference The viva itself The outcome of the viva

121 121 122 123 124 125 126

Conclusion Epilogue: Life after the PhD References Index

131 135 139 141

112 113 114

Acknowledgements

This book would not have been possible without the goodwill and guidance from a wide range of people. I would first like to thank all those involved in helping me attain my PhD in the first place, including the directors who allowed me access to respondents in their companies and the respondents themselves who spent nearly three hours of sheer mental exertion in completing the tests and questionnaires. I would like to thank Thomson Learning for believing in me and the potential of my first book for the mass market when other publishers I approached were simply interested in publishing textbooks for undergraduate students. I also thank them for continuously encouraging me to write a second book on the same subject. I would like to give special thanks to my supervisor Colin Ingleton whose knowledge in psychology has enabled him to know which of my buttons to press. Life as a PhD student of his was a rich learning experience, from tense to light moments, from exasperation and frustration to exhilarating success, and from ignorance to knowledge. Though his sense of humour may seem cruel at times, he was an excellent motivator and guide. He has:

Taught me but never spoon-fed me. Guided me but always allowed me to make my own little discoveries. Given me confidence but never allowed me to become complacent. Defended me when others were attacking me.

viii

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank members of my family, especially my wife Zaleha who married me shortly before I did my MBA then ICSA then PhD, then writing this book. I am indeed grateful for her patience, sacrifice and support these past ten years. Thanks also to my son Kamarul Shahiran (born during my MBA) and my pretty baby daughter Nur Shahirah (born during the third year of my doctorate studies), who provided pleasant distraction during my studies and a sense of perspective. Also to my late father who passed away earlier this year while this book was being written. However, thanks to Allah, he managed to live long enough to see me complete my PhD. I would also like to thank all the people who have touched my life since completing my PhD – the people who believed in me and my potential, and encouraged me to live life to the fullest and to be everything that I can be. They have made me realise that:

The PhD is not the end of the pursuit of knowledge but the awareness of ignorance and the start of acquisition of new knowledge. The completion of a PhD is not the end of a journey but rather the start of a new life. There is indeed life after the PhD! The possession of knowledge does not equate the ability to impart knowledge. One must not fall into the trap a lot of academic lecturers have fallen into.

CH A P TER

O N E

Introduction

Congratulations! You have purchased this book and you have demonstrated a firm commitment to the next major step towards improving your life, your career and possibly even your relationships. By purchasing this book, you will have a constant guide you can refer to every time you face a challenge in your PhD programme. This book should not be read just once but should be referred to regularly during your PhD candidature be it three years or seven years. By doing so, you can recoup your investment many times over! I thought of several possible titles for this book. Initially I thought of the title PhD: Heaven or Hell? The reason why I initially thought of this title was frankly, the PhD process has been both heaven and hell for me. It was hell when I faced the proverbial brick wall or writer’s block. I have to admit it was hell for my family too who had to put up with me whenever I was in an unresourceful negative state. Eventually, when I realised that I was not getting the results that I wanted, I changed my approach several times until it worked. It was heaven when I made several breakthroughs and finally successfully completed my viva. However, I decided not to adopt that title when I found out that my publishers weren’t too keen on it – it didn’t sound refined enough. Also I personally feel that the word ‘hell’ was a disempowering metaphor for the PhD process. For this reason, I also decided not to adopt the alternative title PhD: To Hell and Back (inspired by the song by Meatloaf). Although the life story of the singer himself, with its ups and downs, is similar to the PhD process, I felt that people are generally more drawn towards the negative connotation than the positive. Therefore the reader might adopt the disempowering belief that the

2

PhD: The Pursuit of Excellence

PhD process is indeed hell and might start looking for evidence to support that belief. This might result in a state of learnt helplessness and self-disempowerment. I thought of several other amusing titles for this book which I feel is not appropriate to mention here – I leave that up to your imagination. I finally decided on the title PhD: The Pursuit of Excellence. In my opinion it sounds rather dignified – as the pursuit of a PhD, for the correct reasons, is indeed dignified. What are the right or wrong reasons for doing a PhD? This is explained later in this book. There are many differences between my first book So you want to get a PhD and this book. My first book was an introductory book aimed at anyone who wanted to know what a PhD was about. It was written in a direct, to-the-point, no-nonsense style, and provides the reader with an understanding of the PhD structure and process, and what it can do for the holder. This book, however, is aimed at the more committed individual who is willing to invest more time in reading a detailed book. I have updated the book and included much more material including an entire chapter on research methodology. I have also included another chapter entitled ‘The Seven Strategies of Excellence’. In this chapter, you will learn how to motivate yourself and increase your chances of successful completion of your PhD. Pursuing and having a PhD can drastically affect your relationships with others, especially your family, for the better or for the worse, depending on how you manage your own emotions. In my earlier book, I explained that I wanted to answer the kind of questions that I found myself asking while I was an MBA student at University of Malaya – things like ‘Is there life after MBA?, Should I do a PhD?, What is a PhD?’ To my knowledge, there was no book presently available at that time in Malaysia that could assist a person desirous of doing a PhD, in deciding whether to do one locally or overseas. I have come across one book that dealt specifically with life as a PhD student in the UK and another that dealt with the career prospects of a PhD holder in the US. However, to my knowledge, there has yet to be a book recently written specifically for people in Malaysia that can assist them in making a rational choice of whether to do a PhD overseas or locally, or to even do a PhD at all. My first book was the result of three and a half years’ experience as a PhD student in the Manchester Business

Introduction

3

School, University of Manchester, UK, and four subsequent years of thoughtful reflection. Without sounding like I’m blowing my own trumpet, my first book was completely sold out. I also had strangers coming up to congratulate me on my book and to thank me. They told me how my book had helped them decide whether or not to do a PhD. This wealth of appreciation encouraged me to contribute more to society, by coming up with a second book that will provide even more strategies for successfully completing a PhD. In addition to that, this book also contains some new information that I gleaned while I was Chairman of the PhD committee at the Faculty of Business and Accountancy, University of Malaya. This book, (like the previous one) is aimed at the many who desire to get a PhD but know little about what a PhD actually is, and the process that one has to go through and the pains that one has to endure in the process of obtaining one. Eliciting and making sense of information provided by current PhD holders can be confusing tasks. This is further exacerbated by the range of PhDs available. The person whom you know may, for instance, have obtained a PhD in the natural sciences like biology or physics, but you may wish to do a PhD in the social sciences such as organisational behaviour or human resources management. As such, the nature of the PhD, as well as the processes that such PhD graduates have gone through, may be different from the one that you will be facing, if you intend to go ahead with your PhD. My PhD thesis can be considered to be a hybrid of industrial organisational psychology, human resources management and organisational behaviour. The citations from my thesis are an invaluable guide to those who intend to pursue, or are already pursuing a PhD in that area. However, there are many similarities with other areas of management including marketing, information technology, TQM, etc. Those who intend to do their research in education or economics will also find this book useful. In short, the main target market of this group are those who intend to do or are already pursuing their PhDs in the social sciences. Only a few references are made to friends of mine who did their PhDs in the natural sciences. This book aims to answer most of the questions pertaining to the nature and structure of the PhD thesis, as well as the processes involved. This book is divided into eight chapters. Chapter 2 answers

4


that all-important question of what a PhD thesis is, and the differences between a thesis and an article, an MBA project paper and a consultancy research report. The difference between a PhD and a DBA are also explained. Chapter 3 proposes some strategies when a student attempts to embark on a PhD course. It gives guidelines on selecting a topic for your research. Also given are some suggestions on whether you should choose the institution or your supervisor, whether you should change your supervisor or research topic, and the pros and cons of having more than one supervisor. Finally it lays down the decision facing most candidates who live in the Far East such as Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Pakistan, India and Thailand – the question of whether you should do your PhD fulltime or part-time, locally or overseas. Chapter 4 is an entirely new chapter and was not in the previous book. It describes, inter alia, the critical issues to consider in your research methodology such as errors in research, survey methods, tactics to increase response rate in surveys, data collection by observation, categories of observation, experimental research, types of scales, reliability and validity of questionnaires and psychometric tests, factors influencing the measurement of test-retest reliability, and sampling methods. Chapter 5 describes the structure of a PhD thesis, i.e. what does it actually look like? What are the chapters, their sequence and contents? In contrast to Chapter 5, which examines the question of what, Chapter 6 looks at the question of how, i.e. the PhD process. It examines the behavioural element, i.e. it addresses issues like when you should start writing, and managing your relationship with your supervisor. Chapter 7 is another entirely new chapter and was not in the previous book. It describes the strategies of excellence practised by successful PhD students such as myself and other successful PhD students. Chapter 8 describes the all-important Judgement Day, i.e. the viva or oral examinations. It is the day when you finally know whether your years of hard work are actually going to pay off. Among the issues described are the appointment of examiners, preparing for the viva and the several possible outcomes of the viva.

CH A P TER

TWO

What is a PhD?

‘What is a PhD?’, I first asked this question when I was still doing my MBA. The answer that I got was, ‘A PhD is an original contribution to knowledge.’ ‘Now what does that mean?’, you may all ask. Believe me, it did not make much sense to me at that time either. I can make more sense out of it now. However, I feel that that definition is woefully inadequate and is in need of further elaboration and explanation. Now, to a layman, ‘an original contribution to knowledge’ can mean many things. However, in the context of a PhD what it actually means is that a person can only be awarded a PhD if he or she has made a discovery that no one else has reported. In the natural sciences, such as biochemistry, it may mean the discovery of new cures for illnesses, the discovery of how certain viruses can be killed by certain drugs, etc. In engineering, it may be the discovery of how previously undiscovered petrol additives can enhance fuel economy (this was an actual PhD project by one of my friends in one of the leading universities in the UK). In the management sciences (of which I am more familiar), it may, for example, involve research to find out whether workers with certain personality traits are more satisfied and perform better if they work in certain types of environments (Ahmad, 2001). The outcome of practically all PhD research is the discovery of something valuable to the academic community that has not been reported elsewhere. By that very definition, it implies that such a discovery must be worthy of publication in an academic journal. Your findings, if published in a journal, may even be cited in a textbook relating to the subject area. Another crucial requirement for the award of a PhD is that your research must be original. Again, the word ‘original’ may mean

6


different things to different people. What does the word ‘original’ actually mean in the context of a PhD? Well, according to Phillips and Pugh (2000, p. 63), originality can comprise any one or more of the following: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

Carrying out empirical work that hasn’t been done before. Making a synthesis that hasn’t been made before. Using already known material but with a new interpretation. Trying out something in this country that has previously only been done in other countries. Taking a particular technique and applying it in a new area. Bringing new evidence to bear on an old issue. Being cross-disciplinary and using different methodologies. Looking at areas the people in the discipline haven’t looked at before. Adding to knowledge in a way that hasn’t been done before.

The question that I am sure you will ask now is whether it would be sufficient to satisfy only one of the above-mentioned criteria. I would advise against research that would only satisfy one of the above criteria. For example, you may be tempted to adopt only criteria number four. This would be the simplest route. All you have to do is fish out one article from a journal where the study was conducted in a foreign country, and replicate the study hook, line and sinker in your home country. I would be extremely reluctant to supervise such students, unless they can show me that they intend to fulfil at least a few other criteria as well. Students may want a quick PhD or take the simplest route. Believe me, there are no shortcuts in a true PhD. The saying, ‘no pain, no gain’ is extremely appropriate for PhD degrees. That is why they are rare, compared to other degrees.

Very Important Development In addition to the above requirements, it has become increasingly apparent to me when I was Chairman of the PhD committee at the

What is a PhD?

7

Faculty of Business and Accountancy, University of Malaya, that a new requirement seems to have surfaced – that the PhD student is required to find out exactly what was wrong with the previous studies in the subject area – and how the research proposed by him or her overcomes or avoids this particular problem. In addition to this, there also has to be a contribution in the literature by coming up with a new theory. Although I have accomplished these in my PhD thesis, I have come across several PhD theses in the past where these were not done. It seems more likely that in the future, students who fail to address these issues, will also fail in their PhD viva (oral exam).

To Do or Not To Do a PhD I believe that it is not the degree in itself that is valuable, but rather the person you become as a result of pursuing a PhD course to its successful completion. If it was just the piece of paper, then you can purchase a PhD qualification on the Internet without having to submit a thesis or sit for examinations! You will still be the same person, perhaps a couple of thousand dollars poorer. What is important is the journey itself which will transform you for the better, not the certificate. You would have cheated yourself of a valuable experience and misrepresented yourself to others. I recall one internationally renowned wealth guru who said something to this effect: ‘It is not the million dollars that is important but the person you become while you obtain the million dollars that is important – for if the million dollars were gone, you would be no less a person as a result of it.’ If you lost that million dollars, you can easily get it back because of the person you are. Many people have become millionaires only to lose everything. But their fighting spirit never allowed them to give up and they managed to get it all back and even more! Thus it is not the paper certificate or even the thesis in itself, but rather the person you become as a result of the successful pursuit of the PhD that is important. Hence there are several wrong reasons for doing a PhD.

8


Examples of wrong reasons:

I want to become a millionaire. I want title, prestige and glamour. I want to climb the managerial corporate ladder. If others can do it, why can’t I?

When I was contemplating doing a PhD, I often made the mistake of asking others and myself the following question: ‘What do I have to do to get a PhD?’ I have lost count of the number of my students (Masters and undergraduate) that have asked me the same question. I am also sure that many of you readers out there have also asked the very same question. It is blatantly obvious that when we ask such a question, we have certain motivations. We are more interested in getting the qualification of a PhD and the title of ‘Dr’ rather than the knowledge that can be gained by pursuing a course at the PhD level. If that is all that you are interested in, you will find yourself dropping out of the course shortly after embarking on it. Believe me, it is not worth the pain or mental anguish it can bring, not to mention the high cost (which includes opportunity cost). If any of you think along these lines, it is my sincere hope that this book will make you rethink doing a PhD. It is not the objective of this book to discourage readers from doing a PhD. Rather, this book will hopefully make you reassess your motives, and if you do finally decide to do a PhD, it will be for the correct reasons. I can safely say that a person who enrols in a PhD course will soon be disillusioned and discouraged as he or she progresses through the course. If the wrong motives are not substituted by the correct ones during the duration of the course, there is a strong likelihood of such a student dropping out. In managerial positions, the cost often cannot be recovered because you are not automatically promoted by virtue of having a PhD. Notice that my statement is confined to only managerial positions. You will more likely be promoted in the technical field (e.g. an engineer with a PhD in petrochemical studies, who works in the R&D department of an oil company). In the academic sector, a PhD is not only desirable but also regarded by many as essential for promotion purposes.

What is a PhD?

9

Hence, the correct reasons for doing a PhD are:

To excel in the academic sector. A PhD is vital for promotions and having credibility especially in lectures and conferences. To fulfil a desire to become a researcher (whether in the natural sciences or social sciences), and to equip oneself with the necessary tools and knowledge.

In my opinion PhD courses offered in the UK are the best training grounds for a budding researcher. It is also a test of whether you have the necessary intelligence, personality, attitudes and temperament to be a researcher. A PhD candidate has to be insightful, resourceful, articulate and tenacious. I feel that in view of the long periods of solitude, an introvert would be more suited than an extrovert as a PhD student, ceteris paribus. Temperament here may refer to determination, perseverance and application. Also, as uncertainty is inherent in a doctoral programme, a tolerance of ambiguity is a prerequisite for successful research work. I feel that a student who significantly lacks any one or more of these attributes will face more difficulty in completing the course. In summary, if your future aspiration is to become an academic, then a PhD is not only desirable, but essential. If you are currently a researcher in the R&D department, then a relevant PhD in the natural sciences will no doubt be beneficial. If your future aspiration is to climb up the managerial corporate ladder, then a PhD should not be undertaken as it would be a waste of time and money and may even jeopardise your performance in your current job (since you will be taking time off to do your PhD). A manager will not automatically be paid more by virtue of having a PhD. In some instances it may reduce chances of obtaining jobs elsewhere, as often a PhD holder would be branded a theorist and ineffective in the real world (a perception that I thoroughly disagree with). Another question that a person might ask is, ‘What is a thesis?’ The word ‘thesis’ is often used loosely by students in Masters or even undergraduate courses when they refer to their project paper. The word ‘thesis’ in the context of a PhD is different altogether. The word ‘thesis’ is derived from the Greek word ‘place’. Thus, it is a

10


position that you wish to argue. A PhD must have a thesis in that it must put forward an argument. In order to do so there has to be a storyline in the form of a coherent thrust which pushes along an argument or explanation. The argument can be operationalised by way of a number of hypotheses. A hypothesis is basically an unproven statement or proposition about a factor or phenomenon that is of interest to the researcher. It may often be a tentative statement about relationships between two or more variables or it may be a possible answer to the research question. There are different opinions among researchers on whether the formulation of hypotheses prior to data collection is mandatory in research. For instance, I have came across theses in which there were no hypotheses. There are some supervisors who advocate that hypotheses are not always necessary in research and that they unnecessarily restrict the imaginative researcher. You may want to consult certain books on research methodology if you wish to follow this line of thinking. The more popular view, however, is that one should have hypotheses in research. One such author, Kerlinger (1986), says that hypotheses can play a valuable role in systematising research. The hypothesis is a prediction and can be tested and shown to be probably true or probably false by reference to more powerful evidence than simply observing without prediction. ‘Hypotheses are part of the rules of the game’ (Kerlinger, 1986, p. 23). He went even further to explain why hypotheses play a valuable role. He advocates that even when the results were not as predicted by the hypotheses, knowledge was advanced: Negative findings are sometimes as important as positive ones since they cut down the total universe of ignorance and sometimes point up fruitful further hypotheses and lines of investigation. But the scientist cannot tell positive from negative evidence unless he uses hypotheses.1

Furthermore, during my candidature as Director of the PhD programme, I observed a trend that hypotheses are almost always 1

From Foundations of Behavioral Research, 3rd edition, by F.N. Kerlinger, © 1986. Reprinted with permission of Wadsworth, a division of Thomson Learning.

11

What is a PhD?

mandatory in research. In light of this, I strongly suggest that you should form hypotheses in your research.

The Difference Between a PhD Thesis and an MBA Thesis The differences between a PhD thesis and an MBA thesis are summarised in the table below. Differences between a PhD and an MBA PhD thesis

MBA thesis

Length

100,000 words

10,000–30,000 words

Methodology

New

Replication

Sample size

Larger

Smaller

Period taken to complete

3–6 years

3–6 months (if the thesis is done in partial fulfilment of a taught course)

Depth and width

Great depth, narrow focus

Wide focus, relatively shallow

From this table, it is fairly obvious that a PhD thesis is lengthier than an MBA thesis. One is also given more time to complete the PhD. A PhD thesis can be ten times longer than an MBA thesis. However, length is not the only difference. A more important difference is that of depth. A PhD thesis focuses on a few issues but investigates them at great depth. For example, an MBA research project often requires the student to go to a company, identify the problems faced by the company, and recommend some solutions to solve the problems. Whilst this is acceptable at the MBA level, it is not acceptable at the PhD level. The focus of the MBA is the company in which the research was conducted. The focus of the PhD, however, is the nature of relationships between variables. Another

12


distinction between an MBA thesis and a PhD thesis is the level of analyses. For example, at an MBA level, a student can investigate the relationship between personality and performance. However, although this study looks at the relationship between variables, it may not be sufficient for a PhD. At the PhD level, the student has to go one step further. He perhaps has to investigate the moderating effect of the work environment on the relationship between personality and performance (Ahmad, 2001). Notice that the level of analysis in a PhD is more complex and at a higher level than that in an MBA. There may be PhDs in the past (over fifteen years ago) that have merely looked at the relationship between personality and performance. These were done before the Windows versions of statistical programs were available on personal computers. Statistical analyses were much more difficult to conduct in those days. However, such theses may not be sufficiently complex in this day and age. Yet another difference between an MBA thesis and a PhD thesis lies in the citations and references to original work. For instance, in an MBA thesis, it is permissible to quote an authority quoting someone else. For instance, a student can quote from a textbook regarding say, Maslow’s theory of motivation. However, this is not acceptable for a PhD thesis where the student would be expected to have read and evaluated Maslow’s article in the original publication. The table below shows the differences in behaviour between students pursuing a PhD and those pursuing an MBA. Differences in student behaviour

Interaction with teachers and students

PhD course

MBA course

Less

More

Supervisor

Laissez faire

Directive

Classes

None or only in the first year

More

Time

More time for reflection, inspiration and finally proofreading

Time is of the essence, hence speed is paramount

What is a PhD?

13

It can be seen that a PhD student spends a major part of the course in solitude compared with the MBA student who has the benefit of interaction with other students in the classroom. A PhD student has to spend far more time on thought and reflection, as the supervisor often will refrain from giving explicit instructions on what to do. The student will have to find out things by oneself. Often, the student is left alone, and the feeling of being abandoned by the supervisor is common. This does not necessarily mean that the supervisors are irresponsible, unhelpful and uncaring. Rather, it is part of the training for PhD students to discover things on their own. After all, I believe (after this fact was drummed in by my supervisor) that the objective of a PhD course is to train you to be an autonomous professional researcher, not an efficient research assistant! The thesis has to be carefully crafted like a book, hence more time has to be spent on proofreading, clarifying ambiguities, and correcting grammar and typographical errors. However, writing a PhD thesis is more difficult than writing a book. In a PhD thesis, research has to be conducted, data analysed and findings reported in a satisfactory manner. Furthermore, a student has to be careful of what he writes as he can be cross-examined on any statements he has made in his thesis. Theoretically he must be capable of defending every statement in his thesis. Thus a valuable piece of advice that I can give to readers is this: after you have finished writing every statement, ask yourself whether you are able to defend it. Another distinction that I have made recently is that the theoretical and conceptual framework is crucial in a PhD thesis. In a recent viva in which I was the external examiner, every student was questioned about his or her theoretical framework and conceptual model. Students were required to draw from their literature review, a theoretical framework which could be distilled into research questions and hypotheses. Without this, no student could ever hope to pass his or her viva. The holder of a doctorate is someone who is recognised as an authority by the academic and professional sector. Some have proclaimed that a PhD is a licence to teach. However, I feel that it is much more than that. I believe that a true PhD holder is a fully

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professional researcher and is able to demonstrate all of the following:

You must have a command of what published research has been conducted in your subject area not only locally but worldwide. You must have sufficient command of your subject area in order to become aware of the limitations of the past research and where you can make a useful contribution. In addition to the analytical tools that you have used in your research, you must also be familiar with other analytical tools that could have been used in your research. You must be able to argue why the methods that you have chosen are superior to the alternatives. You must be aware of the limitations of your research and of others’. You must be aware of the paradigms and work within them (at least during your candidature as a PhD student). You must be able to communicate your results effectively in conferences, seminars and other venues in the professional arena. You must be aware of the ethical principles governing research and work within them.

In order to be awarded a PhD, you have to be able to carve out a researchable topic, master the techniques required and put them to appropriate use. You must also be able to communicate your findings clearly and convincingly. Your research must have both theoretical and practical contributions. The award of a PhD is evidence that you have mastered certain research skills and that you have obtained the skills necessary to become a fully professional researcher.

The Difference Between a PhD Thesis and a Consultancy Research Report There are also differences between a PhD thesis and a consultancy research report. I have come across many students who wanted to

What is a PhD?

15

do a PhD but proposed to do a research that resembled more of a consultancy research. The main difference between a PhD thesis and a consultancy report is this: a consultant would investigate the problems in the company and come up with several alternative solutions and some recommendations for management. The sole purpose is to diagnose and solve the problem unique to that company. In a PhD thesis, however, a general phenomena has to be investigated. For instance, in the subject of industrial organisational psychology, one would investigate whether extroverts would be more satisfied if they were made to work in large groups rather than small ones (Ahmad, 2001). The actual study should be conducted in a few companies. In the consultancy report, the focus would be on the problems unique to the company, whereas in the PhD the focus would be on the behaviour and attitudes of people in general (or people of a certain category).

The Relationship Between a PhD and a Journal Article As mentioned earlier, the findings of the PhD research can be published in journal articles. In fact it almost always is. A necessary (but not sufficient) condition for a PhD to be awarded is that the research must be worthy of publication. Very often the findings in the PhD research can be broken down into three or four separate parts and reported separately in different articles. As such, several articles reported in management journals may actually have been derived from one PhD thesis.

The Difference Between a PhD and a DBA One question that has been asked of me of late is, ‘What is the difference between a PhD and a DBA?’ This question was frequently

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asked because lately, there have been several overseas universities that offered DBA (Doctor of Business Administration) courses in Malaysia. The Manchester Business School, University of Manchester also offered DBA courses together with the PhD. When I was a PhD student there, I asked some of the resident professors the very same question. According to them, the DBA was first offered by Harvard University in the US. It was formed with the intention that it should be more practical rather than theoretical. The DBA in Harvard was of course prestigious because of the association with that particular university. However, recently many other universities have started offering DBAs. In the Manchester Business School, there are many similarities between the PhD and the DBA. However, on average, DBA students have been known to finish the course quicker than PhD students. Also, in principle, the requirement for theoretical contributions in a PhD thesis is far greater compared to a DBA thesis. These two factors have resulted in many students (who were envisaging a career in the academic sector) to opt for the PhD. Recently I have come across several foreign universities that were offering DBAs in Malaysia. An interesting thing was that in the course, students were expected to prepare an assignment for each subject (totalling about eight to ten subjects) and a final dissertation of between 30,000 and 70,000 words. This can be contrasted to the UK PhD in which the students are expected to write a thesis of up to 100,000 words that has to be defended rigorously before two examiners (excluding their supervisors). I have come across many PhD students who have failed their viva or oral examinations despite having managed to complete writing their 100,000word thesis. One Australian university, for example, claims that their DBA course is not meant for those who intend to pursue careers as academic lecturers at universities, but rather as practitioners in the corporate world. It is just as rigorous as a PhD with the exception that it does not require the student to come up with a contribution to theory (i.e. the student is not required to come up with new theories). The contribution to knowledge is only empirical. Now a graduate with a DBA is entitled to have the title ‘Doctor’ very much like

What is a PhD?

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a PhD graduate can. Many would therefore be tempted to do the DBA rather than the PhD because of the time constraint. Of course, I may be biased, but I have never regretted doing a PhD instead of a DBA. However, the choice is yours. You would have to weigh all the pros and cons.

The Difference Between UK PhDs and US PhDs The nature of the work undertaken in a PhD course in the UK differs substantially from that in the US. In the UK, the thesis forms the main part of the course. For instance, the thesis is substantial in length (around 100,000 words). Not only that, the degree of difficulty and the contribution to knowledge (explained earlier) have to be substantial. In the US, however, the structure of the PhD course is very similar to that of an MBA in that there are several taught subjects and students have to sit for examinations in those subjects. After that is done, the students have to do a small dissertation of around 30,000 words. Obviously, the standard required is higher than that of an MBA. But the structure is the same in that there are taught courses with examinations and students only spend about 25 per cent of the duration of the course on the thesis. I did my thesis in the Manchester Business School, University of Manchester, in the UK. We spent the first year going to classes; sat for the statistics examinations; prepared assignments for several subjects such as social research methods, applied statistics, literature review, and epistemology; and did a pilot project. However, the main purpose of the assignments was for the university to determine if we had the necessary skills and knowledge to proceed with our research. At the end of the year, we were required to give a research proposal presentation. It is at this point that the university determines whether the research that we have proposed is viable. If the university is of the opinion that our research proposal is viable, then we are allowed to proceed. If not, then they will either ask the

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student to revise the proposal to one that is satisfactory, or recommend continuing along the MPhil (Master of Philosophy) route instead. Of course, the student may also choose to voluntarily drop out. In other words, the research proposal presentation is the basis on which the university forms the opinion of whether the student has a viable research plan in which to carry out and write up his research. It is vital to determine this at this stage as the research and writing up is a process that will normally take at least another two and a half years for a full-time student. In some cases it can even extend to another four years, even for a full-timer. If the university is of the opinion that the research proposed is not satisfactory, then the university will inform the student of this fact. Thus no further time (of the student and his or her supervisor) will be wasted. The pilot project (mentioned earlier) is also another factor in which the university assesses whether the student is capable of conducting research. The pilot project is actually a part or a component of the overall research, conducted on a far smaller sample of around fifty people. Success in the pilot project is persuasive evidence that the research proposal is viable and the student is capable of handling the research. The thorny issue of access is resolved, as the student has demonstrated that he or she is capable of gaining access to respondents in the research that he or she has proposed. In the Manchester Business School, success at the research proposal stage acts only as a green light for the student to proceed. It does not, however, guarantee that the student will pass the viva or oral examinations even if one manages to carry out the research as per the proposal. I have came across several students in my university and many more in other universities who did not manage to complete their PhD successfully even though their proposal was approved earlier. This may be because the students had not been able to express their arguments cogently, coherently and clearly in the thesis or in the viva. Students have had their theses torn to shreds (metaphorically) by the external examiners. One cannot say decisively which type of PhD is better – UK or US. There are pros and cons of each type. If you are exam-oriented, prefer to study a wider range of topics and are not able to write long dissertations, then I suggest that you do your PhD in the US.

What is a PhD?

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However, if there is a particular field that you wish to specialise in and you wish to conduct detailed rigorous research (say in a particular aspect of psychology), then the UK PhD is probably better for you. A UK PhD is more unstructured. Many moments are spent gazing across open fields chasing that elusive idea. I enjoyed my PhD since I was always trying to come up with something new and novel. It taps the creative element in you. However, at the same time, it is also demanding in that you are constantly required to work on the same problem for many years. As for Australian universities, I have heard that some universities there have adopted the US style while others have opted for the UK style. It is best that you check directly with the universities before applying.

CH A P TER

THR EE

Getting into the System

Choosing the Topic of Research By now most of you would have at least decided on the subject area that you wish to do your research in. For those of you who contemplate doing a PhD in management, you may have considered doing a thesis on finance, organisational behaviour, marketing, operations management, corporate strategy, etc. Your choice of topic should be governed by:

your interest (and not of your parents or friends or imposed by the supervisor) future aspirations (e.g. to lecture in that subject area) market demand for that subject past education and experience whether or not the area has previously been well researched by others.

You are often alone in your research, and doing something that you enjoy helps the process very much. Often in times of crisis, this is the major factor that can greatly affect your decision to either continue persevering, or to give up altogether. PhD courses have high drop-out rates (which is more common than actually failing the oral examinations) as the initial enthusiasm will eventually decline. The decision to do a PhD and the subject area of research should be your own and not that of your parents or friends. It is about time that you exercise your right on what you intend to do, not only for the next three or four years, but for the rest of your

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life. If your future aspiration is to become a lecturer, then the topic of your research should be in a subject area that you will enjoy teaching. It should also be one that is popular and fairly established such as organisational behaviour, human resources, marketing, finance, etc. Otherwise you will end up having knowledge that is not valued by a large section of the community. One has to be pragmatic about this. Your knowledge must be marketable. In other words, you must be able to generate income through your expertise and knowledge in that area. After all, that is what the knowledge economy is all about. There is little point in being a so-called expert in an area that is regarded as trivial (rightly or wrongly) to your customers/students. As for me personally, the most important requirement is that the knowledge that I gain must be marketable outside the university, i.e. it must add value to organisations and individuals and help them enhance their business and/or personal lives. In this regard, I differ from the traditional academic who is only looking at employment within the university. I can say that a few lecturers, particularly in other fields, have gone into areas so remote and detached from the real world, that the only place they can make a living is within the deep recesses of universities. You might want to do a PhD in a subject that you have some prior knowledge and experience in, as you may not wish to start from scratch. This will certainly boost your confidence and reduce the time required to complete your PhD. On the other hand, you may decide to go into an area that is somewhat unfamiliar to you – area in which you have little experience or knowledge. You may want to do this because you have decided to change your line of work, or area of specialisation. This was exactly what I did. I myself decided to do a PhD in applied psychology at work, although I did not possess a degree in psychology. As such, a great deal of my first year was spent reading psychology textbooks all by myself. You may not wish to do the same. Similarly, a classmate of mine at the Manchester Business School wanted to develop a software program to help in financial analyses but he had no prior knowledge in computer programming. According to him, he spent two years of his PhD programme just learning programming. He was still doing his PhD when I attended my convocation in July 2001.

Getting Into the System

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You may decide to choose an area that already has been well researched by others. The question that you may ask yourself is, ‘How can I be original when other researchers have already conducted and published research in that area?’ Another question that you may ask yourself is, ‘How can I contribute something new in an area that has already been well researched by others, i.e. how can I contribute to knowledge?’ Do not be afraid to choose a subject that is popular. For example, organisational commitment, management of change, culture and job satisfaction, are current business issues. This means that a lot of information is available. This is an asset rather than a liability. By having a great deal of previously published research readily available to you, you will be able to cite more than enough articles in your literature review. Not only that, you can and you must critically analyse the methodology of the previous research and come up with your recommendations, i.e. a new methodology which will be used in your current research that overcomes the problems or criticisms of previous research. You may wonder how you will be able to find fault with previous studies especially those that have been published in reputed international journals by world-renowned professors. Rest assured, it is possible. In fact, this is exactly what I have managed to accomplish in my PhD research. The next questions that you may ask are, ‘What happens if I’m not able to do this?’ and ‘Is it a necessary and critical requirement?’ Frankly, I’m not certain if all examiners are of the view that this condition is mandatory, because there was some debate about this when I was Chairman of the PhD committee. However, what I am certain of is, if you are able to fulfil this condition, your chances of passing the viva is greatly increased. On the other hand, there are some students who have chosen a topic primarily because not much research has been conducted in that area. This in fact, was done by one of my classmates at the Manchester Business School. When he presented his proposal, there were objections by the chairman who said that it is not sufficient merely to argue that not enough research has been done. There should be some critical analyses of previous research which justifies conducting the new research proposed. Undaunted, my classmate went on to do his research and completed his PhD in three years

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(he was among the first in the class to complete his doctorate). But I do recall that his literature review was rather short simply because not enough studies have been conducted in that area. He even had to cite other seemingly unrelated studies and draw analogies with his research. In other words, he had to exercise a certain degree of lateral thinking. So it is clear that this option is not a short cut, and taking this route presents the traveller with its own set of challenges.

Choosing the Institution or the Supervisor When I was contemplating doing a PhD, a well-known professor once advised me, ‘Select the supervisor, not the institution.’ He added, ‘First of all, do a Literature search. Find out who is influential in the subject area or topic that you intend to do your research in. Then, write to him or her and forward your research proposal.’ The rationale behind this is that the supervisor is the person with whom you will be dealing for the most part of your PhD course. Furthermore, even leading institutions may not have an academic staff that is considered to be an expert in the area that you wish to do your research in. It is certainly a privilege to be a student of wellknown people such as Vroom (a well-known figure in organisational behaviour. Some might even be too intimidated to write to him). Valuable lessons can be learnt through their expert guidance. You will obviously benefit by having such a supervisor. However, it does not mean that all other supervisors are not qualified. What you do not want is to have a supervisor who knows little about your subject area and is only able to correct your grammar and spelling mistakes. That may sound ridiculous, but I have actually heard my friends saying exactly that about their supervisors. Such supervisors offer little assistance. Apart from expert knowledge, personal compatibility is also important in choosing your supervisor. As you will have to communicate with your supervisor for the next three to eight years, it is


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vital that you are able to get along with him or her. So, how can you ensure this? Well, quite easy really. You may choose someone whom you already know personally – perhaps your lecturer in your Masters programme. Of course, he or she must be a PhD holder (This seems to be a requirement of University of Malaya, although not of some universities in the UK! The rationale for the stance taken by University of Malaya is that only a person who has undergone the PhD process himself or herself is competent enough to guide a PhD student. I believe that this is generally true – and with generalisations, there are obviously some exceptional individuals). If you have sat through an entire course under this lecturer and found him or her to be a reasonable person (i.e. one whom you think you can work with), you may approach him or her to be your supervisor. This in fact was done by a few PhD students of mine – they were previously my MBA students. Although choosing the supervisor rather than the institution may be the ideal method, there can be several reasons why one should write to the institution and not the supervisor. Schedules of internationally renowned professors are extremely tight. They are hard pressed for time and probably have many PhD students under them. Chances of such professors accepting students who write to them directly are slim. To be accepted, your research proposal has to be outstanding. There must be something in your proposal that makes it stand out (favourably) among the crowd. It takes a great deal of time (perhaps even more than a year) to come up with such a proposal, if one can do it at all! Remember that at this stage you will probably have to write your proposal without any guidance, since you do not yet have a supervisor. Therefore, it is often easier to write to a well-established institution, indicating your area of interest. The person or committee in charge of research degrees in the university will probably then speak to the relevant professor or lecturer and seek his or her consent. I myself chose the institution rather than the supervisor. I applied to the Manchester Business School, University of Manchester, and sent in a proposal. The research degrees committee chose one of their lecturers (Dr Colin Ingleton, a chartered psychologist) who was the most appropriate person based on my proposal.

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If you wish to seek more information or wish to apply to any particular university in the UK, you should visit the British Council. There are directories with addresses of universities. There are also the standard forms to fill in. When I first applied in 1996, I had to fill in a form and was able to apply to only three universities. You should go there yourself to check on the latest regulations as they may change from time to time. Alternatively, if you wish to do your PhD in the US, you should go to MACEE (Malaysian-American Commission on Education Exchange). In other words, the offices that you have to visit to enquire are the same as those for Masters and undergraduate courses. If you have done either your Masters or undergraduate degree overseas, then you will have some experience in this matter.

Changing Your Topic Question: What if your supervisor suggests that you to do something different from what you have indicated in your proposal?

Do you ignore his suggestion and carry out your research exactly as laid out in your proposal?, or Do you accept his advice, abandon your earlier proposal and follow his suggestion?

The correct decision will depend on three main factors: 1. The degree of difference between your proposal and that of your supervisor’s. 2. The strength of your desire to carry out research as per your proposal. 3. Whether there are any cogent reasons for you not accepting his proposal. If there is not much difference between your proposal and your supervisor’s, my recommendation is to follow your supervisor’s.


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This is particularly so if the topic remains the same (e.g. job satisfaction) and if the supervisor is merely suggesting that you look at it from another perspective or use a slightly different methodology. Your supervisor has probably spotted potential problems in your proposal (problems not immediately apparent to you but which he has been able to spot by virtue of his greater experience and knowledge). Since he is generous enough to offer you an alternative, by all means, accept the gift gracefully and be thankful. Not all supervisors are willing to do this. Some supervisors may just say that the research that you proposed is not sufficient to be awarded a PhD without offering any alternatives. In short, my recommendation to you is that if your supervisor’s suggestion does not drastically involve changing your proposal, accept his suggestion. The consequences of not doing so can be disastrous for you. A classmate of mine was in such a situation. He refused to change his proposal even though his supervisor had suggested an alternative. He worked on his thesis for a year and presented his research proposal before a committee. His proposal was rejected.

Changing Your Supervisor Although I have recommended that you should adopt your supervisor’s suggestions, it does not necessarily mean that you should always forgo your ambitions and ideas for your supervisor’s. There may be circumstances where you should not accept your supervisor’s proposal. Such circumstances are: 1. If the subject area is totally different. For example, you plan to do a research in organisational behaviour and your supervisor asks you to do a research on marketing. This is rare, but not impossible. 2. If the topic is different e.g. if you wish to do research on personality and satisfaction but your supervisor asks you to do a research on culture or R&D. If learning about R&D is not

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your cup of tea and you do not wish to be an academic specialising in that area, then you should refuse. 3. If there are other lecturers readily available, within the university or outside, in your area of interest. In such cases the proper course of action is to change your supervisor. This can easily be done if the new supervisor is attached to the same university and he agrees to be your new supervisor. However, if there is no one within the university who is able and willing to act in this role, then you may have to find someone from another university. If you are able to find a supervisor in a different university who is willing to accept you as his student, then you will have to apply to that university for a transfer. Now this may be a little more complex in Malaysia. You may have to resign from a PhD programme in one university and enrol in another programme in a different university. If there are special requirements, such as attending compulsory courses in the latter university, then the student may have to start the PhD course all over again. In other words, the student’s completion may be delayed. However, this disruption can be minimised if the decision to change the supervisor is taken at the early stages of the PhD programme.

Having More Than One Supervisor There may be instances where a student needs more than one supervisor, either simultaneously or consecutively. This may happen where the student is doing an interdisciplinary study and there is nobody available considered to be expert enough in both fields. Desirable though it may seem (because he has two supervisors for the price of one), there is the potential for violation of one of the classic management principles – unity of command. A student may find himself torn between two supervisors who give contradicting instructions. Another scenario is one where a student changes his supervisor halfway through his course. This was exactly what happened to


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my classmate. He wanted to do a thesis in finance that involved writing his own computer software program. He had one supervisor who was knowledgeable in computing for the first two years and another supervisor who was an expert in finance for the remainder of the period. For him, having two supervisors was a necessity, not a luxury.

Should You Do Research Locally or Overseas, Full-Time or Part-Time? If you reside in Malaysia, you may wish to do your PhD locally rather than overseas, primarily because of the lower costs. University fees in the UK, US and Australia are obviously higher compared with Malaysian universities. Furthermore, you can work while doing your PhD in Malaysia, thus minimising opportunity costs. Malaysians will find it more difficult to get work permits in the UK, US and Australia if they are studying there. They are also able to minimise disruptions to their family life by staying at home. Their spouses and children do not have to face the inconvenience of having to find new jobs and schools, respectively. I can safely say that these are the main reasons why many of my friends have opted to do their PhDs in Malaysia. Of course there are other reasons why people would want to do their PhDs overseas, e.g. their courses are sponsored and they have young families. However, there are some drawbacks to doing a PhD course in a local university. The major one is the difficulty in obtaining journal articles in their full versions. Some universities may subscribe to electronic journals, i.e. full versions of articles which can be obtained via the Internet. However, I have noticed that electronic articles in management rarely go beyond the previous five years. You may need to go as far back as twenty to thirty years for purposes of your research. Other databases (in the form of CD-ROMs such as ABI/INFORM) may only contain the citation and abstracts. It was much simpler obtaining full versions of articles in the UK.

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If the university that I was studying in did not have one, then the library staff would arrange for an interlibrary loan. Usually the article was traced to another university where it was photocopied and sent to my university library. Another major difficulty is obtaining the more obscure books. British universities are well stocked with useful books. Again, if the book that I required was not stocked in my university library, I would request the library staff for the book to be borrowed from another university library, on an interlibrary loan. Students are usually allowed to borrow items for three weeks. There are far more universities in the UK compared to a developing country like Malaysia and therefore one would have greater chances in the UK of successfully locating a book. I remember when I was doing my MBA thesis in Malaysia, I wanted to refer to an authoritative book on job satisfaction. I was informed at that time that the book was not available in any of the universities in Malaysia. On the other hand, the book was readily available in the University of Manchester library. My supervisor even had his own personal copy in his room! However, when I was writing my first book in 2003, there were few improvements in the availability of databases in public university libraries. When I was doing my PhD in the UK, I relied extensively on the Social Sciences Citation Index or SSCI. The SSCI is one of the most comprehensive databases that I have encountered. For me it was virtually a one-stop search station. If an article I was looking for did not surface, I can be fairly confident that it did not exist (or at least not in reputed journals). Thus I did not have to do multiple searches in multiple databases. The problem with doing such multiple searches is that you may have 200 articles from one database and another 200 articles from another database. But you do not have a total of 400 articles because when you compare the two lists, you find that about 120 articles were reported in both databases. Also, a lot of time is wasted reconciling the two lists. If you use more than two databases, your problems will be compounded. The SSCI overcomes this problem by being a comprehensive one-stop station. However, the only drawback with the SSCI is that they do not have the full-length version for all the articles – only the abstracts and citations were available (at the time


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when I did my PhD). Thus you may still have to trace the full-length article from the hard copy of the journal in the library. But my argument is you may not need the full-length journals of all the articles cited. The abstracts provided by the SSCI give a very good starting point. I believe that most of the local universities have adopted either the SSCI or its equivalent (in their view). So it seems that research is becoming easier to conduct in Malaysia. As for other universities in Asia, I am not able to comment specifically – you will have to come to your own conclusions. Both local and overseas PhD courses can be done full-time or part-time in most universities. Generally speaking, part-time students take nearly twice as long to complete their PhDs compared to full-time students. However I think the attrition rate of part-time students is higher (although I have not conducted any analysis of this). I believe this is true because the part-time students can be easily distracted from their PhDs, due to the demand of their jobs, or simply boredom since the part-time PhD takes twice as long. Probably the main reason for the diminishing initial enthusiasm is the length of time that one has to spend working on a single problem. A PhD requires a lot of thought and reflection. The thought process can be frequently disrupted if one has a thousand and one things to do at the office, and twice as much housework to do at home. Another danger facing part-time students is that their research may be rendered obsolete even before they complete their PhDs. There is a real danger of somebody else out there doing exactly the same thing but finishing and publishing his work earlier (I had nightmares of this while I was doing my PhD!). Another possibility is that whilst a student is doing his or her PhD, an article may have been published by someone renowned in that area that coincidentally criticises a methodology or theory that the student is relying upon. I heard a story of a PhD student who after being a full-time PhD student for two years decided to take just one year off to work. During that time an article was published by someone else that, by coincidence, raised serious theoretical issues in this student’s research. The response from the student’s supervisor was, ‘Well, that is just too bad.’ The student never got his PhD.

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I have came across students who initially did their PhDs fulltime for a year or more in the UK and then returned to Malaysia to complete the course. Their initial intention was perhaps to save money. However these students ended up taking a longer time getting their PhDs than if they had stayed in the UK. Furthermore, a great deal of the money that was saved was subsequently lost by having to pay for frequent flights to and from the UK. The student cannot rely merely on emails and telephone calls. Regular face-to-face interaction with the supervisor is needed in order for the student and the supervisor to spark ideas off each other. As the saying goes, ‘Out of sight, out of mind’. The supervisor whose student has left the country may feel that the student is not committed enough to the PhD process. Thus lesser attention may be given to him or her. Despite the pitfalls facing the part-time student, you may still wish to do your PhD on a part-time basis. In that case, I offer you the following advice: 1. Set aside regular periods of your time for your PhD work. Make sure the timetable is realistic, then stick to it. A realistic target would be every alternate weekend plus one or two evenings during the week day. It would be unrealistic to set a target of every evening plus every weekend for most people. Remember, a PhD course done part-time may take between five and eight years. 2. Choose a research topic that is related to your work. This would be easier for lecturers. They need only to choose a topic that they are currently teaching. Knowledge gained by reading research articles can be incorporated into lectures. However remember that there is a limit to this as a PhD research is very focused. For instance, you are a lecturer of organisational behaviour and may want to do research into a particular aspect of organisational culture. Organisational culture is usually only one of the ten or eighteen topics in a typical syllabus on organisational behaviour. 3. If you are a university lecturer and doing a PhD locally, you may choose a lecturer from your own university. Logistically


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speaking, this would make meetings easier to conduct. Another reason is that you probably do not have to pay any fees, or the fees charged are nominal. Thus one can achieve drastic savings in cost. I feel that choosing a PhD supervisor from your own faculty whom you already know and are able to get along well with would be of great help. However, there are some doctorate holders I know who are reluctant to accept their colleagues or anyone of their friends as PhD students, for fear that their friendships might compromise objectivity and effective supervision. Due to rising costs and increasing demands of families, more and more people in Malaysia have opted to do their PhDs locally. This is especially so where the student is self-financed. This is because the education sector (globally and especially in Malaysia) is one of the lowest paid. The nominal increase in income is not sufficient to pay for the expenses incurred while doing your PhD overseas.

CH A P TER

F O UR

Critical Issues to Consider in Research Methodology Errors in Research While it is important to ensure that you do not make serious errors, there is no such thing as a perfect research or a research that is free from errors. Every piece of research, even those that are published in top journals have got some degree of error. How can this be possible? Permit me to explain. Total error can be divided into two categories: random sampling error and systematic error. Random sampling error is the error caused by chance variation. Imagine for instance that you have a sack and in that sack there are 100 balls. 50 of the balls are white and the rest are black. You pick out 10 balls from that sack. In an ideal situation, you would expect to retrieve 5 black balls and 5 white balls. However, isn’t it possible that you end up picking all 10 balls that are black or all 10 balls that are white? This is what is meant by chance variation or random sampling error. This error can be minimised by using other sampling methods such as stratified random sampling error (which will be explained later in this chapter). The next category of error is systematic error and this can be divided into two categories: administrative error and respondent error. Administrative error is where the error is caused by some improper administration or execution of the research task such as data-processing error, sample selection error, interviewer error and interviewer cheating. Data-processing error can occur where, for example, due to some computer error, the number 4 appears whenever you strike the number 2 key. Note that in such an instance the error is indeed systematic. This error should be avoided at all costs.

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Total error Systematic error Administrative error Data-processing error

Random sampling error

Respondent error

Non-response error

Response bias

Sample selection error

Acquiescence bias

Interviewer error

Extremity bias

Interviewer cheating

Interviewer bias

Central tendency bias

Auspices bias

Social desirability bias

Sample selection error can occur, for example, when you select your sample from a telephone book. Sample selection error occurs because unlisted numbers are not included. Interviewer error can occur when the interviewer is not able to write fast enough to record answers verbatim. Interviewer cheating is when the interviewer fills in the questionnaires themselves. In view of this, I would strongly urge PhD students to collect the data themselves and not to contract out this task. This is because the lack of honesty, dependability, diligence and accuracy of any one of your research assistants can seriously jeopardise the quality of your data and hence the quality of the results that you get. This can even result in you failing to get the significant correlations that you have predicted. Hence this would seriously undermine your chances of successfully completing your PhD. All the errors mentioned in this paragraph should be avoided at all costs. I repeat, that is why

Critical Issues to Consider in Research Methodology

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I always advocate that PhD students should collect the data themselves and not subcontract the task! This can ensure the highest quality of data. You can definitely increase your chances of establishing the predicted relationships between variables. Furthermore, collecting the data yourself gives you invaluable experience as a researcher. I have stated earlier that systematic error is made up of administrative error and respondent error. We have already talked about administrative error. Now I shall describe to you respondent error. Respondent error can be categorised as non-response error and response bias. Non-reponse error occurs in the following instance. You send out 1,000 questionnaires but you receive only 200. You conduct analysis of the 200 questionnaires that you have received and you found that overall, the respondents are highly dissatisfied with the product. You also found that there were a few highly satisfied respondents in the sample, but most of them are highly dissatisfied. However, isn’t it possible that the other 800 people found the product to be fairly satisfactory, and because of that, they did not bother to respond? Therefore, if you got all 1,000 respondents, the results would be entirely different, i.e. the respondents would be neutral or even slightly satisfied. You see, this is natural human behaviour – to respond only if they felt strongly about the product – either favourably or unfavourably. People whose opinions or attitudes are in the middle tend not to respond. Also, isn’t it more likely for a person to say something when they hate it rather than when they like it? There is not much you can do about this other than perhaps trying to increase your response rate. How can you do this? This is explained later in this chapter. Response bias (either deliberate or unconscious) can be divided into the following categories: acquiescence bias, extremity bias, central tendency bias, interviewer bias, auspices bias and social desirability bias. Acquiescence bias is the tendency for respondents to agree with a statement. Consider the statement ‘I find it easy to get up in the morning’ or ‘I find it difficult to get up in the morning.’ These are opposing statements – the first is framed in the positive whereas the latter is framed in the negative. There is a tendency of respondents to agree with statements, either positive or negative. So

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the way in which questions are phrased becomes critical. The best way to reduce acquiescence bias is to have approximately the same number of questions phrased in the positive and in the negative. Extremity bias is the tendency of respondents to respond to the extremes. Phrasing all questions either in the positive or in the negative tends to increase this. Central tendency bias is the tendency for respondents to give marks at the middle point of the scale. This may occur where the respondents are not really interested in filling up your questionnaires and want to complete them with the minimum amount of thought, effort and time. I have rarely come across this although some of my friends have. If after you have conducted your pilot study you found that most respondents ticked the middle point of the scale, then you will have to use even-number scales (such as 1, 2, 3, 4) rather than odd-number scales (1, 2, 3, 4, 5). Respondents are then forced to make a stand and will not be allowed to sit on the fence. Interviewer bias occurs when the presence of the interviewer (predominantly in face-to-face interviews) influences the answers of the respondents. Consider this situation. You are a married man with kids and along comes this beautiful young lady interviewer who asks you, ‘What is your income?’, ‘What car do you drive?’, ‘What is your marital status?’ If your real income is RM 4,000, you drive a small car and you are married, wouldn’t you be tempted to say, ‘I earn RM 10,000’, show her your BMW car key ring and say that you are single? Of course not! Not you! But everyone else would! Auspices bias is the tendency to indicate your response because of the organisation conducting the study. This is somewhat related to the next bias which is social desirability bias. Consider the first instance when you are asked this question by a PhD student conducting a study: ‘Do you make an effort to send your waste paper to a recycling centre?’. Suppose you don’t. You may be honest with the PhD student and admit it. But even then, some of us are shy to admit it because of social desirability bias. In other words, social desirability bias is the bias caused by the respondent’s desire, either consciously or unconsciously, to appear in a favourable social position. Now, what if the person conducting the study is from Greenpeace or some other conservationist group? The tendency to say ‘yes’ to


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that statement although the truthful answer is ‘no’, is even stronger. This is the auspices bias – a bias in the response of the subject as a result of being influenced by the organisation conducting the study. You are able to reduce all the biases mentioned in this paragraph by being aware of them in the first place and then consciously trying to avoid them. The saying, ‘Forewarned is forearmed’ is applicable here.

Survey Methods There are different ways of communicating with respondents in a survey. They are door-to-door, mall intercept, telephone and mail surveys. Comparisons of these different methods are listed in the table below.

Comparison of the different methods of survey Criteria

Door-to-door personal interview (office or home)

Mall intercept interview

Telephone surveys

Mail surveys

Speed of response during data collection

Moderate to fast

Fast

Very fast

Slow. Researcher has little control over return of questionnaires

Cost

Highest

Moderate to high

Lower but more than mail

Lowest

Geographical coverage

Limited

Confined to urban areas

Wide

Very wide

Respondent co-operation

Moderate in office, low in homes

Moderate to low as shoppers are busy

Moderate. Better if calls are kept short

Low. Even lower for poorly designed questionnaires

(Continued)

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Comparison of the different methods of survey (cont’d) Criteria

Door-to-door personal interview (office or home)

Mall intercept interview

Telephone surveys

Mail surveys

Questionnaire length

Longer than telephone

Moderate to short

Short

Longest especially where incentives are provided

Versatility of questioning

Versatile because can clarify and modify

Versatile because can clarify and modify

Moderate

Low as highly standardised format needed

Item nonresponse

Low

Low

Low to medium

High

Degree of interviewer influence of answer

Highest

High

Moderate

None

Anonymity of respondent

Lowest

Low

Moderate

Highest

Ease of call-back or follow-up

Easy to trace but they may not cooperate a second time

Impossible if no address is obtained

Easy but they may not cooperate a second time

Easy if you can identify the respondent from the questionnaire received

Possibility of Low respondent misunderstanding

Low

Low to average

Highest as no interviewer is present for clarification

Supervision of interviewers

Difficult to moderate

Moderate if they are in one shopping mall

High where telephonists are located in one room

Not applicable

Special features

Visual materials may be shown or demonstrated. Taste test possible

Visual materials Only audio Pictures and may be materials can samples may shown or be played be enclosed demonstrated. Taste test possible


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Tactics to Increase Response Rate in Surveys Among the most effective tactics I would recommend that you use in order to increase response rates in mail surveys are:

give advance notification write a ‘sales oriented’ cover letter stimulate respondents’ interest with interesting questions have a questionnaire with a good layout that is easy to read enclose a stamped return envelope conduct follow-up enquiries on those who have yet to return the questionnaires use the name of the organisation conducting the study.

If all else fails, then money is a good motivator. However, researchers have a very limited budget. One PhD student in the Manchester Business School used a lottery ticket to induce participants to respond. The lottery ticket costs merely one British pound – but the prize for the winner is a minimum of one million pounds! However, the use of a four-digit lottery ticket in Malaysia may not have the same motivating effect. Many Muslims would object to that on religious grounds. It may also be not as motivating for nonMuslims because the prize money would be far less than the British lottery. As an alternative to mail questionnaires, the drop-off method can be used. This is where the researcher makes an appointment to see the respondent. During the meeting, the researcher explains the questionnaire briefly and then leaves it with the respondent to complete at his or her leisure. There is usually a deadline set upon which the interviewer will return to collect the completed questionnaire. I found this method to have a much better response rate compared with the ordinary mail method. However, I found that for my PhD, the best method to use is a variation of the drop-off method. I would first of all explain the questionnaire to a group of respondents and then, rather than leaving, I would wait for them fill in the questionnaires in my presence. In other words, the questionnaires

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were self-administered in my presence. The advantage of this method is that I did not allow them to ‘conveniently forget’ to complete my questionnaire. Secondly, I was available should any respondent have any questions. Thirdly, the respondents do not have to worry about returning or posting the questionnaire. Fourthly, I can check the completed questionnaire for any questions that were inadvertently unanswered. With the Internet, it is now possible to send questionnaires by email instead of traditional mail. The pros and cons of email are somewhat similar to traditional mail but with some notable exceptions. In the case of email,

the cost is free (if using university or office facilities) the speed of distribution and return is faster there is an increased likelihood of response as the respondent does not need to place the questionnaire in a letterbox multimedia messages in the form of videos, audio and 3-D pictures can be sent to respondents keying in of responses by respondents in electronic form can reduce the need for subsequent data entry by researchers the researcher can easily trace those who have not responded to the questionnaire.

There is no such thing as the best method for all situations. If there were one, then everyone would be using that method. Cost seems to be the main factor in deciding which method to use. However, this does not mean that all PhD students opt for mail surveys since they have extremely tight budgets. In fact, I know several students who have used the personal interview method, which is the most expensive of all. Of course, they conduct the interviews themselves to save costs. This method is preferred because researchers can be relatively confident that the respondents fully understand the questions, and that the answers have been accurately recorded. Also, students would use this method when they have relatively few respondents to interview, i.e. less than 100. Having less than 100 respondents in a PhD research is acceptable where the units of analyses or respondents are companies rather than individuals.


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However, where larger numbers of respondents distributed over a wide geographic area need to be accessed, then mail or email survey is preferred. A good question to ask at this juncture is ‘Can you use more than one method in the same survey?’ I would say ‘yes’. For example, there is nothing wrong with sending questionnaires by traditional mail and email, then following up by calling the respondents. This was exactly what was done by my classmate at the Manchester Business School. She initially sent all her questionnaires by mail. When some did not reply, she followed up with a telephone call. The respondents said that they misplaced the questionnaires and offered to give their responses by telephone. She then proceeded to collect the data by telephone interview. This method was accepted by the examiners as valid and she managed to pass her PhD viva. However, be prepared to be questioned by the examiners whenever you use different methods of data collection in a single study. I feel that the examiners’ intention of asking this is merely to find out whether you know the implications of using different methods, as well as the pros and cons of each, rather than an outright objection.

Data Collection by Observation What can be observed?

Physical actions, for example shoppers’ movements in the store, teachers’ movements in the classroom, etc. Verbal behaviour, i.e. statements made by customers who wait in line. Expressive behaviour, i.e. facial expressions, tone of voice, or other forms of body language of customers or employees. Spatial relations and locations, i.e. how close people stand facing each other when they talk. Temporal patterns, i.e. how long customers in a restaurant wait for their order to be served.

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Physical objects, i.e. items on supermarket shelves. Verbal and pictorial records, i.e. bar codes on product packages. Physical trace evidence, i.e. finding out what a household consumes by looking into its garbage.

Categories of observation Observation can be:

done by humans or mechanical counters, and is visible or hidden.

Prior consent should be obtained where observation is hidden, for example, where the cameras cannot be seen by the respondents. Ethics demands that people should be informed in advance that their movements and actions in the store will be recorded. This is usually done by way of a notice at the entrance of the store. If they continue to walk into the store, they are deemed to consent to being videotaped. Customers normally forget about the notice and the cameras soon after they enter the store. They go about their activities as they normally would do and their actions and behaviour can be regarded as fairly normal. Some benefits of observation of human behaviour include the following:

Communication with respondents is not necessary. There is no need to rely on the respondents’ memory. Data is collected quickly and without distortions due to selfreport. Environmental conditions may be recorded. Data may be combined with the survey to provide supplementary evidence.

Consider this situation. You might want to study the eating habits in a survey of habits of weight-watchers. More precisely, you may wish to find out how often they raid the fridge. If you asked


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them how many times they take food from the fridge in a day, they may not remember. Worse still, some may remember but lie to you (i.e. exhibiting social desirability bias). The camera however, never lies. Researchers, with the consent of house owners of course, can install cameras in the living rooms, dining rooms, and kitchens (installing cameras in toilets and bedrooms are usually not done). Thus the movement and actions of all members of each household can be recorded accurately. However, this kind of research is more commonly done by professional market research firms rather than by PhD students. There are many obvious limitations of collecting data by observations of human behaviour:

Cognitive behaviour cannot be observed. You cannot tell what a person is thinking about just by looking at his or her face. Interpretation of data may be a problem and observer bias is possible. This problem is often aggravated in cross-cultural studies. Not all activity can be recorded. As previously mentioned, the bedroom and toilets are ‘no-go’ areas. Only short periods can be observed as most people would not want to have cameras installed in their houses for more than a few weeks. In the case of a store, only movements within the store can be recorded. There is a possible invasion of privacy.

There are some terms commonly used in observation which are useful to know. They are:

Scientifically contrived observation, i.e. the creation of an artificial environment to test a hypothesis. Response latency, i.e. recording the decision time necessary to make a choice between two alternatives. The shorter the time, the greater the preference between the two alternatives. Content analysis, i.e. obtaining data by observing and analysing the content of advertisements, letters, articles etc. to see the content of the message itself and/or the frequency of its occurrence.

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Some electrical/mechanical devices used in PhD research in the area of psychology include:

Eye-tracking monitors which record eye movements, thus providing information on how the subject actually reads or views an advertisement. Pupilometer, a device which observes and records changes in the diameter of the subjects’ pupils – the more excited the subject, the more dilated the pupils. Psychogalvanometer, a device which measures the galvanic skin response, i.e. the electrical resistance of the skin or physiological changes which usually accompany the varying emotional states of the subject. Voice pitch analysis which measures the emotional reactions through the physiological changes in a person’s voice.

However, these equipment are expensive. I have not come across any of them in any of the local universities.

Experimental Research In experimental research, conditions are controlled. One independent variable is manipulated at a time and its effect on the dependent variable is measured. All other variables are controlled i.e. kept constant. Experiments are often used to test hypotheses. The easiest way to understand the mechanics of an experiment is to use an example. Suppose you wish to test the effect of light levels on workers’ productivity. You formed the following hypothesis: H1: Increased light levels will result in increased productivity. The way to test this is by experiment. You set up two rooms – room A (which we will call the experimental group) and room B (the control group). Both rooms have five workers each. All the workers


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have been randomly selected. Further checks are made to ensure that the workers in room A are somewhat similar in terms of skills and experience to those in room B. At the initial stage of the experiment, the light levels in both rooms are the same. Measurements of workers’ productivity, known as O1, are taken from both rooms A and B. The productivity levels of both groups should be roughly equal. After the measurements are taken, the light level in room A is increased, whereas it remains unchanged in room B. Then, a second measurement of productivity known as O2 is taken from both rooms A and B. In order to prove their hypothesis, the researchers would need to find the following: at O1 the productivity levels of workers in both rooms should be roughly equal. At O2 however, the productivity levels of workers in room A should increase whereas those in room B should be the same as O1. All other conditions should remain constant. If that happens, the researchers can be confident that the increase in productivity was caused by the increase in the light levels. Note that in this experiment, the light level is the only independent variable that has changed. All other variables are kept constant. Also, the increase in productivity of workers in room A occurred immediately after the increase in light levels. Thus one can safely conclude that the increase in light levels improves productivity. The above example is a description of what researchers in the Hawthorne experiments hoped to find. However, what happened in that experiment was that the productivity of workers in both rooms A and B improved. The researchers correctly concluded that productivity was not increased as a result of the increased light levels (as the productivity levels continued to increase even though the light levels were lowered). However, they wrongly concluded from the experiment that it must have been the attention paid to the workers that improved their productivity. Hawthorne’s findings have been severely criticised. This was because if attention was indeed the variable influencing work performance, where was the control group? Attention was received by workers in both groups A and B and therefore there was no real control group as far as the variable of ‘attention’ was concerned. This is the major experimental flaw of the Hawthorne studies and

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until today, the research is heavily criticised by research purists, although managers are quite content to accept the findings and act upon them.

Types of Scales Nominal scale A nominal scale is a scale in which the numbers or letters assigned to objects serve as labels for identification or classification. For example, the number 2 does not indicate more of a characteristic than the number 1. Suppose you assign 1 for Malay, 2 for Chinese and 3 for Indians. This does not mean that there are more Chinese than the Malays or that there are more Indians than the Chinese. Nominal scales are often used to identify race, gender and location.

Ordinal scale An ordinal scale is a scale that arranges objects or alternatives according to their magnitudes or rank. Consider for example your favourite car. In order of ranking, 1 being highest, it could be 1 for Proton, 2 for Honda and 3 for Peugeot. This means that of all the brands of cars, you prefer a Proton. However, it does not mean that the magnitude of your preference for Proton over Honda is equal to your preference for Honda over Peugeot.

Interval scale An interval scale is a scale that not only arranges objects according to their magnitudes but also distinguishes this ordered arrangement in units of equal intervals. The best example is the temperature


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scale; the thermometer has markings of equal intervals. However, an important distinction between interval and ratio scales (see below) is that there is no absolute zero point in interval scales. If the temperature is 100 Celsius, it cannot be said that it is twice as hot as 50 Celsius. The zero point is arbitrary and does not represent the total absence of heat. As we all know, temperatures can drop below zero. Other examples of indicators that use the interval scale are the consumer price index (CPI) and intelligence quotient (IQ).

Ratio scales Ratio scales have an absolute rather than relative quantities. It has the same characteristics as the interval scale but with the added benefit of having an absolute zero point. For example, money and weight can be considered as ratio scales. If you have no money in the bank, then your account balance is zero. No doubt if you are a bankrupt and owing money, your bank balance will be negative. But the point is, the absolute zero point in your bank balance account does indicate a total absence of money. That is why it is a ratio scale.

Reliability and Validity of Questionnaires and Psychometric Tests Two concepts which are absolutely critical to know and understand are reliability and validity.

Reliability Reliability, in the context of tests, has two distinct meanings. One refers to the stability of scores from a test over time, the second to internal consistency of the items that purport to measure the

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construct in question. The reliability of scores of a test over time is known as test-retest reliability (rtt). Test-retest reliability If a person does the same test twice, the scores in the first test should be identical to the second if the test is totally reliable. Consider this example. I take a measuring tape and use it to measure the length of a table. I do so by placing the correct end of the tape to one edge of the table and place it taut along the table to the other end. I observe that the reading is 6 feet. I then remove the tape and take another measurement a minute later. The reading is now 5 feet 8 inches instead of 6 feet. Somebody must have chopped off the table, you say! Suppose that has not happened and there were no changes in the table length. Then, it must have been the tape, you say. What if I reveal to you that the measuring tape I used was made of stretchable rubber, and that in the second measurement, I had stretched it more. Since the tape is elastic, it is not a reliable measuring instrument for each time it is used, it will give a different measurement depending on how much I stretch it. In a questionnaire, test-retest reliability is measured by correlating the scores from a same set of subjects who take the same test on two occasions. The correlation coefficient measures the degree to which the two sets of scores agree with each other. The more they are in agreement, the higher the correlation coefficient, thus the higher the test-retest reliability. Correlation coefficients range from 1 (complete agreement), to 1 (complete disagreement). It is extremely rare for the correlation coefficient in such cases to be 1. That would mean that the person would score at one extreme (high or low) when doing the test for the first time and scoring at the other extreme when doing the same test for the second time. For example, in an intelligence test of low test-retest reliability (1), a person, after the first test may have achieved scores indicating that he is a genius and after doing the same test for a second time, achieved scores suggesting that he is mentally retarded. In the case of a personality test of low test-retest reliability, the person, after the first test may have achieved scores indicating that he is an extrovert and after doing the same test for a


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second time, say a week later, achieved scores suggesting that he is an introvert. A correlation of zero indicates that there is absolutely no relationship between the two sets of scores. Most correlations tend to fall between 0 and 1. Squaring the correlation coefficient indicates the extent of agreement between the two sets of scores. For example a correlation of 0.8 shows an agreement between the sets of scores of 64 per cent. Obviously, the closer to 1 the test-retest reliability of a test is, the better the test is. If scores are vastly different on two occasions, there is no reason to trust either of them. A correlation of 0.7 is often regarded a minimum figure. Also, the sample should have at least 100 subjects who are representative of the population for whom the test is intended. Of course, no real change in the characteristics of the respondents being measured should occur between the two periods. Factors influencing the measurement of test-retest reliability Changes in subjects

The time period between the first test and the second should be a reasonable period, i.e. not too long or too short. There is no fixed rule as to the ideal time frame as this would depend on the nature and complexity of the test involved. A three-month gap can be considered as reasonable. However, if the test involves measuring personalities of children, it is quite possible that they may have changed during the period between the first and the second tests. For instance, during the first test, the child may have been an introvert but by the time the second test was done five years later, the child may have turned into an extrovert. Similarly, during the first test, the child may have obtained low scores on an ability test, but subsequently, the child’s mental ability has improved such that he or she obtained much higher scores doing the same test a second time. In such cases, the correlation coefficients would suggest that the test-retest reliability is lower than it actually is. In other words, the changes in scores that contributed to lowered reliability are assumed to be errors of measurement, not real changes in variables. In connection with the above, I myself discovered how the personality of adult subjects can change during the period between the

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two tests. During the administration of a personality test, the subject, who was completing the test for the second time a mere six months later, remarked, ‘It’s funny how my perspective has changed since I became pregnant!’ Measurement error

These can be divided into the following: Environmental factors. Suppose that the first time around, the subject completes the test in a conference room with adequate lighting, ventilation and working space, free from outside noise and distraction (the way tests should be administered). The second time the subject completes the test in an environment totally opposite to the earlier one, i.e in dark, stuffy, cramped and noisy conditions. The tests of the two scores may vary. This is especially so where intelligence tests are concerned. Fatigue of subjects. Subjects will not feel at their best when they are suffering from physical ailments such as colds, flu or headaches or when they had a late night out and are suffering from hangovers. If the subjects are sick when doing the test on one occasion but are healthy when doing the test during the second occasion, then scores may vary as a direct result of these differences in health states. Poor test instructions. If the test instructions are ambiguous, the subjects may not grasp what they are supposed to do when completing the test for the first time. They may only figured it out when doing the test the second time. Their scores may have been better in the second test (in the case of ability tests), or more accurate (in the case of personality tests). Subjective scoring. It is important for the scoring of personality and intelligence tests to be objective, i.e. the test scores should be the same regardless of who happens to be the examiner. Subjective scoring can result in differences arising between two sets of scores, either in a case involving different scorers or when the same scorer is used on different occasions.


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Guessing. This mainly affects ability tests. Unlike environmental factors, poor test instructions and subjective scoring, this source of unreliability is often beyond the control of the test administrator. Subjects will still guess despite being expressly told not to do so, as I have found out in numerous surveys. In one test, The Ingleton Word Recognition Test (a perceptual ability test), respondents were required to identify sixty-four partially printed words. Prior to doing the test, they were expressly told not to guess if they were not sure what the words were. Despite the explicit, unambiguous instructions, subjects went ahead and guessed, getting some of the answers wrong. Factors that can artificially boost test-retest reliability Two factors that can artificially increase the reliability score and does not represent true test-retest reliability in the sense of stable error-free measurement. Too short a time gap. If we were to administer a test to a group of subjects and immediately after they have finished, we were to ask them to do it again, we would obtain a high test-retest reliability (provided that the subjects are not bored or fatigued). This would be simply because the subjects would remember their answers, so the correlation coefficients would be especially high. Too simple a test. If items are too easy for the subjects, then subjects will always get them right. Test-retest reliability will be unusually high. This, of course, applies to ability tests, as there are no right or wrong answers for personality tests. Internal consistency reliability This is the second meaning of reliability. Most psychometric test constructors aim to make their psychological tests as internally consistent as possible. This means that the different items (questions) that purport to measure the same construct should be highly correlated with each other if the test is to be internally consistent. If they are not highly correlated, then some of the items may be measuring one construct and other items may be measuring other constructs. Consider this example: Question 1 measuring stress

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states: ‘I find it difficult to not worry about my work.’ Question 2 measuring stress states: ‘I frequently have so much fear that it affects my health.’ Scores on question 1 should be highly (but not perfectly) correlated with those on question 2. Consequently, high consistency or reliability is a prerequisite for high validity. This is the more popular view held by psychometric theorists. Internal consistency is often used as a basis for retaining items in a test that correlate highly with each other and deleting items that do not correlate highly. There appears to be only one significant dissenting voice against the argument that internal consistency must be high. Some have argued that an ideal questionnaire should have individual items correlating highly with the criterion but not with each other. This is an important feature of the 16 Personality Factors test (16PF). There are many other tests whose items were virtually paraphrases of each other and it comes as no surprise that these items are highly correlated with each other. These can be referred to as bloated specifics and as having low validity (or more precisely low incremental validity). However, this is not to say that high reliability always precludes validity. What you should be concerned with is that questionnaires that attempt to measure multi-dimensional constructs that have considerable breadth and complexity such as extraversion, should have items that attempt to measure the different aspects of that construct. Hence, lower internal consistency should actually be preferred in such circumstances, contrary to the popular belief that test constructors should always strive for high internal consistency. From the arguments above, we can safely conclude that internal consistency should be high, but not too high, especially where the construct has considerable breadth, such as certain personality traits. Statistical methods of measuring internal consistency reliability

Split-half reliability. This technique is accomplished by splitting a multi-item scale in half and then correlating the summarised results


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of the scores in the first half with those in the second half. It can be done in a variety of ways. One method is by using the first half of the test and the second half of the test. It can also be used by using the scores on the even and odd items. Sometimes, it is done by randomly assigning questions to one half or the other. However, the major problem with the split half technique is that the estimate of the coefficient of reliability obtained is wholly dependent upon the manner in which the items were split, i.e. all these splits give a different estimate of reliability. Consequently, this method of estimation is no longer popular, in the age of computerisation. The next method is more popular. Cronbach Coefficient Alpha measure of internal consistency. This overcomes the weakness of the split-half technique. The Cronbach Alpha technique computes the mean reliability coefficient estimates for all possible ways of splitting a set of items in half. With the aid of computers and software packages such as the SPSS (statistical package for social sciences), the Cronbach Coefficient Alpha can be obtained in seconds. There are even options within the SPSS to obtain the reliability coefficient if each item of the scale were deleted. This is useful if deleting one of the items from the scale would make the scale much more reliable. However, this rests on the assumption that higher reliability should always be achieved (see earlier argument against this view). In practice, I have found that only negligible improvements can be obtained, where the scales involved have already been well established. However, this may not be the case where a new questionnaire is being developed. Bearing in mind that internal consistency reliabilities ought to be high, but not too high (see arguments earlier), Cronbach Coefficient Alpha should ideally be high, around .9, especially for ability tests, and should not drop below .7.

Validity A measurement scale is valid if it measures what it is supposed to measure. Let me ask you a question. What would you use to measure your height? A ruler or a measuring tape are valid instruments

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to measure height. Would you use a thermometer to measure your height? Of course not. Thermometers are valid instruments to measure temperature but not height. Hence if you purport to measure your height using a thermometer, it would be an invalid measure. The following are examples of validity of questionnaires: Face (content) validity It is important to point out that face validity is not a requirement of true validity. A test is said to be face valid if on the face of it, it appears to measure what it claims to measure. From the point of view of selection, the question that arises is whether tests used in selection should always be face valid. It has been suggested that tests used in personnel selection should be face valid since it can increase the motivation of the subjects to expend their best efforts when completing the tests – an essential element if testing is to be valid. For example, when trying to select pilots, face-valid tests of tracking ability or rapid reaction time will motivate full cooperation because subjects believe them to be valid indicators of flying skill. On the other hand, if these subjects were subjected to tests that required them to make animal noises, or add up numbers while distracted by jokes (genuine objective tests in the compendium of tests by a distinguished psychologist), many would refuse, thinking them to be absurd, even if they were valid. The subjects would object to having to spend valuable time and energy completing the tests, the nature of which in their view, is totally irrelevant to the job that they have applied for. If forced to do so, they will spend little thought when completing the questionnaires, thus affecting the test scores. This problem becomes even more serious in third world countries where the completion of questionnaires is relatively rare, compared to the US. However, as with the issue of reliability mentioned earlier, a minority are of the dissenting view that tests should not always be face valid. This is because in a face-valid test, subjects can guess what the questions are really trying to measure. Hence it is likely to induce fake or deliberate distortion, especially during personnel selection. A person applying for the job of a salesperson will not


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admit that he or she prefers quiet interests such as reading books as opposed to meeting people, even if it were true. Job applicants will have a picture in their minds of the ideal person that the company seeks. The applicant would want the company to think that he or she is that person. Consequently, applicants’ answers will try to reflect the desired qualities. In conclusion, personality questionnaires should not be too face valid. Some of the items in the 16PF were deliberately worded in such a way that they were not face valid. For instance, it is extremely unlikely for respondents to be able to deduce that preferring chess to bowling or preferring violin solos to military band marches means that one is more open to change. Respondents are equally unlikely to deduce that preferring Shakespeare to Columbus means that one is more sensitive or that having fantastic and ridiculous dreams means that one is not a perfectionist. Also, questions on whether one should take a gamble or play it safe would have been thought to relate more to risk tendency than to dominance. The rationale for making questions less face valid is to prevent subjects from determining exactly what the tests are measuring and hence make it more difficult for subjects to give fake answers during selection. The greater complexity and length of the test makes it less ‘transparent’ to the applicant and so less susceptible to faking. Concurrent validity A test is said to possess concurrent validity if it can be shown to correlate highly with another test of the same variable which was administered at the same time. Correlations above .75 would be regarded as good support for concurrent validity of a test where there are benchmark criterion tests. It would be extremely difficult to obtain correlations above .9 as this would indicate that the tests are virtually identical in their ability to measure the construct in question. There are some problems regarding benchmark tests. First of all there are very few psychometric tests that can be properly regarded as benchmark tests. The next logical argument that

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arises is, if there is a test so good that it can be taken as standard, what is the point of a new test? There are several reasons why new tests are sometimes still constructed. First of all, a new test may have been constructed for purely economic (and self-serving) interests. Researchers may not wish to continue paying royalties for the use of the questionnaires. Researchers thus develop their own questionnaires so that they do not have to pay royalties. They may even charge others for using their questionnaires. Secondly, the new questionnaire may have been developed as a shorter alternative to the original questionnaire. Sometimes the short version will only contain some of the items taken from the original questionnaire. For example, there is a 20-item short version of the original 100-item Minnesota Satisfaction Questionnaire. In other instances, the short version may be totally different from the original. For instance, Ahmad (2001) compared two scales that measured job satisfaction – Job Descriptive Index (JDI) (Smith, Kendall & Hulin, 1969), a well-established job satisfaction questionnaire that contained 72 items, and Numerical Facet Satisfaction Scales (NFSS) that has five items. The JDI consists of five separate sections. Each section measures one separate facet, i.e. the job itself, pay, promotion, supervision and coworkers. The NFSS has five scales, one for each facet. These facets are identical to those in the JDI. Each NFSS scale ranges from 1 to 20 (1 being lowest and 20 being the highest level of satisfaction). It was found that the correlation between the two scale were as follows:

Item

Correlation coefficient

JDI work facet satisfaction – NFSS work facet satisfaction

.626**

JDI pay facet satisfaction – NFSS pay facet satisfaction

.633**

JDI promotion facet satisfaction – NFSS promotion facet satisfaction

.408**

JDI supervision facet satisfaction – NFSS supervision facet satisfaction

.757**

JDI co-worker facet satisfaction – NFSS co-worker facet satisfaction

.675**

** significant at the 0.01 level


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The presence of a highly significant correlation between the facet satisfaction as measured by the JDI and that by the NFSS was expected. In fact it would be very surprising if the correlation were not significant. However, one would expect such correlation to be stronger since the two instruments were supposed to measure exactly the same thing. Furthermore, the respondents completed both instruments simultaneously. This raises questions as to why the correlation coefficients were not as high as expected. One possible cause is that the JDI uses items that requires respondents to indicate either ‘yes’, ‘no’ or ‘undecided’ against a particular description of the work environment. The JDI assumes that a given description of the work situation would indicate either satisfaction or dissatisfaction regardless of who the worker happens to be. However, there are a few (only a few) descriptions of the work situation in the JDI (e.g. ‘routine’, ‘simple’) that if true, would cause satisfaction in some people and dissatisfaction in others depending on their personality. This is one weakness of the JDI. This is not to say that the NFSS has no limitations either. Human feelings cannot be precisely quantified in integers on a 20-point scale. After taking into account the weakness of both instruments, one would not expect a correlation between the two instruments to be in excess of the .80 mark and that the average correlation was only slightly below the aforesaid .75 threshold mentioned earlier. In fact, a correlation above .90 would theoretically not be possible. In conclusion, it can be said that the aforementioned correlations found were reasonably satisfactory but could be better. Predictive validity A test can be regarded as having predictive validity if it is able to predict some criterion or other. This is extremely important in personnel selection. For instance predictive validity of intelligence tests might be demonstrated by correlating intelligence with success at the job. However, the problem with this is that it assumes that success at work depends, in part at least, on intelligence. Measurement of success at work could be in terms of number and amount of

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salary increments. Since intelligence is only one factor in success at work (other factors may be the number of contacts the person has, experience, technical knowledge, etc), a moderate (but significant) correlation of .3 or .4 can properly be regarded as evidence of a predictive validity of a test.

The Art of Drafting Questionnaires The problem of unstructured, open-ended verbal interviews can be explained by the following example: if forty different interviewers conducted interviews in different parts of the country, the data they collect will not be comparable unless they follow specific guidelines and ask questions and record answers in a standard form. Thus there is a pressing need for the proper development of a questionnaire.

Objectives of a questionnaire First, it must translate the information needed into a set of specific questions that the respondents can and will answer. This is not as easy as it sounds. Two apparently similar ways of presenting a question may yield different information. Second, a questionnaire must motivate and encourage the respondent to become involved in the questionnaire answering process. Incompletely answered questionnaires will result in missing values. In designing a questionnaire, the researchers should strive to minimise respondents’ fatigue, boredom and effort in order to reduce incomplete answers and non-response. Third, a questionnaire should minimise response errors. Response error can be defined as the error that arises when respondents give inaccurate answers or when their answers are misrecorded or misanalysed. A questionnaire can be a major source of


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response error. Minimising this error is an important objective of questionnaire design.

How to draft questions Zikmund1 (2000, pp. 310–326) lists some of the following points to be borne in mind when drafting questionnaires: 1. Questions have to be relevant and accurate. 2. Questions can be phrased as open-ended or closed-ended questions. 3. Phrasing questions can be different for mail, telephone and personal interview surveys. 4. Avoid leading questions. 5. Avoid loaded questions. 6. Avoid ambiguity: be as specific as possible. 7. Avoid double barrelled items. 8. Avoid making assumptions. 9. Avoid burdensome questions that may tax the respondent’s memory. 10. Be aware of order bias. 11. Pay attention to the layout of the questionnaire. Questions have to be relevant and accurate A question should only be asked if relevant. Respondents may be unwilling to divulge information that they do not see as serving a legitimate purpose. Why should a firm marketing cereals want to know about their age, income and occupation? Explaining why the data are needed can make the request for information more legitimate and may increase the respondents’ willingness to answer. A statement such as: ‘To determine how the consumption of cereal and preferences for cereal brands vary among people of different ages, incomes and occupations, we need information on . . .’ can make the request more legitimate. 1

From Business Research Methods, 6th edition, by W.G. Zikmund. © 2000. Reprinted with permission of South-Western, a division of Thomson Learning.

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Questions can be phrased as open-ended or closed-ended questions Open-ended questions allow respondents to answer them in any way that they choose. A closed-ended question, on the other hand, would require the respondent to make choices from a set of alternatives given by the question designer. Closed-ended questions help respondents to complete the questionnaire faster by merely ticking the appropriate box. They also help the researcher to code the answers more easily as numbers have already been assigned to the answers. However, the disadvantage of closed-ended questions is that it is not possible for the researcher to list out all the possible answers to the question. In other words, the answer that the respondent wishes to give may not be in the list. This may happen in exploratory studies where the researcher has not had a full grasp of the phenomena of interest. Therefore, to what extent a questionnaire should contain open-ended responses is often a question of judgement and common sense. Phrasing questions can be different for mail, telephone and personal interview surveys Generally speaking, telephone and personal interview questions should be shorter compared to mail interview questions. Questionnaires for telephone and personal interviews should be written and read in a conversational manner. Avoid leading questions ‘What is it that makes you like your job?’ is a leading question because it assumes that the respondent likes his or her job. Even if it is an open-ended question and the respondent can answer ‘I don’t’, the seed of bias has already been sown in the respondent’s mind. The respondent must really hate his job to say ‘I don’t’. An important point to note is that although the questions per se may not be leading, the manner in which they are arranged can make them so. For instance, if respondents are asked how often they pray followed by how religious they are, they are more likely to say that they are religious if they have already answered that they pray a lot.


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It is the respondents’ desire for consistency that makes them answer this way. In this case, the answer given to an earlier question has affected the respondent’s answer to later questions. Avoid loaded questions Loaded questions are sensitive questions or questions that have a social desirability bias. Respondents can sometimes answer untruthfully or refuse to answer sensitive questions. One approach may be to desensitise the issue. For example one might say, ‘As you know, many people throw litter on the streets without a second thought. Do you happen to have thrown litter in such a manner yourself?’ This attempts to describe the event in question as commonplace and nothing unusual. It might not work with more sensitive topics such as murder and theft. Another method is to ask, ‘Do you know of any people who have thrown litter on the streets?’ Pause for the reply and then ask, ‘How about yourself?’ The first part of the question totally detaches the answer from the respondent as a person. The respondent is answering on behalf of other people. While some psychologists may argue that the respondent is not actually talking about other people but actually himself or herself (some kind of projective technique), there is no way of knowing exactly when he is talking about himself and when he is talking about other people. Nevertheless, even if the first part of the question manages to detach the issue from the respondent, the following question brings it right back home to the respondent. However, this method may not work for more sensitive questions. Another aspect of social desirability, often not mentioned in textbooks, is the reluctance of respondents to admit ignorance. Studies have shown that respondents often answer questions even when it appears that they know very little about the topic. To avoid this problem, the researcher should start with a question of whether the respondent knows the topic or not. Furthermore, the question should not be phrased or asked by the interviewer in such a way as to make it embarrassing for the respondent to admit ignorance.

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Avoid ambiguity: be as specific as possible Although the questions may appear perfectly clear to the researcher, they may not be so to the respondent. For instance, the questionnaire distributed to a respondent at his workplace may contain the question, ‘Are you happy?’ The respondent may have interpreted the question as, ‘Are you happy at your workplace?’ whereas in fact the researcher intended to enquire about the feelings of the respondent at work as well as outside it. Pretesting the questionnaire can help bring out ambiguities. Avoid double-barrelled items Consider the question, ‘Do you enjoy drinking coffee and tea?’ A ‘yes’ answer will presumably be clear but what if the answer is ‘no’? Does this mean that the respondent enjoys:

Coffee but not tea? Tea but not coffee? Neither tea nor coffee?

Such a question is called a double-barrelled question because two or more questions are combined into one. Catch-all questions can even combine more than two questions in one. Such questions can be confusing to respondents and result in ambiguous responses. Avoid making assumptions Consider the following question: Should the University of Antartica continue its excellent Eskimo-training programme? a) Yes b) No This question contains the implicit assumption that people believe that the Eskimo-training programme is excellent.


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Avoid burdensome questions that may tax the respondent’s memory Some questions may require respondents to recall experiences from the past that are hazy in their memory. Most people are able to recall important or unusual details in their lives but forget minor details or insignificant events. A researcher should avoid asking questions requiring recollection of insignificant events such as, ‘What did you have for lunch last week on Wednesday?’ However, questions involving one-off and significant events like, ‘Where did you get married?’ will usually illicit more accurate answers. The same event can be remembered more accurately by people most affected by it compared to people who were not so affected by it. However, even a significant event, if cognitively painful to respondents, will likely be repressed, forgotten and pushed out of their conscious minds. Be aware of order bias Order bias is a bias caused by the influence of earlier answers to questions in a questionnaire. As a rule of thumb general questions should precede the specific questions. This prevents specific questions from biasing the responses to general questions. Consider the following sequence of questions: 1. What considerations are important to you in selecting a supermarket? 2. In selecting a department store, how important is the location? Note that the first question is general whereas the second is specific. Going from general to specific is called the funnel approach. This is a strategy for ordering questions in a questionnaire in which the sequence starts with the general questions, followed by progressively specific questions. The funnel approach is particularly useful when information has to be obtained about respondents’ general choice behaviour and their evaluation of specific products. The handling of filter questions is extremely important. Sometimes whole blocks of questions should be left out for

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some respondents because they do not apply to the respondents. Branching questions should be designed carefully. The purpose of branching questions is to guide an interviewer through a survey by directing the interviewer to different spots on the questionnaire, depending on the answers given. Failure to make this clear will result in frustration for the interviewer and the respondent, not to mention the waste of time and the appearance of unprofessionalism. Also, placing the difficult and sensitive questions at the beginning of the questionnaire may put the respondents off from finishing or completing the remainder of the questionnaire. As a matter of practice, sensitive and difficult questions should be placed towards the end of the questionnaire after the rapport between the respondents and the interviewer (through the questionnaire) has been developed and after the respondents have been able to understand the necessity of the question to be put before them. In short, the sequence of the questionnaire should be such that the respondent is led from questions of a general nature to those that are more specific; and from questions that are relatively easy to answer to those that are progressively more difficult. This facilitates the smooth progress of the respondents through the questionnaire. Pay attention to the layout of the questionnaire The layout of the questionnaire must be such that it promotes fluency of questioning. The formatting, spacing and positioning of questions can have a significant effect on the results, particularly those of self-administered questionnaires. Arguably the tendency to overcrowd questions together to make the questionnaire look shorter is false economy and should be avoided. Overcrowded questionnaires with little blank space between them can increase respondent fatigue and eyestrain and consequently lead to errors in data collection. Moreover, they give the impression that the questionnaire is complex and can result in lower co-operation and therefore lower completion rates. Although shorter questionnaires are more desirable than longer ones, the reduction in size should not be obtained at the expense of crowding. It is a good practice to divide a questionnaire into several parts.


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If the questionnaire is reproduced on poor quality paper or is otherwise shabby in appearance, the respondents will think that the project is unimportant and the quality of the response will be adversely affected. Therefore, the questionnaire should be reproduced on good quality paper and have a professional appearance. Instructions for individual questions should be placed as close to the questions as possible. Instructions should be clear, unambiguous, easy to understand and in simple everyday language. It is often helpful to repeat the instructions on the top of every page in respect of sections which take up more than one page. The order in which questions are asked should be logical. All questions relating to a particular topic should be asked before beginning a new topic. When switching topics, brief transitional phrases should be used to help respondents switch their train of thought. A researcher should avoid splitting a question, including its response categories, into two different pages. Split questions can mislead the interviewer or the respondents into thinking that the question has ended at the end of a page and they will overlook the responses in the following page. This will result in answers based on incomplete questions or incomplete alternative answers. Vertical response columns should be used for individuals questions. It is generally easier for the interviewer and the respondents to read down the single column rather than sideways across several columns. The convention is to have questions on the left hand side and the choice of answers on the right. This assumes that most respondents are right-handed. If openended questions are given, sufficient space should be given to enable the interviewer or respondent to record the answers verbatim. If there is a provision for ‘others’ then adequate space should be left to record what that other is. Where more than one answer/code can be ringed then the instruction should be displayed clearly beside the question.

Other issues The language of the questionnaire The language in the questionnaire should approximate the level of understanding of the respondents. Convoluted instructions and

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jargons are only comprehensible to lawyers and therefore should not be used in questionnaires intended for the layman. Some respondents who have not had higher education will not understand certain technical words or phrases. The best way to uncover such words is through pretesting. Furthermore, certain slang words common in Western culture but totally alien to Eastern culture should be avoided. For example, the word ‘mugging’ means robbery in the West but it means studying hard in Singapore. There are differences in the use of words even among Western countries. For instance, the words ‘highly strung’ (meaning tense) is commonly used in America. However, when the author used the same words in a questionnaire distributed to Welsh and English respondents, the author was asked to clarify their meaning. Even within America itself different words can mean different things. For instance, the word ‘bad’ can even mean ‘good’ among a certain group of people in America. In short, interpretation of words often depends on the respondents’ background, culture and education. Another important point to note is that the researcher should be sensitive to cultural differences and the questionnaire must be adapted if it is intended to be used in different countries. A seemingly innocent question like, ‘What did you have for lunch today?’ can be extremely insulting to a Muslim during the fasting month of Ramadhan. One should undertake a preliminary pilot work in order to understand the potential respondents, their assumptions and perspectives, and what sort of questions are seen as legitimate. Positively and negatively worded items It is advisable to phrase questions in the negative as well as in the positive instead of phrasing all questions positively. Doing so minimises the tendency in respondents to mechanically tick points along one end of the scale. However, the disadvantage of having negatively worded items is that it is often complex and confusing when a respondent has to give a negative answer to a negative question and it would be much easier for him to give a positive answer if the question was worded positively. However, although wording all questions positively will make it easier for the respondent to


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answer, research has show that this leads to extremity of answers. The recommended practice is always to alternate positive with negative answers. Operationalising the concept Questions such as ‘How do you rate your job satisfaction with your current job?’ can prove awkward. Job satisfaction is already a technical term; what makes it even more difficult is that it employs a uni-dimensional scale to a multi-dimensional concept. Abstract concepts like job satisfaction must be broken down into a series of meaningful questions like, ‘Is your pay sufficient to meet your living expenses?’, ‘Are you able to make friends at work?’, etc. Job satisfaction can be more accurately measured by measuring its individual facets like pay, work, promotion, supervision and coworkers. Number of points in a scale Attitude scales can be dichotomous (yes/no) or polytomous (more than two alternatives). I feel that polytomous scales are usually better than dichotomous scales as the former is more sensitive. Oddnumbered scales ranging from 1 to 5 have the advantage of a midpoint, in contrast to even-numbered scales (ranging from 1 to 4). Complex preference questioning When respondents are asked to rank too many items in order of their preference, response errors will result. Paired comparisons will yield more accurate results. Hypothetical questions People will not always do in an actual situation what they think they will do when asked hypothetically. How many times in our lives have we said that we would do something or feel a certain way if something happened? For instance, an angry mother would say that if the prodigal son were to return, she would cast him away, only

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to find that she could not do so when the situation in fact occurred. Furthermore, consider a question such as, ‘How much will I have to pay you before you agree to allow me to cut off your right hand?’ It is unrealistic to think that the respondent can make an objective and rational judgement about this. Therefore, the use of hypothetical questions should be avoided as much as possible. It would be better to ask questions, say, about intention to leave a job by asking whether the respondent has ever considered leaving in the past. In this way the question is no longer hypothetical but requires a description of actual past behaviour, i.e. whether the respondent has thought of leaving in the past. Secondary questions This is when a respondent becomes a proxy for another respondent. It is a mistake to assume that a husband knows subjective things like habits, tastes and preferences of his wife and vice versa. Care should be taken even when asking objective questions of fact such as the household income. You should ask the respondent himself or herself if you want to get an accurate picture.

Problems Unique to Interview Schedules While some of the problems we have discussed apply just as much to interview schedules as they do to self-administered questionnaires, the following are some of the potential problems which are unique to interview schedules. When the respondent, in giving an answer, actually answers two or more questions at once The interviewer may either record all the answers at once or if he is unsure, read out the subsequent questions exactly as worded as if the respondent had not already answered them earlier.


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When the respondent is unclear on a term and explanations or definitions are not provided by the interviewer This is an inherent weakness in the interview schedule. Where possible, interviewers should be trained and briefed regarding the questionnaire before they begin collecting data. Interviewers cannot expect respondents to understand the questions if they do not understand the questions themselves. When there are too many open-ended questions and the respondent is talking too fast while the researcher is too slow in recording As mentioned earlier, a questionnaire should not contain too many open-ended questions but if this is truly unavoidable then the respondent should be asked to speak more slowly. The researcher must be able to record the answers speedily so as not to impede the flow of the interview. In extreme cases, a tape-recorder can be used. Taping the interview, however, will probably result in the respondents not answering certain questions truthfully, especially those that are sensitive and have social desirability bias. When the respondent’s answers are contradictory, clearly showing that the respondent has not understood the question The answers can be read out again to the respondent to ensure that it was not the interviewer who recorded the answers wrongly. This procedure should, however, not be overdone as it disrupts the smooth flow of the interview process. The interviewer should also not give his own interpretations to the questions or suggest answers to the respondents. The researcher should probe inadequate answers non-directively. Overuse of show cards in an interview This can be counter-productive if the interviewer ends up fumbling, creating confusion and even leaving out some cards. A reasonable amount of show cards should be used. Show cards should assist and

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smooth the interview process, not disrupt it. Furthermore, untidy or difficult-to-read cards are a nuisance rather than an aid. Non-standardised Interview Interview schedules can be standardised or non-standardised. Standardised schedules use identically worded questions for all respondents, whereas in non-standardised interviews, the interviewer compiles a list of information required from the respondent and formulates the questions as he goes along. Non-standardised interviews are very much heavily dependent on the interviewer’s skill, hence are extremely prone to errors and not recommended. It is suitable only for focus groups or in-depth questioning for exploratory studies. In conclusion, it can be seen that some of the problems involving questionnaires and interview schedules can be solved whereas some cannot. In spite of the existence of problems which can never be solved, research involving questionnaires and interview schedules should nevertheless continue. Such research results are still regarded as valid and are a great contribution to knowledge. However, this brings to our attention problems in questionnaires and interview schedules which can be solved but were not. A large number (too large to be ignored) of questionnaires were drafted seemingly in ignorance of the above problems and in violation of principles of proper questionnaire drafting techniques. One does begin to wonder about the validity of a vast number of studies in which researchers have not gone through painstaking efforts to ensure that their questionnaires do not suffer from the above problems. No wonder there is such a mass of research with conflicting results!

Sampling Methods A sample is a subset of a larger population. There are pragmatic reasons why a sample should be taken rather than a complete


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census. PhD students have budgets and time constraints. They simply cannot afford the time and money to do a census, i.e. interview or distribute questionnaires to every single person in the population. The irony of it is that sometimes a sample can be more accurate than a census. In a census of a large population, there is a greater likelihood of errors caused by the sheer volume of work. Data may be recorded wrongly due to exhaustion. A small group of well-trained and closely supervised research assistants can do a better job than a large group of poorly trained, poorly coordinated and poorly supervised research assistants. The census may also be impossible to conduct where it involves the destruction of units. Some research projects in quality-control testing require the destruction of the items being tested, for example, tyres, electrical fuses, etc. If such a census was done there would be no product left. Having established the usefulness of sampling, I shall go on to describe the two main categories of sampling. They are probability sampling and non-probability sampling. Probability sampling is a sampling technique in which every member of the population will have a known, non-zero probability of selection. In order for that to be possible, you need to know the exact number of units of analysis (respondents) that comprise the entire population. Take, for example, practising lawyers in Malaysia. We know the exact number because we can obtain the list (or sampling frame) from the Bar Council. Other professional associations keep records of their accountants, doctors and engineers, But what about managers? Do they need to register anywhere? The answer to that is no. We do not know the exact number of managers in Malaysia. What about the number of managers in any named company in Malaysia? Yes, the exact number can be obtained from the company itself. Hence the question that you have to ask yourself is, ‘Can I find out the exact number of elements in the population?’ If the answer to that is yes, then you can choose probability sampling methods. If the answer to that is no, then you have to opt for non-probability sampling methods. Let us look at probability sampling methods. The first is the simple random sampling procedure. Tossing a fair dice, flipping a coin, picking balls from a bag or picking the winning raffle ticket

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from a large drum are typical examples of simple random sampling. Assuming that the person taking up the ticket is not looking into the drum, and the tickets are thoroughly stirred, each ticket should have an equal chance of being picked. Since every unit has an equal chance of selection, simple random sampling appears to be a fair method of selection. However, random sampling errors can still occur in that the final sample can be unrepresentative of the population. I gave an example earlier in this chapter about picking all 10 balls that are all white from a sack that contains 50 white and 50 black balls. So there has to be a sampling method that can ensure that the sample selected are from different parts of the population. One such technique is the systematic sampling procedure in which an initial starting point is selected by a random process and then every nth number on the list is selected, for example every 100th name that appears in the telephone directory. This will ensure that the sample is relatively well spread out throughout the telephone book. There is only one problem with this procedure – when the list itself has a systematic pattern, i.e. it is not random. Suppose you decide to draw your sample from residents of a household estate. Your first random selection results in the owner of a corner lot being selected. You then proceed to choose every seventh resident along the street which coincidentally happens to be a corner-lot unit each and every time. Therefore your entire sample would consist of cornerlot residents who may be different in characteristics from the intermediate lot owners. Corner-lot owners or are usually more wealthy compared to intermediate lot owners. This problem is called periodicity and it occurs whenever the sampling frame or list has a systematic pattern. Stratified sampling method is a probability sampling method in which sub-samples are drawn from samples within different strata. Examples of strata are rural and urban. Variations of stratified sampling are:

Proportional stratified sample in which the number of sampling units drawn from each stratum is in proportion to the relative size of that stratum.


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Disproportional stratified sample where the sample size for each stratum is disproportionate to the population size. This is because the quantity selected was decided by analytical considerations.

There is a third option called the optimal allocation stratified sample which purportedly is based on both the size and variation of each stratum. Cluster sampling is another form of probability sampling. However, discussions of both these methods are beyond the scope of this book. There are four types of non-probability sampling methods: 1. 2. 3. 4.

Convenience Judgement or purposive Quota Snowball

Convenience sampling is conducted by obtaining units or people who are most conveniently available. For example, you may choose your office colleagues, classmates, neighbours, relatives and friends as your respondents. The advantage of this method is that data can be collected quickly and economically. The disadvantage is that the selection criteria is unscientific and more likely to be unrepresentative of the population. Perhaps a slightly better method is the judgement or purposive sampling in which the respondent is selected based upon the judgment of the researcher about some appropriate characteristic of the sample members. The difference between judgment and convenience sampling methods is therefore small and I have known people to claim that they have used judgement sampling just because it sounds better whereas in fact they have used convenience sampling. Now, the question that you might ask is, ‘Is convenience sampling acceptable in a PhD research?’ I would say that using convenience sampling method is not fatal and can be accepted in a PhD research. However, it would be better to use judgmental sampling because here you can demonstrate that you have made efforts to ensure that the respondents selected are in fact suitable because they have fulfilled certain criteria

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in your research. In addition, you can establish that your sample is not peculiar or not too unique and that they are somewhat representative of the population, be it shopfloor workers, managers or professionals. Quota sampling is a non-probability sampling procedure that ensures that certain characteristics of a population sample are represented to the extent that the researcher desires. Quota sampling is similar to stratified sampling – the difference is that the former is a non-probability sampling method whereas the latter is a probability sampling method. Quota sampling can be described by using a very simple example. Suppose you decide that you wish to have 100 respondents comprising 60 males and 40 females. You commence by selecting first the female respondents. Once you have managed to interview 40 females, you proceed to interview only male respondents – up to 60 of them. The advantage of quota sampling is that you can ensure that the sample you have selected is somewhat representative of the entire population (at least as far as the characteristics that you have selected are concerned). Note that I said ‘somewhat’. This is because, since the exact number of elements in the population is not known, we can only approximate. Finally there is the snowball sampling procedure. An MBA student of mine used this method in his research involving expatriates. He initially went to an area which is well known for its nightspots called Bangsar in Kuala Lumpur where expatriates loved to visit. He would buy them drinks, talk to them and distribute questionnaires. In addition, he got them to pass the questionnaires to some of their friends. Hence, in the snowball method, the initial respondents are selected by you, but the subsequent respondents are ‘referrals’. This method was very effective for his study because he was able to get access to expatriates who do not hang out in bars. These are usually married expatriates with families. If he had only interviewed expatriates in bars, the sample would have consisted mostly of single male expatriates. By having referrals, he was able to get access to married expatriates with families. Therefore his final sample was more heterogeneous and representative of the population of expatriates in the Klang Valley in Malaysia.

CH A P TER

F I VE

The Structure of the PhD

What does a PhD Thesis Actually Look Like? The quickest way to find out what a PhD thesis actually looks like is to go to a university library and take a look at a few PhD theses. This will give you an idea of the content and standard required. However, you may be puzzled at the differences in the format and layout. The best thing would be to look at PhD theses in the subject area that you propose to do your research. Look at the more recent ones and try not to go back more than ten years. You may find that the layout for a PhD in management may differ in detail, but generally contain the following chapters:

Abstract Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Literature Review Chapter 3: Research Methodology Chapter 4: Results Chapter 5: Conclusion Bibliography or References

The above represents the minimum number of chapters and their logical sequence. However, you may come across theses with more than five chapters. For instance, my thesis (Ahmad, 2001) is divided into eight chapters as follows:

Chapter 1: Introduction Chapter 2: Literature Review

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Chapter 3: Research Methodology Chapter 4: Selection of Companies and Data Collection Chapter 5: Results (1) – Descriptive Statistics and Correlation Chapter 6: Results (2) – Complementary Fit: The use of hierarchical logistic and multiple regression in the analysis of the interaction effect between person and environment Chapter 7: Results (3) – Supplementary Fit: Co-worker congruence and superior–subordinate congruence Chapter 8: Discussion and Conclusion Bibliography

Notice that I have three results chapters and a separate chapter on the selection of companies and data collection. I conducted many statistical analyses and they were far too lengthy to be contained in a single chapter. So I divided them into three separate chapters according to themes. ‘Complementary fit’ and ‘supplementary fit’ are technical terms that I do not wish to elaborate in this book. Suffice to say that these are related but separate issues, and it is therefore logical to separate them into different chapters. Selection of companies and data collection are usually described in the research methodology chapter. However, I wrote about them in a separate chapter immediately after research methodology. It was more logical to do so as there were specific criteria for the selection of companies, due to the nature of my research. These criteria had to be described in some detail. Combining the chapters would make the resultant chapter too lengthy. Thus, the issue of whether one should have more than five chapters, and what the additional chapters should be, would vary from thesis to thesis. Essentially, the main criteria would be one of length. If you find that your results chapter is too long, break it down into different chapters according to themes. If you feel that you should describe something in a separate chapter in order to draw special attention to it, by all means do so. This is of course provided that the new chapter is not too short. Generally there should not be chapters that are too long or too short. However, it is generally accepted for the introduction and conclusion chapters to be shorter compared to the other chapters in the thesis. Literature reviews and research methodology chapters tend to be long. It is


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always useful to look at other theses and compare them with your own. However, do not abandon your judgement and common sense. If you are completely lost, then ask your supervisor for his opinion! On a general note, all the chapters should have an introduction and a conclusion as subtopics. For instance, the literature review should have an introduction as the first heading and a conclusion as the final heading. The same applies to the research methodology and other chapters. This enables the reader to grasp the essence of the chapter, by merely reading the introduction and the conclusion, without having to read the entire chapter. I will now explain in detail what the chapters are that should be written and what each should contain.

Chapter 1: Introduction The introduction sets the scene and generally hints at why the current research is necessary. I can safely say that I have yet to read a thesis that does not have an introduction. So, what should an introduction contain? My thesis (Ahmad, 2001) had the following sub-headings in the introduction chapter: 1.1 Historical development and current importance 1.2 Main purpose of this research

Another question that might be asked is, ‘What is the purpose of an introduction?’ The purpose of the introduction is to set the scene. It first gives a brief overview of the topics involved and more or less tries to justify why the current research is important. It gives an overview of the subject area of the research, the constructs involved, the problems with past research and to what extent the current research aims to address these problems. Now this might sound like a lot. Perhaps the reader can get a better idea of this by simply reading several theses to see exactly how other students have written their introductions. A valuable tip that I can give you is the introduction should never be the first chapter that you write. In fact, a colleague of mine recommended to me that it should be written last. I feel that it can

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be written simultaneously with the conclusion after most of the other chapters have been written. The rationale for doing so is that the PhD process is rarely sequential. It is only after experimentation that you finally decide on what should be reported in your thesis. Of course, before embarking on a research you must be clear on what is it that you are trying to do: what constructs will be involved in your research, what research methodology you will be using and what statistical analyses you will be carrying out. However, the PhD research is very often fine-tuned as it progresses. What you have proposed earlier on may not be feasible now. You may have found a better method along the way. As I mentioned earlier, the PhD process is a process of discovery. You discover and learn things progressively up to the end, rather than learn it all from the beginning. You are constantly improving yourself every step of the way. Consequently, it should come as no surprise that things that you proposed in the early stages can be substituted by something better. In fact, this was what happened to me. During my research proposal, I merely planned to look at three-dimensional graphs to investigate the interacting effects of group work environment on the relationship between personality and satisfaction. Subsequently, I found a better method, i.e. using a statistical test of hierarchical regression to investigate the moderating effect of the work environment on the personality-satisfaction relationship. Another crucial point which I found recently is that you should address issues relevant to the study at hand and not describe at length, factors or variables which are not part of the study. If you do so, you are actually inviting the examiners to question you about their relevance, or possibly worse, ask you to justify why you have not included these variables in your study.

Chapter 2: Literature Review This is probably one of the first chapters that you will write. However, you probably have to keep amending the same throughout


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your entire PhD period. The literature review should discuss the constructs (e.g. job satisfaction, personality) which are used in the current research. A literature review is a way of demonstrating that you have a full professional grasp of the background theory relating to your subject and that you are aware of the controversies, developments and breakthroughs that are currently exciting or engaging leading practitioners in the subject. Thus the literature review should not be a mere recitation of what other researchers have done in the area of the proposed research; instead, it should be a critical evaluation of what other researchers have done. It should identify a gap in the literature (i.e. an area or issue that no previous reported research has addressed) that the proposed research intends to fill. The literature review should identify the strengths and weaknesses of previous research. The articles should be arranged in such a way that the writer can build up his case from one article to the next. The literature review should also end by showing how these different variables are related. In addition, it should end with a summary of all the weaknesses and omissions of previous research – weaknesses and omissions that the current research will address. In other words, you are not only criticising previous research but you are able to devise a research design that will overcome the criticism that you are making. So, the literature review chapter may end with the proposal of a new model that will capitalise on the strengths of previous research while avoiding their weaknesses. Of all the chapters in the thesis, the literature review probably contains the most cited articles/books – generally around 200 in total.

Chapter 3: Research Methodology The research methodology chapter should contain the following:

The research design. An enumeration of the predictor variables.

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An enumeration of the dependent variables. Demographic data, e.g. age, sex, etc. Rationale for the use of questionnaires (or whatever method used). Detailed description of the questionnaires used. A brief description of alternatives available and why they were not chosen. Possible sources of error. Development of theory and hypotheses.

The research methodology is similar to the literature review because articles of previous studies are also cited here. However, whereas the literature review focuses on the constructs, the research methodology focuses on the instruments that measure these constructs. The research methodology should describe in detail the instruments/questionnaires that were actually used in the study. It should also include a brief description of alternative instruments or methods available and why they were not chosen. Students should resist the temptation to enumerate in their theses all the different methods of data collection that are available, as well as detailed descriptions of the pros and cons of each method. In short, the student should not reproduce the textbook. I have seen instances where students were not awarded PhDs due to this reason. This is the difference between PhDs and MBAs. PhD students are expected to be already well acquainted with the existence and the pros and cons of the different methods of research. What is expected in a thesis is evidence that a rational decision has been made. Thus a thesis should contain a detailed description of the method chosen, and only a brief statement that the student is aware that there are other alternatives available, but that they were not chosen for the reasons given. If the reasons for the choice given were illogical, rest assured this issue will be raised in the viva. I will now explain briefly the different research methods available. There are basically two main types of research – experimental and ex post facto (or after-the-fact research). Experimental research is one where the conditions are controlled so that one variable can be manipulated at a time in order to test a hypothesis. Put in another way, only one variable at a time (the independent variable)


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is manipulated and its effect on another variable (the dependent variable) is measured while all other variables that may confound the relationship are held constant or controlled. Only experimental research can allow the evaluation of causal relationships among variables. It usually involves two groups of subjects – the test group and the control group. Measurements of both groups are taken immediately prior to the test. Thereafter, in the case of the test group, one independent variable is manipulated while holding all other variables constant. In the case of the control group, no changes in any variables are made. Thereafter, measurements are made of both groups. Any changes in readings in the test group that were not in the control group can therefore be attributed to the change in the independent variable. One of my classmates used experimental research to measure the impact of certain advertisements on consumers’ perceptions. He called in two sets of people – the test group and control group. First, he took measurement of their perceptions. Certain advertisements were shown to only the test group but not to the control group. He then took measurements of perceptions of both groups. He found that there were some changes in perceptions of the test group, but not of the control group, after he showed them the advertisements. Thus he could confidently say that the changes in perceptions were due to the advertisements. The objection towards experimental research is that it lacks external validity. This is because people are subjected to artificial conditions. They may not react the same way in real life. The next type of research, ex post facto, is more popular among social science researchers. Ex post facto research takes measurements only once. No control of variables is attempted. Therefore, no causal relationship can be tested. Why is it then the more popular choice of research? This is probably because it is much simpler to conduct and respondents can be more easily accessed and at lower cost compared with experiments. Furthermore, there are a wide variety of ways in which data can be collected in ex post facto research. For instance, data can be collected via survey or observation. Via survey, data can be collected by questionnaires or by personal interviews. Self-administered questionnaires can be sent through the post or via email, or they can be

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completed in the presence of the researcher. Personal interviewing can be done face to face or by telephone. Face-to-face interviewing can be conducted by mall intercept, door to door or at the office by prior appointment. There are obvious advantages and disadvantages of each method. For instance, questionnaires sent by post can be relatively cheap, time saving and can cover wide geographical regions. However, they are notorious for their low response rate. The benchmark, i.e. acceptable response rate, has been said to be around 20 per cent. While this may be more easily achieved in countries such as Britain, it is an almost impossible task in Malaysia. I have heard some of my colleagues at University of Malaya complaining that they had sent out around 1,000 questionnaires and only managed to get around twenty-five questionnaires completed and returned (i.e. 2.5 per cent). Obviously, the low response rate can have some implications of response bias and a lack of validity, i.e. whether there are differences in characteristics between the few people who did respond, and the many who did not. A student of mine at the University of Malaya tried to distribute her questionnaires by email. She also complained of an extremely low response rate. The filling of forms is an activity loathed by many Malaysians and this culture is not helping PhD students and other researchers at all. I feel that getting respondents to complete questionnaires in front of you is the best method of data collection, from the point of view of not only ensuring a high response rate, but also in terms of accuracy of results. This is because respondents will find it more difficult to refuse if you are physically present. Another advantage is that if the respondents are unclear of anything in the questionnaire, they can immediately seek clarification from you. In fact, I used this method of data collection in my PhD research. My collection of questionnaires took respondents approximately three hours to fill! Therefore, a lot of coaxing and persuasion had to be done on my part to ensure that the respondents completed all sections of all the questionnaires. Also, any questions raised by the respondents were immediately answered. In this way I managed to maintain the motivation and co-operation of the respondents. Some of my classmates at the Manchester Business School collected their data by interview. They would interview the respondents


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at their workplace at an appointed date and time. Questions were structured (i.e. the same questions for all respondents) but open ended (i.e. respondents were free to phrase their answers as they wish). Although this method allows flexibility and the preparation of such questionnaires does not take as long (as answers do not have to be thought out by the researcher beforehand), a lot of time has to be spent subsequently in coding (i.e. translating the answers into numbers for use in a statistical software). In fact, I had only a few questions in my questionnaire that were open-ended. However, I spent much time trying to categorise certain words for the purposes of coding. It is an extremely tedious and time-consuming process and I would recommend that you should try to avoid asking openended questions, as much as possible. In addition to carrying out a survey, additional data can also be collected by way of observation. Observation can be overt or covert. In overt observation the subject of observation knows that he or she is being observed, whereas in covert observation, the subject does not. Such data can be used to enhance and explain the data that were collected by survey. In my research (Ahmad, 2001), I used both overt and covert observations. After completing the questionnaire, I would follow the respondents to the shop floor and observe them at work. I also took note of the working conditions, the seating arrangements, the physical space, noise levels and the size of the team. From my observations, I was able to see that the physical arrangements allowed the assembly workers to interact with each other as a team. They were working sufficiently close to each other and the noise levels were sufficiently low to enable them to have a decent conversation with each other. However, what I also observed through overt and covert observations, was that although they were close to each other, the workers tended not to interact very much with each other. In fact, one of the supervisors said that the team members were working rather independently of each other. Thus valuable information can be obtained through observation, which can be used to support or supplement data collected by survey. So, even though most of my data were collected by closed-ended survey questionnaires, I supplemented the same with data collected by observation and even by some open-ended interviews with a few supervisors.

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The research methodology chapter should usually end with the development and enumeration of hypotheses. Having said this, however, I do recall having seen PhD theses without a single hypothesis stated. So it appears that hypotheses are not mandatory in PhD theses. However, I have been informed by several professors that the more ‘modern’ approach for want of a better word, is to have the hypotheses stated prior to data analyses. As a rule of thumb, a thesis should contain at least two but not more than seven hypotheses. However, this is only a general guide. A thesis can have more than seven hypotheses if the student can show that they are actually related and can be grouped in say, three themes. For example, there can be three main hypotheses but each hypotheses is subdivided into four hypotheses, making twelve sub-hypotheses in total (Ahmad, 2001). A thesis that has thirty hypotheses or more will probably leave the examiner with an impression that the researcher lacks focus. The rationale behind insisting that there should not be too many hypotheses is that a PhD thesis should be focussed, i.e. it have considerable depth, not width. The population, sampling method and the sample itself are usually described in the research methodology chapter. It may however, be placed in a different chapter if the student wishes to elaborate on the issue at length and the research methodology chapter is already too lengthy. For instance, I placed it in a different chapter with the headings as follows: Chapter 4: Selection of Companies and Data Collection Introduction Part 1: Criteria for selection 4.2 Criteria for selection 4.3 Rationale for the choice of only one occupation and a few companies Part 2: Data collection 4.4 Introduction: Chronology of events 4.5 Pilot testing 4.6 Selection of companies 4.7 Brief description of the companies 4.8 Collection of qualitative data 4.9 Selection of the sample 4.10 Data collection methods


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4.11 The data 4.12 Conclusion

A common mistake by students is to cite articles relating to methodology (such as the questionnaires) in the literature review when they should be in the research methodology chapter. Similarly, students sometimes make the mistake of citing articles relating to the variables in the research methodology chapter when they should be placed in the literature review chapter.

Chapter 4: Results This usually begins with a statement of the preliminary analyses i.e. checking the missing data, linearity of distribution and homogeneity of variance. It should briefly describe the analyses used; for example, if the researcher used regression analyses, the regression equation should be stated. Results of analyses should be reported in tables and salient points reported in the text. If analyses are many and detailed, it is better to present them in separate chapters. Thus there may be more than one results chapter. For instance, in Ahmad (2001), there were three separate results chapters and these were divided according to themes. For instance, the first results chapter contains the report of the preliminary analyses, basic statistics (frequencies, mean) and correlation. The second results chapter contains the hierarchical regression analyses pertaining to complementary fit. The final results chapter contains analyses pertaining to supplementary fit. Graphs and tables should obviously be included in these chapters complete with numbered headings. However, what is less obvious is, how much should be included? Should the SPSS printouts be included? The answer is no, SPSS printouts should never be inserted directly in the chapters. Rather, only salient or pertinent figures should be inserted and presented in tables in the chapters. Computer printouts should only be included in the appendices.

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Furthermore, you may need to exercise your discretion on what printouts to include if there are too many. As a rule of thumb, appendices should never form more than half of the bound volume of the thesis. You cannot impress examiners with volumes of computer printouts. Essentially, appendices should be provided with the purpose of enabling the examiner to search for more information if he or she so desires. Thus the student should be able to discern the more important ones from those less so.

Chapter 5: Conclusion This should be a summary of all the previous chapters. The conclusion also reiterates what you set out to do from the beginning (i.e. your objectives) and assesses to what extent you were successful. Often the conclusion ends with a statement of the limitations of the study as well as proposals for future research. Usual limitations mentioned are:

Having a small sample size. The study is conducted in a limited number of companies and occupations. The study is conducted in one country only.

The above limitations usually mean that the results of the findings cannot be generalised to the rest of the population, or to other populations. However, this in itself is not fatal. In fact, you may be pleasantly surprised by the fact that the lack of external validity (inability to generalise findings) is a rather common limitation among PhDs in the social sciences. A very important point that I wish to stress is that you should only make conclusions based on your data. I have seen students’ theses, where the data points to ‘A’ but they conclude ‘B’ based on their own feelings and intuitions. If you are going to rely on intuitions, why collect data in the first place? So, do not make


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conclusions beyond your data, or worse still, do not make conclusions which actually contradict your results. This might sound terribly obvious and no one will make that mistake, you say. Believe me, I have seen that happen more than once.

Other Sections In addition to the main sections mentioned above, your thesis should contain, at the beginning, an abstract that summarises your work. My supervisor advised me that the abstract should be written in such a way that readers would be able to know and understand what is contained in your thesis without having to read it fully! This means that it must be a concise, yet a complete summary of what you have done. The usual mistake made in the abstract is not summarising the results. The abstract should summarise the entire thesis. I feel that the easiest way for you to understand this is to have a look at other theses. In addition to the abstract, there are the acknowledgements, layout of title, and contents pages. Normally there should be separate contents pages for tables, diagrams and appendices. Also there are requirements as to the width of the margins, paragraph spacing, type and size of fonts. You should consult your university’s regulations regarding these. Another important section is the bibliography or references section. The importance of this is often underestimated by the students. It is without a doubt the most boring part of preparing a thesis. Yet time, care and effort have to be expended in preparing it as examiners are extremely fond of picking out mistakes in it. The rationale is that if you are relying on a particular theory that has been put forward by somebody else, then due credit should be given to him or her. Also, as a courtesy to your readers, you should give them a means to be able to find more information on the study, should he or she so desire. Students should consult previous PhD theses in their universities for the acceptable format.

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This is because formats used in PhD theses can differ slightly among universities. A common complaint of supervisors is that their students’ theses are ‘dry as dust’ or good cures for insomnia. I remember that when I was doing my PhD in Manchester, my late father told me that he was very interested in reading a PhD thesis. So I lent him one that was written on leadership. However, after a few days he complained that it was extremely dry. He stopped after having read only one third of the thesis. It is a fair statement to make that in general, theses are boring to the layman as they are rather technical. They are nothing like novels. So, do not be put off if your supervisor complains that your thesis is boring. It may be boring because he or she has to read it instead of being able to take a walk down to the pub. However, what you should be more concerned with is whether your thesis has sufficient merit for you to be awarded a PhD. Here is a checklist of what must be included in the different chapters of a thesis: 1. The introduction should contain the uniqueness, significance and contribution of the study and why the study should be conducted – i.e. there should be a theoretical contribution and a practical contribution. 2. The main variables should be introduced here, setting the scene. 3. Do not discuss at length in the introduction, variables which are not investigated in the current research. 4. The literature review should discuss in depth all the variables which are subjects of the study. 5. The literature review should also explain why and how all the dependent and independent variables in the study are related to one another. 6. The literature review should be a critical review rather than mere recitation of previous research. 7. The literature review should identify a gap in previous research. 8. If possible, identify a methodological weakness in previous research and how that has been overcome in your research.


9. 10.

11.

12. 13. 14. 15. 16.

17.

18. 19.

20.

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(In my opinion, this is preferable but not mandatory. However, some examiners may feel that it is mandatory and it is better to be safe than sorry). The research methodology should contain a diagram of the conceptual model, which should be described. The research methodology should cite articles reporting previous research which have made use of the questionnaires you have adopted in your research (if you use questionnaires) – this will justify the use of the questionnaires. The research methodology should also cite articles reporting previous research from which you have adopted your research design – this will justify your choice of the research design. The hypotheses must be formulated in accordance with your research questions and theoretical model. The items in your questionnaires should relate to your hypotheses. Descriptive statistics such as frequencies, means, standard deviation and normality of distribution should be conducted. Reliability and validity tests should also be conducted. More importantly, your results chapter should describe statistical tests that you have conducted in order to find support for your hypotheses. Report explicitly whether the results support the hypotheses or not – do not leave it to the examiners to figure it out for themselves. Report whether the results are consistent or contrary to your expectations; if they are contrary, explain why. The conclusions and recommendations should be based purely on the results obtained and not on the student’s intuition. However, the student may attribute certain factors to be the cause, but the student must make it explicit that it is only a suggestion on the part of the student and the research can in no way confirm that. In other words the student can only offer a suggestion as a possible explanation of the events, although the research cannot confirm the same. The bibliography conforms to APA (American Psychological Association) style or whatever stipulated style.

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21. Ensure that all the articles mentioned in the thesis are listed in the bibliography and there are no articles which have been mentioned in the text but are not in the bibliography (NIBs – Not in bibliography). 22. Also ensure that the bibliography does not give the citation of articles which have not been mentioned anywhere in the thesis (NITs – Not in text). Although at the time of writing this checklist I have tried to come up with a comprehensive list, I cannot help but feel that I may have left something out or that new criteria may have arisen. So my advice to you is that the above list should be treated as containing the more obvious criteria, but should not be treated as exhaustive. It is absolutely critical that you should at the very least, make sure that you have all the items in this checklist, before submitting your thesis.

CH A P TER

SI X

The PhD Process

What the PhD Process is Like We have talked about what a PhD is, and what is required of it. However, what is it like for the students themselves? What is the life of a PhD student really like? This brings me back to the time when I was an undergraduate law student. My friend introduced me to an acquaintance of his who happened to be an engineering PhD student. He was haggard and unshaved, and he looked as if he did not have any sleep the night before. He could barely stand up straight and was leaning against the wall. I was totally put off by that and told myself that I was not going to be a PhD student. There is this common perception that a PhD student is very much like a prisoner locked up in an ivory tower. It can be true to some extent. The PhD process is in fact a very lonely one. I would say that being an introvert can be an advantage. Students interact mainly with the supervisor. Even then, meetings may take place at an average of once a month. There may be some interaction with other students, especially during the first year if there are taught courses. In the second year, there may be some interaction with respondents for students who collect data by survey. This is fairly common among those doing PhDs in organisational behaviour and marketing. Finance students usually make use of secondary data (data collected by other people for other purposes). Sometimes these data can be purchased from firms that do security analyses. What is the PhD process like? The first meeting with the supervisor is usually as follows: The student informs the supervisor of his interests. The supervisor may agree with the student’s proposal but

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usually will suggest some improvements. Some discussion may take place and a provisional proposal is agreed upon. Note that at this stage the proposal is only provisional. The next stage is the literature review. A student begins by identifying the constructs such as personality, intelligence, work structure, job satisfaction, performance, culture, group behaviour, leadership, etc. that the student wishes to explore in his or her research. The student will go to the library and begin a literature search usually from computer databases using the relevant constructs as keywords. The databases will identify the titles and abstracts of all the relevant articles and books published. The student will have to photostat the relevant articles and borrow books. As a rough guide, a PhD student doing research in organisational behaviour or marketing will have to peruse about 1,000 articles and books. Out of these, the student will perhaps cite only 250. Next comes the research methodology. Students will peruse through the same articles to see what instruments/questionnaires other researchers have used. They will try to identify which are the more popular instruments used by other researchers and evaluate the suitability of such instruments for their research. When you are at that stage, a valuable question that you should ask yourself is, ‘Are those questionnaires available?’ i.e. can you purchase them from the author? Another question that you may ask is, ‘Can these questionnaires be improved?’. This often results in you asking yourself (and your supervisor) the following series of questions: 1. Should I use the existing questionnaire in its original format? 2. Should I amend the existing questionnaire and use the amended version in my research? 3. Should I develop my own questionnaire from scratch? My advice to you is, if you are able to find an existing questionnaire that is highly regarded by the academic and professional community and whose reliability and validity have been tested, you should use it. One example is the Job Descriptive Index (JDI) whose reliability and validity in measuring job satisfaction in a variety of occupations have been tested by numerous researchers (including

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myself), all over the world for over thirty years. (An instrument is valid if it measures what it purports to measure. It is reliable if the items are internally consistent with each other as well as over time). Similarly, should your research entails the measuring of personality, then it is best to use existing psychometric tests. Further details of psychometric tests can be found in Mental Measurements Yearbook. However, there may be several reasons why you may not wish to use existing questionnaires. One reason is that the objective of your thesis is to come up with another questionnaire that will overcome weaknesses inherent in existing questionnaires. Another reason is an economic one. Use of existing questionnaires often involves purchasing the questionnaires, answer sheets and scoring keys from the author. If your sample size is over 1,000 and you intend to use three or four different types of questionnaires, the costs can be huge (to a student undertaking his PhD without sponsor). The third alternative, which is to develop your own questionnaire, should be avoided unless developing a questionnaire is the objective of your research. This is because it is very difficult to defend the validity and reliability of such an instrument in the viva. A full-time PhD student should commence with data collection during his or her second year. If the research method is a survey questionnaire, the entire process of data collection and coding can take anything from four months to a year. This is because the respondents/companies are only willing to be interviewed at times that are convenient to them. Thus, there will be some idle periods when you will not be collecting any data. In my PhD research for example, the pattern was usually for me to spend perhaps a week at one factory testing the workers who were available there, and then to return the following month to test some more workers. As the companies that participated in the survey were keen on minimising disruption to work flow, they advised me that testing should be staggered over several months. Workers who were not available on the earlier session would have an opportunity to participate in the subsequent sessions. Visits were always arranged in co-operation with managements of the various companies in order for them to be made at times when it would be most convenient for them to test their workers.

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The next stage is data analysis. Should you do a qualitative or quantitative analysis? A quantitative analysis usually requires the use of a computer software such as the SPSS, Excel or Econometric Views. Qualitative analysis, on the other hand, may require the use of computer software such as NUD.IST or no computer software at all. My recommendation to students wishing to do research in organisational behaviour or marketing is to opt for quantitative research. In other words, my motto is, do quantitative research if possible. Having said that, there may be some areas in the social sciences where quantitative analyses are rare such as those involving corporate strategy and international business management. Here, statistics used are nominal – usually frequencies, percentages and means. Quantitative and qualitative research are not mutually exclusive. Sometimes findings in quantitative research can be supported by findings obtained by qualitative means. If you opt for quantitative analysis, you will spend many hours in front of the computer. Some might find it tedious and boring. However, this process enthrals me and I find that I can spend weeks sitting in front of the computer from morning to night, experimenting with different types of analyses. Time really flies! The initial stages of a quantitative analysis are as follows: 1. Inputting data. 2. Preliminary analyses – checking for errors, missing cases, normality of distribution. 3. Conducting statistical tests like correlation, regression, factor analyses. My description of the PhD process seems to indicate that it is sequential, i.e. a student does the background work and writes Chapter 1, then does the literature search and writes Chapter 2, and so on and so forth. However in reality, the process may be nothing like that at all! For instance, I wrote the literature review simultaneously with the research methodology. My introduction chapter was written simultaneously with the conclusion chapter, after the analyses were conducted and written out. When I was in my first

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year, a third-year student once advised me, ‘Finish off your literature review in the first year. Get it over with and concentrate on the data collection, analyses and writing the other chapters in the second and third years.’ I tried to take his advice, but it did not work. I found myself going back and forth, constantly revising and amending what I have already written in all of the chapters. I was even amending my literature review about one month before I submitted my thesis. Anyway, my friend who advised me was still doing his PhD when I attended my convocation in July 2001. I heard more recently that he had sat for his viva and was required to make major corrections to his thesis. Three years later, he had still not managed to make the corrections and he subsequently dropped out of the programme without managing to complete his thesis. It is clear that his strategy did not work!

When to Start Writing The questions that one should logically ask are:

When should I start writing? Should I start writing as I go along, or after all the data have been collected and analysed? Should I write the chapters in sequence? Should I write first in longhand or type straight into the PC?

I would recommend you to commence writing as early as possible and not leave it all to the end – that is the advice I give to all students, even those at the University of Malaya who have to attend classes and examinations as part of their coursework. Writing a thesis involves a great deal of work and is often grossly underestimated by those who have not written a thesis before. Some students, during their second year of the PhD course, have advocated, ‘There is no point in writing too early as we may change the direction of our research as we progress. Thus all that we have written earlier has to

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be thrown out – a waste of time. After finishing my analyses, I am going to spend the next three months, solid, in writing up the whole of my thesis.’ Students may make the above remarks because they are motivated to conserve effort. They do not wish to do any work that might be thrown out later. In other words, they want to minimise ‘wastage’ of time and effort. However, they do not realise that writing a thesis can be an extremely time-consuming process. Furthermore, it is only through writing and rewriting that we can discover flaws in our arguments. Yes, I said rewriting. In fact, a thesis has to be rewritten several times before it approximates perfection. Rewriting a thesis or ‘polishing’ as some students refer to it, can take as long as one year! Why does it take so long? Well, as I mentioned in earlier chapters, a thesis is a position that you wish to argue. As such, your arguments must not contradict one another. You have to literally be able to defend every statement that you make. Rest assured that if you do not identify and eliminate contradicting statements, your examiners will, and you will automatically reduce your chances of succeeding in the viva. I have often observed my MBA students simply copy and past sentences from their literature searches. I can easily spot when a student has done this. The result is often an obvious lack of continuity and flow. There are often disjointed themes and sentences which do not make any sense. I have often asked the students to explain to me any ambiguous sentences. I find that they are unable to do so, for they have merely lifted portions of text from the database without fully comprehending its meaning and relevance to the current research. This exercise would be fatal if it were done by a PhD student. Regarding the third question, I believe that the literature review should be written first. Start writing as soon as you have collected and read about 100 articles. At this stage your draft will probably look like a mere recitation of cases, with the very occasional criticism here and there. It is quite all right at this stage. Writing out the literature review early helps you to organise and categorise the articles on paper as well as in your mind. As you read further, more articles can be added and old ones rearranged. You will begin to see some patterns and will be one step closer to being

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able to make a critical review of these studies. As for the research methodology, start writing as early as possible. You do not have to wait until you have finished writing your literature review. These two chapters can be done simultaneously. Start writing on the descriptions of the instruments once you have decided to use them. Write about how you selected your sample and describe how you collected the data, as soon as you have commenced. The reason for doing so is that it is easiest to write about how you have gone about collecting data when you have recently done it and while it is still fresh in your mind. Results should be written shortly after they are obtained. The results chapters should also be amended from time to time as new analyses are conducted. This is because you may probably think of conducting further analyses, after you have obtained results on your earlier ones. The introduction and conclusion chapters should be written last. In short, a thesis is rarely written in the order that it is presented. The final question is whether to write first in longhand or type straight into the PC. A classmate of mine preferred to write his first draft in longhand, amend the same a few times, and then type it in a computer. This was probably because he did not have his own personal computer, and English was not his first language. On the other hand, you may still prefer to write the first draft longhand, even though you have your own computer and English is your first language. This may be so because you find it easier to write it all down first and then look critically at what you have written. Basically, whether it is better to write the first draft in longhand or type it straight into your PC depends wholly on the individual. I have heard of a professor who insists that all his students write their first draft in longhand. I feel that it is wrong to make all of your students do so just because it works for you. When doing my PhD, I typed all my drafts straight into the computer. However, when writing this book, I wrote my first draft longhand. So, it appears that there are no set rules, even for the individual. If there is a rule of thumb, then that rule must be ‘Experiment with different methods, and do whatever works for you at the time.’

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The Importance of Having Multiple Back-up Copies of Your Work It is critical to not only save your work but to have multiple back-up copies stored in various media in various locations. During my second year, my house was broken into and my computer was stolen. I lost all the valuable data and research in my hard disk – amounting to two years’ work. Fortunately, I had backed up most of my data in an Iomega Zip drive. As the last time I saved my data was a week earlier, I lost only a week’s amount of work instead of two years’ worth. I would also recommend that you save data in different formats and in different locations. For example, you may store your entire data on an external hard drive (this is highly recommended and it is what I do now) and keep this hard drive in your house and store another set into CD-ROMs in your office. So if there is a fire in either your house or your office, your data will still be safe. It is highly unlikely that both your house and office would catch fire at the same time (unless your house is your office). It is important not to keep your computer and back-up copies in the same location – and especially not in your car! While I was in Manchester, I saw a note written by a very desperate PhD student. It went something like this: ‘Please, whoever who took my laptop last week from my car, please return only my data as I am a PhD student in my third year and about to complete my thesis. You can keep the laptop – just return my data and I promise not to press any charges.’ He had kept all the hard copies and the soft copies in the same briefcase – a rather foolish thing to do. I keep two back-up copies – one in the office and one at home. The reason is that I sometimes keep my computer at home, and sometimes in my office. Having both the computer and the back-up copy in the same location is not wise. Another factor which I had to worry about (but you do not) was that my PhD was conducted during the infamous year 2000. I not only kept the soft copies in multiple back-up copies but I also printed all of my data and drafts in preparation for 1 January 2000. I spent New Year’s Eve not partying with friends, but at home in front of my laptop watching the clock tick past 12 midnight and watching with great

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apprehension, my data and drafts – that’s the commitment and passion that I had for my PhD! Fortunately, the Y2K problem was greatly exaggerated and I experienced no problems.

Managing Your Relationship With Your Supervisor What is the role of the supervisor? What are the supervisor’s duties? A supervisor is not a coach. A PhD student is not supposed to be instructed on what to do, every step of the way. This is one of the core differences between a PhD student and an undergraduate or MBA student doing a thesis or project paper. A supervisor’s duty is merely to lay down the boundaries in which a research is to be conducted. Thereafter, the student is left on his own. Of course the supervisor gives help and suggestions but only occasionally. The research has to be the student’s own and not the supervisor’s. A PhD is in reality a training ground for a person to be a researcher, not a research assistant. The student must learn to exercise independent thoughts. My external examiner once told me in words to this effect: ‘A PhD is not just about writing a thesis. It is the process of self-discovery, adventure and agony. The pains and disappointments of the process of exploration have to be experienced by the student first hand. This process builds character.’ This was certainly what I encountered when I was a PhD student. I have seen some supervisors sitting next to their students in front of a computer, teaching their students how to do analyses. I have also heard of supervisors correcting the students’ first drafts, making amendments and even writing out whole paragraphs for them. Incidentally, I have also told my supervisor of this, in the hope that he will do the same. However, my supervisor said that what they (the other supervisors) did was wrong. In other words, my supervisor refused to do the same. Although I was a bit disappointed at that time, I realised subsequently that he was doing the right thing. In fact, one of the common questions that examiners

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ask the student at the beginning of the viva is ‘To what extent is this thesis your own? Who came up with the idea?’ A student who receives instructions from the supervisor every step of the way may love it and be able to finish his PhD within three years. However, the student has short-changed himself. He has not gone through the process of being lost in exploration and experiencing the subsequent joy of discovery. He has deprived himself of valuable training and experience and is not developing his full potential as an explorer and inventor. A PhD student should be an explorer, crossing uncharted waters, and not a passenger in a taxi. Unfortunately many people I know wish to be taxi passengers. They just want to take the simplest and quickest route to get a PhD. My experience as a PhD student in the UK has taught me that generally supervisors expect:

their students to be independent their students to be excited about their work, able to surprise them and fun to be with their students, when producing written work, to have their ideas reasonably thought out, typed and checked, rather than a roughly sketched first draft to have meetings with their research students only when necessary and that students should not waste the supervisor’s time their research students to be honest when reporting on their progress their students to follow the advice that they give, when it has been given at the request of the student.

My Experience as a PhD Supervisor My experience as a PhD supervisor, on the other hand, has resulted in me laying down certain rules for my students. Some of these rules are also adopted by my colleagues. These are essentially my rules

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and I am not saying that all supervisors must adopt them. It is entirely up to them and the students. My students who do not like these rules can always find another supervisor. My experience is that it is important to clarify the rules from the beginning as it helps to manage customers’ (students’) expectations and reduce chances of misunderstanding later. The rules are:

Students have to come up with their own thesis. It is not my job to come up with the literature gap or research design. Students must not expect me to proofread their drafts and to go through them line by line correcting mistakes. They will have to check their own work. I recalled my supervisor telling me, ‘There is something wrong with your draft and I will not tell you what it is – you have to find it out for yourself.’ Initially, I found this extremely hard. However, after a while, I became competent in being my own supervisor. The experience was invaluable and I became a different person – from a demanding spoon-fed person to an independent critical researcher – thank you, Colin! Students should meet me without fail at least once a term and not more than three times (therefore twice a term is optimal). This will ensure that students will be motivated to make continuous progress. Often, students (not mine as yet) will not see the supervisor for several months, and when they finally are making progress, they want the supervisor to drop everything and interact with them every other day! This wreaks havoc on the supervisor’s time management. Students have to remember that in most universities, supervisors are not paid an allowance nor have their teaching workload reduced because they supervise PhD students. They are the ones who need the supervisor and not the other way round. It is not my intention to upset you readers out there. Because I care for you, I am being perfectly honest and saying it the way it is. The supervisor can (not must) lay down the boundaries in which the research should be conducted. For example, the supervisor can instruct the student to conduct the research from the viewpoint of person-environment fit theory, strategic fit or

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culture. This is appropriate where the supervisor is well-versed in the area and knows that valuable contribution to the literature can still be made. Also, if the student decides to adopt a different approach with which the supervisor is not familiar with, the student will be on his or her own and the supervisor cannot guide the student effectively. Having said that, I know some supervisors actually prefer their students to go into areas with which they themselves are not familiar with. This is done so that the supervisors can broaden their own knowledge. The above are my rules and my rules alone. After all, it is the student’s thesis, not the supervisor’s. It is common among students from the Far East, especially those who are fortunate enough to have parents who can afford to send them to private colleges, to expect teachers to spoon-feed them with notes. It is not the duty of supervisors to spoon-feed their PhD students. The time has come for such students to learn to think for themselves. I mentioned in my earlier book that supervisors expect their students to be excited about their work. After all, no one is forcing them to do a PhD. Students must also be able to surprise their supervisors by showing them some material that their supervisors have previously not been aware of. Now you might say that is impossible. If the supervisor is supposed to be an expert in the area, how can he be ignorant of something that the student was able to discover? However, this is not only possible, but occurs more frequently than you think. In fact, I was able to do just that during my third year. It is not a sign that your supervisor is incompetent. Rather it is a sign that you have made real progress. During the first year, the supervisor should know more than you regarding the research area. However, as the research becomes more focused, the student should become more of an expert than the supervisor, at least as far as the research problem that the student has been working on is concerned. This is because, by the third year, the student has been working on the problem far longer than the supervisor has. However, I fully acknowledge that there may be some supervisors out there who are so far ahead in their fields that students may never catch up with them.

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It is not always necessary to show written work to the supervisor. Usually, I only produced written work for my supervisor when I felt that such a method of communication was clearer than merely explaining to him orally what I had found out or the line of argument that I wished to take. However, whenever I did so, I had it reasonably prepared, typed and checked, rather than a roughly sketched first draft. It is a matter of courtesy to spend some time on the material, if you expect your supervisor to do the same. Supervisors expect to have meetings with their research students only when necessary and students should not waste their supervisors’ time. I met with my supervisor only when I felt that I had something important to discuss. Meetings were more frequent in the first year – about once a fortnight. Meetings were less often during the second half of the second year when I was collecting my data. Meetings were even less often during the third year because this was the write-up stage. However, I did send him a lot of written work at that time. There were a few rare occasions that we met more than once a week. This may contradict my earlier rule about frequency of contacts. However in my case, I was his only PhD student – so my supervisor had lots of time to meet up with me (which he’d probably disagree with). I also remembered a time when I did not see my supervisor for six months. This was because I was preoccupied with domestic issues at the time and my work progress was rather slow (at first our house was broken into, then we moved house, and finally my wife gave birth to my beautiful baby daughter). Thus over the three-year period, I met with him for an average of once a month. A general guideline that we agreed upon from the start of the course was to meet as often as we really needed to. My classmate had a supervisor who insisted that they met once a week. He would work into the early hours of the morning before each meeting so that he would have something to show his supervisor. Needless to say, this caused him a lot of stress. Subsequently, the supervisor’s other workload increased and he was no longer able to keep up with the weekly meetings. They subsequently abandoned the idea of meeting once a week and met only when necessary, which was approximately once a month.

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Students should always be honest with their supervisors when reporting on their progress. There is no point in lying to their supervisors; they would only be deceiving themselves. If the student is behind schedule for any reason, then it would only mean that the PhD would take longer to complete. This is a fact of life for a PhD student. More often than not, students end up taking longer than they initially planned at the start. It is not the end of the world. In fact, further determination and perseverance, rather than despair, is required in such situation. I know of one person who boldly proclaimed that she was going to complete her PhD within three years; at the fourth year she still has not completed her PhD. Another classmate of mine also told me during our second year of the PhD candidature that he would take a few more months to complete his thesis, i.e. well within three years. I submitted my thesis in the third year but he submitted his only during his fifth year. So much for ambitious proclamations! At the University of Malaya, we have a Doctoral Colloquium in which students are required to present twice a year (i.e. once per semester) the current status of their research. The Board, consisting of the chairman, the supervisor and another lecturer, will listen to the student’s presentation for half an hour. The Board can make one of the following recommendations: 1. Allow the student to continue with his or her research, or 2. Allow the student to continue with his or her research but with close supervision because some but insufficient progress has been made, or 3. Terminate the students, candidature on the basis that the student’s performance has been unsatisfactory for at least two semesters. Finally, supervisors expect their students to follow the advice that they give, when it has been given at their request. I have observed some of my colleagues (PhD students) asking their supervisors for advice, and if the advice given was not what they (the students) wanted to hear, they ignored it. I feel that such behaviour is very insulting. I can relate that to my experience as a practising

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lawyer when I was often sought for advice by my clients. When the advice that I gave them was not what they wanted to hear, they would ignore me. Worse still, they would even try to convince me to give them the advice they wanted to hear. I can therefore sympathise with a supervisor who has faced similar situations in the past. So, please, do not do the same to your supervisors. I know of supervisors who have actually resigned (as supervisors but not as academic staff) as a result of this. They claimed that they have requested their students to make specific changes and that the students have refused to do so. Although I have said earlier that students should exercise independence, this extreme form of independence is highly inappropriate.

CH A P TER

SEVEN

The Seven Strategies of Excellence From my observation of the many PhD students that I have met, I personally believe that what separates successful students from unsuccessful ones are the different habits, rules and beliefs that they have. These manifest themselves in the following strategies.

Strategy 1: Successful PhD Students Constantly Manage their Emotional States and Motivate Themselves This rule is probably the most important rule. Almost all successes and failures in the PhD programme are a result of the candidates’ success or failure in managing their emotional states. Emotional states of success precede all success and emotional states of failure precede all failure. If you feel like a failure, you will act like one. Feel like a winner and you will think like one and eventually be one. I always say in my motivation seminars that if you want to make something happen in the external world, you must first of all make it happen in the internal world. In order for you to become the person that you want to become, you must first of all visualise yourself as already becoming that person in your mind. If you come to my classes, I can conduct hypnotherapy sessions where you can easily visualise the new you. However, I will briefly explain to you in this book what it entails, and I strongly recommend that you put down this book for a short while, and do the exercises immediately after reading this section. Don’t just read

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on. Your life will not be changed simply by reading but by action. In my self-development seminars, my participants do lots of crazy things that they thought were not possible – all these demonstrate the power of the mind. So how do you make things happen in the internal world? I will give you some simple strategies. First of all, sit yourself comfortably in a chair. Imagine yourself having already achieved your PhD. Ask yourself the following questions, ‘What will I look like?, How will I feel?, What do I stand to gain?’ See, hear and feel yourself having already obtained your PhD, attending the graduation ceremony, holding the certificate in your hand, having the adoration of the loved ones around you. See yourself as the third person, then step into the image. How would you feel? What would you hear? What would you see? Imagine what it would be like – the more vivid the feeling, the better. Imagine the image in bright colours, up close, huge and loud. Note that it is not about cold logic, it’s about emotion and motivation. Associate all the pleasures you can think of if you get your PhD, and all the pain you can think of, if you fail to get your PhD. When I was studying for my PhD, I truly believed, at that time, that failure to get my PhD meant death – more precisely financial death. I would have no job to go back to and to make matters worse, I would have to pay back the massive monies I obtained from my PhD scholarship. It would basically bankrupt me. I imagined my loved ones, my wife and two children in torn clothes, starving and the cynical smiling faces of people who always were jealous of me and doubted my capabilities – that my failure to complete my PhD was proof to them of my incompetence. Visualising this for a brief moment was enough for me and I did not want to dwell too long on this negative thought – for it may then turn out to be a reality! Then, I imagined what it would be like if I succeeded, and how I would feel. I imagined being surrounded by my loved ones, who were in a state of wealth and comfort. I imagined how good it would feel to have proven my critics wrong and yet not lowered myself to their level. I would be basking in glory, having achieved the highest level of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs – the need for selfactualisation. I would feel immensely proud and would say to myself, ‘My future is now secure, as I have job security.’

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Actually, when I think about it now, some of the beliefs that I had at that time were simply untrue. For example, you and I both know of millionaires who don’t have PhDs. And there are plenty of PhD holders who are not millionaires. I have said in the beginning of my book that one of the wrong reasons for doing a PhD was to become a millionnaire. I understand now, after attending Robert Kiyosaki’s seminar, that having job security is not the same as having financial security. But what is undeniable is that these beliefs (mistaken as they were at that time) were so strong that they motivated me to push past obstacles, knock down metaphorical brick walls and obtained my PhD. I achieved the results that I wanted, and ultimately, that is all that counts. If you want to do the same, you have my permission to model me – motivate yourself the way that I have done. You may even wish to modify some aspects of it. Do whatever it takes to motivate yourself to success – that is my message.

Strategy 2: Successful PhD Students Decide It sounds so simple, doesn’t it? Why is it that most people don’t decide and choose to procrastinate? It is because most people do not put themselves in the correct emotional state to decide. It is in your moments of decisions that your destiny is shaped. Decision or change takes only a moment. It is arriving at that decision that takes a long time. Decide to do a PhD and decide to do whatever it takes.

Strategy 3: Successful PhD Students Believe Having a PhD is a Must It is not sufficient to say, ‘How nice it would be if I had a PhD’ or ‘I think I should do a PhD.’ You have to convert all your ‘shoulds’ to ‘musts’. All too often we say we should do this and we should do

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that, but we never get round to doing it. Why is this so? Because, until we take consistent action in that direction, it is still a should for us and not a must. When a goal is a must, we operate from a different mindset – we are not willing to accept anything less. There is a burning desire to have a PhD – burning bridges as you move forward and not turning back. When something is a must, we will stretch beyond our comfort zone. Our minds are constantly ‘switched on’ and receptive to new ideas and strategies – for when we give ourselves no option but to succeed, we will always find a way and are motivated to take action. Put yourself on the line. I took massive consistent action while I was pursuing my MBA and my PhD. I raised my level of acceptance, I burnt bridges and I did not give myself the luxury of quitting and turning back. My relatives and friends who did not fully understand me during those times, often advised me not to do what I was doing because it was too drastic and risky, and because I was a newly married man with a baby – that I’d better stick to what I was doing and play it safe. Too risky for a married man with a baby? I was doing it for myself and for my family and for our future financial security! Needless to say, those people who advised me have not got MBAs or PhDs and are still doing the same jobs that they did years ago and struggling to make a living. The path of a leader is often a lonely and controversial one – but one with untold rewards both intrinsic and extrinsic. If you want to follow the crowd, you will become one of them. The question that you must ask yourself now is, ‘Whom do I want to become?’ Listen only to those people whom you want to become.

Strategy 4: Successful PhD Students Sincerely Believe that it is Possible to Complete Their PhDs Belief is nothing but a feeling of certainty that something exists or is true. It is backed up by references or ‘evidence’ that support that idea. If you do not have any references, it is merely an idea and not


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a belief. The more references you have to support the belief, the stronger the belief becomes. The truth is that you can find references or evidence to support any belief – even outrageous and disempowering ones. I did my PhD at a time when there were many references to support the belief that getting a PhD is next to impossible, that the failure rate is extremely high, that supervisors are racist and unhelpful, that students fail through no fault of their own. However, I began to examine these so-called evidence and found out that in a lot of cases, students who failed to complete did not have a strong enough desire to obtain a PhD. They were often too wrapped up in their own businesses to care. In short, for these people, getting a PhD was not a must but rather a should. I began to assemble a new belief that I could complete a PhD. I began to collect references to support that belief – that I had a strong desire; that I was willing to do whatever it takes, just as I had done for my MBA; that I had always been good at studying since I was a child (my parents had always pushed me to study since I was in primary school). So I believed that it was possible. What you believe, you will achieve (even though there were a couple of episodes during my PhD candidature that attempted to shake that belief).

Strategy 5: Successful PhD Students Accept Responsibility for Their Own Destinies If you do not have a plan for yourself, you will fit into other people’s plans – and they may not have your best interests at heart. Life is like a river and most people tend to go with the flow and not consciously decide. When they reach a fork in the river, they don’t consciously decide to go either left or right but allow the river currents to decide for them, i.e. they take the path of least resistance. If I had wanted to take the path of least resistance, I would have stuck with my old job and career and tried to please everyone but myself. You have only one life – do not live for others (other than your family). I am not suggesting that you become a selfish person.

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Sometimes you have to give to yourself first before you can give to others. For example, I am now able to conduct free motivational seminars for orphans and help numerous others improve their lives and relationships with others – something that I was not able to do previously. Coming back to the river analogy, if you allow yourself to be dictated by the river, you may find that one day, you are about ten feet from a waterfall in a boat with no oars! You could have prevented this by some wise planning and action taken further upstream. I knew one person who at the age of sixty lamented that he had stayed in the firm thirty years too long. I felt sorry for him and I learnt a valuable lesson – it was not going to happen to me! What has all this got to do with me, you might ask. The answer is, ‘everything’. You have to decide right now which is more important – your current job or your PhD, your boss or your PhD (that is, if you have to decide between one or the other – you may be very lucky to have a very understanding boss). Another thing is, do not blame your boss or your job, or give other reasons for failing to complete your PhD. People tend to look for excuses in order that they can reduce their pain and frustration for not completing their PhD. The truth is, you have failed to complete your PhD because you have allowed other peoples’ interests to interfere with your own. Do not expect other people to take your interests into account, when you yourself have failed to do so. You see, taking absolute responsibility gives you absolute power. Giving excuses and blaming others take power away from you. Life is about results, not excuses.

Strategy 6: Successful PhD Students Model on Those Who Have Successfully Completed Their PhDs Model those who have successfully completed the PhD programme. In the past I made the mistake of modelling my seniors, i.e. those


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who have been in the PhD programme much longer than myself, but have yet to complete it. I found subsequently that some of their strategies did not work – I eventually completed my PhD earlier than them. I also made the mistake of modelling myself on those who had completed their PhDs some ten or twenty years earlier. I found out subsequently that what they had done may have been acceptable during that period, but is not necessarily acceptable now. The SPSS was not available then, and hence, complex statistical analyses were not expected during those times. However, it has become more or less mandatory in this day and age. It is becoming increasingly difficult (though not impossible), to get by with qualitative research nowadays.

Strategy 7: Successful PhD Students Adopt the PDCA Approach in TQM PDCA in the context of TQM (total quality management) stands for Plan, Do, Check and Action. I will now present these four steps in the context of a PhD research.

The first stage – Plan You must first of all know your outcome. If you do not know what is your outcome is, how are you going to achieve it? For a PhD, however, the outcome of the research is often not known from the outset. So, you may have to start by delineating the boundaries and say to yourself that whatever your outcome may be, it lies within those boundaries. In that way, you will not stray away from the path. However, at the same time, you have to flexible in your approach. What you do not want is to be too rigid and unable to change direction as the situation demands. Neither do you want to go to the other extreme where you are constantly changing topics and even subject areas, and having to start from scratch each time.

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The second stage – Do The next step is essential. Having a great plan is useless if you do not take massive consistent action. Nothing great can ever been achieved without action. Your thesis will not be written by itself. You alone (and not your supervisor) will have to write it.

The third stage – Check You should have sensory acuity and check your progress (i.e. notice what you are getting). To me there is no such thing as failure. There are only results. However, it may not be the results that you want. So, check to find out whether or not you are getting the results that you do want!

The fourth stage – Action If you get the results that you do not want, then change your approach and take a different course of action. Einstein defined insanity as doing something over and over again and expecting a different result. If you want to have a different result, then you need to change your approach. How many times should you change your approach? Once, twice, one hundred times or a thousand times? The answer to that is – keep changing your approach until it works. Do not say to yourself, ‘I’ve tried everything.’ If you have, you would already have achieved the results that you wanted. You may say, ‘Well, I’ve not tried everything but I’ve done thousands.’ Well, my response to that is, ‘Name a thousand.’ You may respond, ‘Well, I haven’t done a thousand but I’ve done several hundred.’ My response to that would be, ‘Name a hundred.’ You will eventually say, ‘Well, I did these three things over and over again that didn’t work!’ Thomas Edison was reported to have tried 10,000 times before he managed to invent the electric light bulb. For him, each time he did not get the result that he wanted was not failure but a learning


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experience – he learnt 9,999 ways not to invent the light bulb. The second last experiment actually resulted in a small explosion which nearly killed him and his assistant. Immediately after the explosion, Edison calmly got up and wrote in his notes. His assistant, obviously furious with him, shouted, ‘Are you going to wait until 10,000 failures before you give up?’ Edison replied calmly, ‘I did not have a failure. What I found out was another way not to invent the light bulb and how to create a small explosion, which may be useful in the future.’ You see, mistakes are only failures if we fail to learn from them. Similarly, Colonel Sanders was reported to have ‘failed’ about 1,000 times to get restaurant owners to pay him for his recipe. Restaurant owners would say, ‘Why should we use your recipe and pay you? We have our own recipe.’ Today, we all know that Kentucky Fried Chicken is a global franchise. Similarly, Sylvester Stallone was reported to have been turned down more than 1,500 times before he got his first acting part – by sleeping over at the producer’s office and refusing to leave. By the way, this was not for the movie Rocky but for a prior movie where he appeared only for a few minutes! He was turned down by some of these agencies four of five times in a row. Sylvester Stallone’s real-life story is actually much tougher than his fictional character’s in Rocky.

Additional Tips for Success In addition to the seven strategies, I have some advice for you – take care of your health. Nothing great can be achieved without energy. To have boundless energy, you must have enthusiasm for your PhD and take care of your nutrition. Note that I said nutrition and not food. You need to drink enough water – between three and five litres of clean, clear water every day – not coffee, soft drinks or alcohol. Eat plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables, cut down on meat, fried foods and processed foods like crisps, chocolate bars and other junk food. Of course, there’s a lot more to it and you may

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wish to read up on it – written by people with PhDs in diets. My PhD is in psychology. By the way, I’m not a fan of the Atkins diet insofar as intake of protein is concerned. Since writing a thesis involves much sitting down, i.e. a sedentary lifestyle, you need to have regular exercise. The trick is to have regular aerobic and gentle exercises every day, rather than a one-off strenuous anaerobic exercise. If done incorrectly, it would indeed be one-off, i.e. once and then you’re dead! I used to play squash which is an anaerobic sport. During my PhD studies, I played for the university and my local club. I used to feel proud being able to beat players literally half my age in this sport dominated by the young. I remember a game in which I played against a 19-year-old student from Liverpool University – matching him power for power and he finally collapsed and I won the game. I may have won the game, but I paid the price the next day – I felt feverish and about 100 years old. What had happened was that, as a result of the anaerobic activity of squash, toxins had accumulated in my body. I still did not learn from that incident, being a masochist, and continued to play squash. But now, having read up more about health, I have come to the wise decision to stop doing anaerobic exercises. I do not know you personally, but I observe that the problem with a lot of Malaysians is that they do not exercise at all. I recommend that you do regular aerobic exercises. I am not saying you have to dress up in leotards and take up aerobics. Aerobic activity is any activity (such as jogging, swimming, etc.) conducted at a light or moderate pace such that your muscles are not deprived of oxygen. Anaerobic activities, on the other hand, are any exercises that are carried out so intensively, that the body is deprived of oxygen. I now engage in regular aerobic exercises in the gym and play golf (I do not take the buggy, I pull the trolley and move quickly around the course – doing nine holes in less than an hour and a half). Lastly, have sufficient sleep. Your body and mind needs to recover. There is no use in cramming, drinking tons of coffee and burning the midnight oil – these are not MBA examinations. Doing a PhD is a long and continuous process. Regular, consistent action is needed, not inconsistent spurts of activity. If you are tired during the day, take a short break. If it is already late at night, then go to


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sleep. I had one experience when I was tired and it was past midnight, but I pushed myself to continue for many more hours working my data analyses using the SPSS. I discovered the next day (when I was fresh) that all the analyses that I had conducted the previous night were wrong and the entire thing had to be thrown out. In short, I would have been better off going early to sleep that night! It was a valuable lesson that I learnt and I never repeated that mistake afterwards.

CH A P TER

EI GH T

The Viva (Oral Examination)

Giving Notice of Submission Normally, university regulations require you to give a notice of submission before you are actually allowed to submit two or three soft-bound copies of the thesis. There is usually also a specific time slot in which to give the notice and when you are allowed to submit the thesis. The actual times vary from university to university, so it would be best to check with the university that you are registered with. Now you feel that you have done all that you can do. It’s been more than four years already. Enough is enough, you say to yourself. But what your supervisor says is probably more important. You normally give the notice after your supervisor has agreed that you have written your thesis (save some minor typographical errors) to a standard required of a PhD. The question that arises is whether you can submit your thesis without the support of your supervisor, i.e. if he feels that there are certain errors and omissions in your thesis. At the Manchester Business School, technically speaking, students may submit their theses against their supervisors’ advice. However, I would strongly advise against it. If your supervisor does not think that your thesis is up to the standard, then you are most probably going to have a very tough time in your viva. When I say tough, it means that your examiner will probably ask you to do major corrections, the same corrections that your supervisor has asked you to do, and probably more (if they don’t fail you altogether).

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The Appointment of Examiners After you have given a notice of submission, the university’s formal procedures are set in motion for the appointment of examiners. However, practically speaking, the informal process of appointing examiners has been decided long before that, around six months before submission of the thesis. There are normally two examiners (one internal and one external). The internal examiner is usually another lecturer in the same university (usually in the same faculty but sometimes from another faculty). In addition to the internal examiner, there is usually another examiner from another university. The rationale behind this is to avoid the appearance of bias or collusion (the assumption here is that the external examiner, who is not the supervisor’s work colleague, would be able to exercise more objective and independent judgement than the internal examiner). Another possible reason for having an external examiner is that he is probably more experienced and knowledgeable than the internal examiner and/or the supervisor. The choice of examiners is often made by the supervisor. Although at first glance this seems like collusion, there is a simple rationale for this. There is much disagreement between academics, especially at the doctoral level. One lecturer may belong to a particular camp and prefer to follow the teachings of a particular guru, whereas another lecturer may belong to an opposing camp and prefer a different guru. Also there may be different orientations as to the nature in which the research was conducted. Some prefer quantitative methods whereas some others may prefer qualitative techniques. A supervisor would obviously try to choose an examiner whom he believes thinks along the same lines as he does. If not, it can spell disaster for the PhD student who can fail, despite having done research up to a standard befitting a PhD. However, it does not necessarily follow that all students would pass if the examiners belong to the same camp as the supervisor, especially if the research work is not up to the required standard. In the University of Malaya, the Board is presided by the chairman of the PhD committee, the dean of the faculty, a representative


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from the Senate, two external examiners and one internal examiner – a full battalion, you might say. However, it is common for at least one of the external examiners to submit a written report and not be present personally during the viva. This leaves much of the examination to be conducted by the internal examiner. My role as chairman is usually to make sure that there is no collusion between the internal examiner and the student at one extreme, or unfair harassment at the other. Frankly, I have yet to come across either situation.

Preparing for the Viva When I was preparing for my viva, I was given some advice by an associate professor. He said that usually, if the supervisor allows a student to submit a thesis and says that you are ready for the viva, nothing much else can affect the outcome of your viva. What he was trying to say was, I was assured of either a pass or a pass subject to corrections, rather than an outright fail. Normally, if the thesis is woefully inadequate, the supervisor will not recommend submission of the same. Still, that doesn’t mean that you should be complacent. Start your preparation a few weeks before the viva. Aim to read the whole thesis in about four days. Once completed, repeat the cycle. Do this until your viva. At the same time, play the role of a devil’s advocate. Think of all the possible questions that your examiners can ask and prepare your replies. You should go through the checklist in Chapter 5 (pp. 90–92) again to prepare yourself for the viva. In addition, you should also prepare yourself for the following questions: 1. What motivated you to do this research? 2. To what extent is this your research idea as opposed to your supervisor’s?

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3. Who set the parameters of this research? 4. Which paper has been most influential in your work? In what ways are your research better? 5. In what ways do the findings in your research contradict previous research? Can you explain why? 6. What do you feel are your major contributions (theoretical and practical)? 7. What are your suggestions for future research? Where do you think the future direction of research in this area will point to? 8. What statistical tests did you use and why? 9. If you can do your research all over again, would you have done things differently? Were there things that you could have done but did not, and things which you did but should not?

Presenting Findings in a Conference If you are an academic, you should always present your thesis (or part thereof) in a conference after successfully completing your viva. The question that remains is whether you should present your findings in a conference prior to a viva. My advice is that you should present at least once but not more than three times. There are several advantages of doing so.

Advantages of presenting before the viva

Helps spot mistakes in your thesis and gives you an opportunity to correct them. Gives you practice in answering questions, criticisms and objections. Adds to your credibility during the viva, especially if the conference paper is accepted for publication in a journal.


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Disadvantages of presenting before the viva

Time consuming. You will have to set aside time to prepare for the conference, hence the PhD might take longer to complete. It may distract you from completing your thesis. This is particularly so where the conference paper concerns issues that are not central to the thesis. If presented to an audience unfamiliar with the subject area, the audience will make objections and recommendations that will lead the student astray. I experienced this when I was presenting my PhD thesis on applied psychology at work. The audience consisted mostly of mainstream managerial researchers who were not well versed with psychological theory. I was criticised by a member of an audience who said that he did not believe that there is such a thing as personality! How do you respond to that? If there is no such thing as personality, then perhaps all the psychologists in the world should resign from their professions, and The British Psychological Society, the American Psychological Association, and all other psychological associations should be dissolved. In another presentation, a member of the audience recommended that I should simply look at the relationship between personality and satisfaction instead of what I proposed, which was, the interactive effects of environment on the relationship between personality and satisfaction. Clearly, what I proposed was more sophisticated. My supervisor also suggested that I should not follow that person’s recommendation. I had no problems following my supervisor’s advice and until today, I am glad that I did.

The Viva Itself You may or may not have to make a formal presentation of your thesis. Much would depend on the university in which you enrolled. However, be prepared to be ‘grilled’ or cross-examined by the

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examiner, who will go through your thesis chapter by chapter. Do not take this personally as it is part of the process. The idea is to build humility in the candidate. The examiner is also testing you to see how well you are able to defend your position and justify your actions. Do not be too defensive and closed-minded. The general rules are:

Be assertive yet modest. Don’t be too defensive. Keep an open mind and be open to new ideas and suggestions.

Do accept certain suggestions of the examiners gracefully. That will immediately soften their ‘attack’ on you. So, when do you defend your viewpoint and when do you accept the examiner’s viewpoint? Easy – whenever you defend your viewpoint, and the debate goes on for more than five minutes on the same topic, you accept the examiner’s viewpoint. During my own viva, I accepted the proposition by the external examiner even though he was wrong. He subsequently realised his mistake and apologised to me! Imagine the leverage that I had over him subsequently! Do not underestimate the power of being humble when appropriate. If, on the other hand, the examiner is indeed correct, then all the more reason for you to accept his opinion.

The Outcome of the Viva According to the Manchester University’s regulations, there are eight possible outcomes of the viva.

A. Award (i) With no corrections. (ii) Subject to minor corrections being made to the satisfaction of the internal examiner.


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B. Refer (i) Permitting submission of a revised thesis without further research and without further oral examination. (ii) Permitting submission of a revised thesis without further research but with a further oral examination. (iii) Permitting submission of a revised thesis with further research and with a further oral examination.

C. Reject (i) But award the master’s degree. (ii) Advising that the thesis be submitted for examination, with revision, for the master’s degree. (iii) Not permitting re-submission. Minor corrections referred to in A (ii) are corrections that can be done within a day. These usually involve typographical errors, grammatical errors and very minor changes here and there. However, I have come across students who have been awarded this category, whose corrections took as long as three days. The most common category, I would say, is B (i) where some changes need to be made to the thesis but there is no further oral examination. However, you will still need to check with the examiners that you have made the corrections to their satisfaction. Such corrections may take from three days to just over a month. You have to hope and pray that you do not fall under categories B (ii) or B (iii) as this means that you have to go through a second oral examination. Students who have to go through a second viva probably did really badly in their first. A student would be awarded a category C (i) if the examiners feel that the work cannot be raised to the standard required of a PhD – when they feel it is something of a lost cause. This may happen if the supervisor did not really know what is required of a PhD (this may sound strange but it is not impossible) and was not able to guide or warn the student from the beginning. However, one cannot automatically blame the supervisor if his student has been

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awarded this category. It may well be that the supervisor had warned the student that the research that he proposed was of insufficient merit for him to be awarded a PhD but the student went on regardless. The student may have chosen to ignore the supervisor if he was simply obstinate, or felt that his supervisor was wrong, or felt that his motivations were too great or, due to some personal dispute, could no longer communicate effectively with his supervisor. It is a sad day for the student, when, after three years of study, he is only able to get a MPhil when his initial objective of embarking on the research programme was to get a PhD. Categories C (ii) and C (iii) are rare to my knowledge. I think that students who end up in that categories were probably doomed from the start. That is why I always insist that students must get it right from the beginning before I agree to supervise them formally. When I say get it right from the beginning, I do not mean, get it all right and perfect from the beginning. That would be extremely rare. The PhD research that one eventually writes up is often slightly different from the one originally proposed. However, what I mean is that the student must be sufficiently clear at the outset on the constructs that he wishes to examine, the relationship between the constructs that he hypothesised and the instruments that he wishes to use. This does not mean, however, that he cannot refine his hypotheses or opt for more appropriate research instruments as he goes along. The improvement on what was originally planned must always be welcomed and never hindered. My point is that the student must be clear on what he wants to investigate and how he is going to go about it from the very start. Until he is able to demonstrate that, I will decline to accept him as a student. It is important to stress that the above position taken is mine only. In fact, some of my colleagues have disagreed with me on this issue. They feel that it is better to have the student formally registered with the university and the supervisor formally appointed. In this way, the university will know of the supervisor’s workload, i.e. that supervisor A has X number of PhD students. However, I feel that it is my moral duty to only encourage the student to register for a PhD and pay fees to the university when I can see that there is a good chance of success. If other supervisors shared my


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view, perhaps the attrition rate of PhD students would be lower. There have been some students who briefly told me what they wanted to do, and after listening to them, I could see a potential PhD. And there were others who described to me in detail or gave me a written research proposal, but I still failed to see how they could be awarded a PhD based on what they were trying to do.

Conclusion

I hope this book has answered most of your queries surrounding the issue of what, when, where and how to do a PhD research. In particular, what a PhD is, a thesis and the concept of originality were explained. A PhD thesis is about ten times as long as an MBA research, but more importantly, it has much more depth. A PhD research examines relationships between variables as opposed to a company report that examines the unique problems faced by a company. Several journal articles can be written out of one PhD research. A PhD covers both theoretical and practical issues whereas a DBA focuses more on practical issues. UK PhDs are essentially theses-based whereas US PhDs have more coursework, assignments and examinations, with the thesis forming a relatively small portion of the course. The choice of the topic of your research should be governed by your own interest, future aspirations, market demand and your past education and experience. Generally speaking, you should perhaps choose the institution rather than the supervisor, not change supervisors and not have more than one supervisor. However, your peculiar personal circumstances may dictate you to do otherwise. If you are a university lecturer and have received a scholarship to do a PhD, then I recommend that you do your PhD overseas. However, if you are self-sponsored, then you may prefer to do your PhD locally, for financial reasons. At the very least, a PhD thesis should contain the following chapters: Introduction, Literature Review, Research Methodology, Results and Conclusion. An introduction should set the scene and give an overview of the topics involved. The literature review is probably one of the first chapters that you will write. It should not

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be a mere recitation of previous studies in your area of research but there should be critical evaluations. Also, it should identify a gap in the literature, i.e. an issue that previous researchers have failed to address. The research methodology should describe the research design, predictive and dependent variables, demographic data, questionnaires used, possible sources of errors and the development of theories and hypotheses. Survey research questionnaires (the most popular form of research) as well as other research methods were also explained. You can also describe the companies/respondents in the research methodology chapter. It may, however, be placed in a different chapter if the student wishes to elaborate on this issue at length and the research methodology chapter is already too long (Ahmad, 2001). You may have more than one results chapter if your analyses are detailed. The conclusion should summarise all the previous chapters (very much like this book). It should also reiterate what you set out as your objectives at the beginning and assess the extent of success you were in achieving them. Limitations of the study as well as proposals for future research should also be mentioned in the conclusion chapter. Students should also not neglect the bibliography – examiners are fond of picking on mistakes in the citations. The PhD process was also described in detail. The UK PhD student spends a great deal of time alone. He usually starts off with the literature review, spending much time in libraries. Soon thereafter, he will commence with the research methodology. This will be carried out simultaneously with the literature review. At the end of the first academic year, the full-time UK PhD student should have come up with a theoretical model and a research design fit to be presented before a research committee. Data collection should be done during the second year. The writing of the thesis should be done as early as the first year, starting off with the literature review and research methodology chapters. These chapters are rewritten in the second and third years. Analyses can be conducted in the later part of the second year and the early part of the third year. Much of the third year is spent writing up the entire thesis. Students may often find that they have to rewrite much of what they had written earlier. This has to be done so that there will be a smooth flow of thoughts and ideas

Conclusion

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throughout the thesis. Students must be able to identify contradicting statements and inconsistencies and eliminate them. Supervisors should not act as coaches. They are also not supposed to lead students every step of the way. However, supervisors have to inform their students if they think that their students are at a dead end or that the proposed research is doomed from the start. Supervisors should give suggestions occasionally but must allow (and sometimes even insist) that their students think independently. Students are expected to work independently and be excited about their work. It is not always necessary for the student to show written work to the supervisor but when he or she does, it should be written carefully. Students should be considerate and not waste their supervisors’ time. Meetings once every three weeks are normal for full-time PhD students. Students should also follow the advice of their supervisors when it was given at their request. Once the thesis has been completed to the satisfaction of the supervisor, the student can submit the thesis and wait for the viva. The student should aim to read the whole thesis in about four days and to keep reading until the viva. At the same time, play the role of a devil’s advocate. Think of all the questions that the examiners might ask you and prepare your answers in advance. There are advantages and disadvantages of presenting your findings in a conference prior to your viva or even before completing your thesis. The main advantage is that it helps to spot mistakes in your thesis and gives you some practice in answering questions and criticisms. Publication in conference proceedings also adds to your credibility. The disadvantages are that it is time consuming and might delay you in completing the thesis. Worse still, if presented to an audience who are unfamiliar with your topic, the audience might make illogical criticisms and inappropriate recommendations. I suggest you should present at least once, but not more than three times. The outcome of the viva can be either to award (minor or no corrections), to refer (submission of revised thesis with or without further oral examinations) or to reject (award of the master’s degree with or without submission or reject altogether). By now you know what a PhD is and what is required to obtain it. My experience has been with the UK PhD done mostly by

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dissertation. You may or may not choose the same path. Much will depend on your peculiar needs and resources (time and money). If after having been warned of all the potential problems that you will probably face and you still wish to pursue a PhD, then I recommend that the next step you take is to seek the addresses of universities and apply to them enclosing your proposal. Best of luck! Make sure you have the blessing of your family. Do not underestimate the value of your family’s support as a lack of it can be one of the major causes of failure to complete a PhD.

Epilogue: Life After the PhD

In my first book, I posed the question, ‘Is there life after an MBA?’ The answer was, ‘Do a PhD.’ But what about life after the PhD? What is the answer to that question? Here are some suggestions: 1. Do a post-doctoral programme. This is often offered in overseas universities. It takes on average about two years. Recently graduated doctorate holders will join a team of researchers, usually led by a senior professor, and embark on a big research project that is funded usually by the government or local authority. It resembles a team-based PhD project but because it is funded and there are more people involved, it can be conducted on a much larger scale. Research team members are also paid a salary equivalent to that of a junior lecturer. Postdoctoral research is commonly done by those who have just entered the academic profession and wish to excel further in their academic career. The rewards are mainly intrinsic rather than extrinsic – so you have to decide whether money is important to you. You probably wouldn’t be pursuing an academic career and a PhD, if money was critical to you. A career as an academic can allow you to meet your basic survival needs and even provide some luxuries, but you won’t be rolling around in cash. 2. Focus on publishing your thesis. As I mentioned earlier, you should be able to get your work published in both local and international conferences and journals. It would be a waste if you did not since 80 per cent of the work has already been

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done. Also, you must publish quickly before the information is out of date – that can happen sooner than you think. 3. Begin/resume your life as an academic lecturer in your local university. 4. Join a government research-based organisation like MARDI (a biological research firm in Malaysia). This is especially appropriate for those who did their PhDs in the natural sciences. 5. Join the private sector if the company is willing to pay you more than at the university. Of course, you will be doing much more administrative work and hardly any teaching. You may love it or hate it – much depends on the individual. It’s your future and your decision – so choose wisely. You may, like me, prefer to join the university because that is the best place to be if you love teaching. However, three years later, I was promoted to the post of Deputy Dean in charge of research and infrastructure, and also became Chairman of the PhD committee and the Quality Manager. I ended up doing 80 per cent administrative work and only 20 per cent teaching. Is that all there is? For most people, that seems to be more than enough. My colleagues who have recently returned from overseas with their PhDs are all fired up and motivated to publish their research. I have managed to publish several papers. I make it a rule to present a paper in overseas conferences once a year – the university only pays for one annual trip. The rest has to be self-funded. I have the following conference publications: 1. The IT industry: The Quest for Emotional Stability in an Insane World. UM-FBA Asian Business Conference 2005 (2005) Park Royal Hotel, Kuala Lumpur. 2. Attracting Scientific and Technical Talent from Abroad: Lessons for Malaysia. The 4th International Malaysian Studies Conference (MSC4)(3–5 August 2004) Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Bangai. 3. Work Value Congruence and Satisfaction at Work: Is Western Concept Applicable to a Developing Country such as Malaysia?

Epilogue: Life Afer the PhD

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Academy of World Business, Marketing and Management Development Conference (13–16 July 2004) Gold Coast International Hotel, Queensland, Australia. 4. Person-Environment Fit: A Critical Review of the Previous Studies and a Proposal for Future Research. EPUK conference (June 2003) The Scott Sutherland School, The Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, Scotland. 5. The Association between Intelligence, Group Size and Satisfaction (Workplace): A Logistic Regression Analysis. EPUK conference (June 2003) The Scott Sutherland School, The Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, Scotland. 6. Superior-Subordinate Fit: An Extension of the Supplementary Fit Model. Presented at the Federal School of Management Conference (2000) Manchester UK (won prize for best abstract), and also at the 7th Asia Pacific Conference (2001) Citidel Kuala Lumpur. I also have the following journal publications: 1. Emotional Stability and Perception of Job Security in the Services Sector Malaysia (in press). 2. The Association between Ethical Decision Making, Job Satisfaction, Organisational Commitment, and Selected Demographic Variables (2003). Malaysian Management Journal, 7(2): 1–11. 3. The Association between Training and Organisational Commitment among White Collar Workers in Malaysia (2003). The International Journal of Training and Develop-ment, 7(3): 166–185. 4. Person-Environment Fit Perceptions and Satisfaction at Work (2003). Malaysian Management Journal, 7(1): 35–46. 5. The Association between Sensitivity, Group Size and Satisfaction (2002). Malaysian Management Journal, 6(1): 53–61. I have mentioned five alternative routes that you may take after you have completed your PhD. They are not mutually exclusive and can be taken in combination. However, you are not limited

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to these – I leave it your imagination. You will have to take charge of your own destiny. As for me, successfully completing my PhD was exhilarating. I take this opportunity to thank you once again for giving me the privilege to share my knowledge and experience with you, and I sincerely hope that you have found this book useful. I hope to meet you in person some day and until then, PURSUE EXCELLENCE!

References

Ahmad, K.Z.B (2001). The Association between Person, Work Environment, Job Satisfaction and Performance: A Study in Light Manufacturing Assembly Plants. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Manchester Library. Kerlinger, F. N. (1986). Foundations of Behavioral Research. Orlando, Florida: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, Inc. Phillips, E. M. and Pugh, D. S. (2000). How to get a PhD. Buckingham: Open University Press.

Index

ABI/INFORM 29 acquiescence bias 36–37 administrative error 35 auspices bias 38 back-up copies importance of 100–101 belief 112–113 branching questions 66 British Council 26 central tendency bias 38 changing supervisors 27–28 changing the topic 26–27 correct decision 26 choosing institution 25–26 concurrent validity 57–59 consultancy research report differences with PhD 14–15 content analysis 45 covert observation 85 Cronbach Coefficient Alpha measure 55 data analysis 96 data collection by observation 43–46 data-processing error 35 DBA and PhD 15–17, 131 doctoral colloquium 106 drafting questionnaires 60 attitude scales 69 complex preference questioning 69

difficult/sensitive questions 66 how to draft 61–67 hypothetical questions 69–70 language of questionnaires 67–68 objectives of 60–61 operationalising the concept 69 positively or negatively worded items 68–69 secondary questions 70 econometric views 96 email, pros and cons 42 errors in research 35–39 Excel 96 extremity bias 38 eye-tracking monitors 46 face (content) validity 56–57 family support 134 filter questions 65–66 funnel approach 65 general questions 65 getting into system changing the supervisor 27–28 changing the topic 26–27 choosing institution/supervisor 21–24 choosing the topic 21–24 full-time versus part-time 31–33 local or overseas 29–33 more than one supervisor 28–29 hypnotherapy

109–111

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Index

increasing response rates effective tactics 41–43 Ingleton Word Recognition Test 53 interdisciplinary studies 28 two supervisors 28–29 internal consistency reliability, 53–55 Cronbach Coefficient Alpha measure 55 split-half reliability 54–55 interval scale 48–49 interview schedules unique problems 70–72 interviewer bias 38 interviewer cheating 36 interviewer error 36 issues in research methodology data collection by observation 43–46 drafting questionnaires 60–70 errors in research 35–39 experimental research 46–48 interview schedules, unique problems 70–72 questionnaires and psychometric tests 49–60 sampling methods 72–76 survey methods 39–40 tactics to increase response rates 41–43 types of scales 48–49 Job Descriptive Index (JDI) 58–59, 94 job satisfaction 23, 27, 58, 69, 81, 94 journal article and PhD 15 knowledge economy

22

lateral thinking 24 life after PhD MARDI 136 post-doctoral programme 135 publishing thesis 135–136 literature review 80–81, 131 local universities 29–33 drawbacks 29–30

Malaysian–American Commission on Education Exchange (MACEE) 26 management of change 23 managing supervisor’s relationship 101 supervisors’ expectations 102 Manchester Business School 16–18, 22–23, 25, 41, 43, 84, 121 MARDI 136 MBA and PhD theses differences 11 students’ behaviour 12–13 measurement error environmental factors 52 fatigue of subjects 52 guessing 53 poor test instructions 52 subjective scoring 52 more than one supervisor 28–29 ‘must’ attitude 111–112 nominal scale 48 non-probability sampling 73 convenience sampling 75 judgement/purposive sampling 75–76 quota sampling 76 snowball sampling 76 non-response error 37 non-standardised interview 72 NUD.IST 96 Numerical Facet Satisfaction State (NFSS) 58, 59 nutritious food 117–118 observation categories of 44–45 limitations 45 oral examination see viva ordinal scale 48 organisational commitment 23 original 5–6 definition 6 outcome of PhD 133–134 outcome of viva award 126–127 refer 127

Index

reject 127–128 see also Outcome of PhD overseas courses 29–33 overt observation 85 part-time courses advices 32–33 pitfalls 31–32 PDCA for TQM action 116–117 check 116 do 116 plan 115 PhD process back-up copies 100–101 data analysis 96 data collection 95 managing supervisor’s relationship 101–102 meeting the supervisor 93–94 research methodology 94–95 supervisor’s experience 102–107 in UK 132–133 what is it like 93–97 when to start writing 97–99 positive thinking see hypnotherapy, belief post-doctoral programme 135 predictive validity 59–60 preparing for viva 133 presenting the findings 124–125, 133 advantages 124 disadvantages 125 probability sampling 73 simple random sampling 73–74 stratified sampling 74–75 systematic sampling 74 professional researcher 13–14 psychogalvanometer 46 publishing thesis 135–136 pupilometer 46 random sampling error ratio scales 49 reasons to do PhD correct reasons 9 wrong reasons 8

35

143

reliability artificial boosting factors 53 influencing factors 51–53 internal consistency reliability 53–55 test-retest reliability 50–51 research methodology ex post facto 83–84 experimental 82–83 hypothesis 86 observation 85 response rates 84–85 research methodology 132 respondent error 37 response bias 36 response latency 45 sample selection error 36 sampling methods 72 non-probability sampling 73, 75–76 probability sampling 73–75 scholarship 131 scientifically contrived observation 45 selecting supervisor knowledge expert 24 personal compatibility 24–25 seven strategies of excellence accepting responsibilities 113–114 adopting PDCA approach 115–117 belief 112–113 managing emotional states 109–111 ‘must’ attitude 111–112 role modelling successful people 114–115 taking decision 111 tips for success 117–119 social responsibility bias 38 social sciences citation index (SSCI) 30–31 specific questions 65 split-half reliability 54–55 SPSS 55, 96, 115, 119 SPSS printouts 87

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Index

structure of PhD abstract 89 acknowledgements 89 bibliography or references 89–90, 92 checklist 90–92 conclusion 88–89 introduction 79–80 layout 77–79 literature review 80–81 research methodology 81–87 results 87–88 supervisors, not coaches 133 supervisors’ experience 102 students’ expectations 103–104 supervisors’ satisfaction thesis completion 133 survey methods comparison 39–40 systematic error 35 test-retest reliability 50–51 changes in subjects 51–52 measurement error 52–53 thesis definition 9–11 tips for success exercise 118 health care 117 nutritious food 117–118 sleep 118–119 topic selection analysis 23 drop-out rates 22–23 marketability 22 originality 23 total error 35 UK PhDs 17–19, 131 dissertation types 18–19 University of Malaya 2–3, 7, 25, 84, 97, 106, 122 US PhDs 17–19, 131

validity concurrent validity 57–59 face (content) validity 56–57 predictive validity 59–60 valuing time 102, 105 viva appointment of examiners 122–123 notice of submission 121 outcome of 126–129 preparing for 123–124 presenting the findings 124–125 viva itself 125–126 voice pitch analysis 46 what is PhD consultancy report and PhD thesis 14–15 DBA and PhD 15–17 important developments 6–7 MBA and PhD theses 11–14 PhD and journal article 15 to do or not 7–11 UK and US PhDs 17–19 when to start writing 97–99 Zikmund’s points, questionnaires accurate and relevant 61 assumptions 64–65 burdensome questions 65 double-barrelled items 64 layout of questions 66–67 leading questions 62–63 loaded questions 63 mail/telephone/personal questions 62 open- and closed-ended questions 62 order bias 65–66 specific questions 64

PhD: The Pursuit of Excellence

The Pursuit of Excellence Through Education

The Excellence of Play

The Pursuit of Marriage

The Pursuit of Jesse

The Pursuit Of Marriage

The Pursuit of Jesse

The Pursuit of Happiness

The Pursuit of Happiness

The Pursuit of Happiness

The Pursuit of God

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