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Ethical questions are
philosophical questions
General rights and
obligations of the
concerned parties
 Ethical questions are
Ethical
principles
philosophical
questions
To maintain the To promote the
highest level of trust of the public
business and for marketing and
professional survey research
conduct To maintain
To maintain high accuracy
standards of
competence
To protect the
anonymity of
respondents
Rights and obligations of
the respondents and the
researchers
RESPONDENT: Is the person who give
input or information and views to the
researcher at the time of questioning.

RESEARCHER: Is the person who

collects information from the
respondent so as to conduct research.
 Rights and Obligations of the Respondent

• The Obligation to Be Truthful:

When a subject willingly consents to participate, it is generally
expected that he or she will provide truthful answers. Honest
cooperation is the main obligation of the respondent or subject.
Rights and Obligations of the Respondent…

• Privacy:
This issue involves the subject's freedom to choose whether to
comply with an investigator's request.
Generally, certain standards of common courtesy have been
set by interviewing firms-for example, not to interview late in the
evening and at other inconvenient times.
Rights and Obligations of the Respondent…

Deception:
In a number of situations the researcher creates a
false impression by disguising the purpose of the research.
Deception or concealment may be used if a researcher
would otherwise be unable to observe or straightforwardly ask about
the phenomena of interest and still hold all other factors constant.
Rights and Obligations of the Respondent…

• The Right to Be Informed:

The subjects have a right to be informed of all aspects
of the research, including information about its purpose and
sponsorship.
 Rights and Obligations of the Researcher

• The Purpose of Research is Research:

No research firm should engage in any practice other
than scientific investigation.

• Objectivity:
Ensuring accuracy via objectivity and scientific
investigation is very important. Researchers should maintain high
standards to ensure that the data they collect are accurate.
Rights and Obligations of the Researcher…

• Misrepresentation of Research:
Research companies (and clients) should not
misrepresent the statistical accuracy of their data, nor should they
overstate the Significance of the results by altering the findings.
Rights and Obligations of the Researcher…

• Protecting the Right to Confidentiality of Both Subjects and

Clients:
It is the researcher’s responsibility to ensure that the
privacy and anonymity of the respondents are preserved.
Information that a research supplier obtains about a
client's general business affairs should not be disseminated, to other
clients or third parties.
Rights and Obligations of the Researcher…

• Dissemination of Faulty Conclusions:

After conducting a research project, the researcher or
decision maker may disseminate conclusions from the research that
are inconsistent with or not warranted by the data. Most research
professionals consider this to be improper.
Rights and Obligations of the Researcher…

• Competing Research Proposals:

Consider a client who has solicited several bids for a
business research project. The research supplier that wins the bid is
asked by the client to appropriate ideas from the proposal of a
competing research supplier and include them in the research study
to be done for the client. This is generally regarded as unethical.
Rights and obligations of
the sponsoring Client
Nature of business
problem
• Ethics between Buyer and Seller:
– The General Business ethics Apply (i.e., not to
solicit competitive bids when a research
proposal from a friend already is accepted).

• An Open Relationship with Research

Suppliers:
– The Sponsoring Clint obliged to encourage the
researcher to seek out the truth objectively.
• An Open Relationship with Interested
Parties:
– Conclusion should be based on the data. A
user should not disseminate conclusions from
a research that are inconsistent with the data.
• Privacy:
– The privacy rights of subjects create a privacy
obligation on the part of the client.
• Privacy on the Internet:
– It is a Controversial issue. whether Web site
questionnaires, registration forms, and other
means of collecting personal information are
legitimate.
– Some Websites, such as American Online
(AOL), established privacy policy assuring
customers that it will not divulge any
information (Eg: Customers’ E-mail Website
visit and related information ) to anyone
without their authorisation.
– people are more willing to disclose sensitive
information if they are aware of the Web
site’s privacy policy.
– Many Websites today use privacy statement
that visitors can access.
• Commitment to Research:
– A Business Research undertaken to support a
specific claim in a legal action.
– Research design is often developed on what a
Judge or Jury will consider appropriate.
– Researchers engaged in such work do not
necessarily bias results intentionally.
– However many Advocacy Research trial rarely
Submit research evidence that does not support
the Client’s position.
 – Can the researcher search out the
truth when the Sponsoring client wishes
to support its position at a trial?
• Pseudo-Pilot Studies;
– Sometimes a client will suggest that a
more comprehensive study is in the
planning stages and that the proposal the
research supplier is bidding on is a pilot
study.
 Nature of the Business
Problem
• Business problems are sometimes hard to
define.
• Different people see the problem in
different ways.
• Well-tested research techniques are
regularly used to investigate routine
problems that have already been defined.
iMPORTance of problem
definition
 The Research Process

Problem Discovery
Importance Discovery and
and Definition
of proper Definition

Research
Design
problem
and so on
Conclusions and

definition Report

Sampling
Data Processing
and Analysis
Data
Gathering
1.Research should 3. The right answer
not begin until to the wrong
the problem has question may be
been clearly absolutely
defined. worthless.
2.Properly and 4. Solution to the
completely wrong problem
defining a may actually be
business harmful
problem makes
research easier.
Process of problem
definition
 Problem Definition

The indication of a
specific business
decision area that will
be clarified by
answering some
research questions.
 The Process of
Problem Definition
Ascertain the Determine unit
decision of analysis
maker’s
objectives

Understand Determine
background of relevant
the problem variables

Isolate/identify State research

the problem, questions and
not the objectives
symptoms
Ascertain the Decision
Maker’s Objectives
• The studies:
– Goals
– Objectives
– Targets
– Aspirations

• “What” do you want to

accomplish?

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Understand the Background
of the Problem
• Isolate and identify the
root problems, not the
symptoms
• The “Why”
• Do a needs analysis –
– Why does the problem
exist?
– The informal gathering of
background information
to familiarize researchers
or managers with the
decision area.

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 The Iceberg Principle
• The principle
indicating that the
dangerous part of
many business
problems is neither
visible to nor
understood by
managers.
Determine the
Unit of Analysis

• Who or “what” is to
be analyzed?
– Organization?
– People?
– Attitudes?
– Behaviors?
– Processes?
– What?

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 “What” Are the Relevant Variable
• Anything that may assume
different numerical values
• Categorical:
– Put into categories but
have no equal order
– top vs. bottom
– Gender, ethnicity
– Hint: ½ of male is?
• Continuous:
– Values within a given or
infinite range that have
equal order
– 0 to 100
– SD to SA
– Hint: ½ of 100 is? 34
 • Independent
– Influence variable; variable
you can manipulate
Types of Variables

• Dependent
– Measured variable;
measure the effect of the IV

• Extraneous
– Variables external to the
study that could affect the
DV
– Time of day, style of
teaching, etc.
“What” are the
research questions
and objectives

Question: “What” is the

effect of a graduate degree
on income?
Objectives: “How” much do
those with a Bachelor’s
make? Masters? Doctorate?
Deeper Question: “Why” do
we need to know this?
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Problem statement
clarification
 How Can the Problem
Statement Be Clarified

What is a statement problem?

• Define and describe the problem

• Tool to clarify the issue by
specifically identifying what has to
improve to:
– To meet goal
– The magnitude of the problem
– Where? With whom?, and when? of the
problem.
• The financial impact.
ELEMENTS OF A SUCCESSFUL PROBLEM
STATEMENT
Description and measure used to
describe it
Process name and location of the
problem
Time frame
Magnitude of the problem.
Objective Statement
Tool which directly describes the
problem statement

ELEMENTS:
Improvement from baseline to goal
Indicate level of improvement
SYMPTOMS
Symptoms are used if the problem is vague or
unclear.

To identify the symptoms following questions

have to be answered:
----- Who is involved?
-----What has happened?
-----Where it is occurring?
-----When does it happen?
Eg: HR manager V/S Finance manager
Decision oriented
research objectives
The decision oriented research objectives are given as below:-
 It promotes better decision making.
 The research is the basis for innovation.
 Research identifies the problem areas.
 Research help in forecasting, which is useful for managers.
Decision oriented research
objectives…
 Research helps in formulation of
policies and strategies.
 It helps in identifying marketing
opportunities and constraints.
Time spent defining
problem
Research proposal
 How much time should be
spent defining the
problem?

• RECOGNISED PROBLEM

• Manager v/s researcher

 Research
Proposal
Written statement of the research
design.
• Objectives
• Problem definition
• Methodology
• Research process
• Schedule of costs and deadlines
 Research
Proposal
• Think critically
• Vague to precise
• Information triggering procedures
• Why and how?
• Communication function
• Determine alterations, necessaries
• Accomplishment
 How should a proposal
be?
• Communication
• Explicit
• Questions must be answered
• Compliance with the audience
• Writing it down
– Creates a record
– Omissions
– Provides with standard
CONCLUSION
The respondent, researcher, and the client have to

THANK YOU
be well aware of their rights and obligations and
Define the problem because a well defined
problem is like the problem almost solved. All
these will help in a successful research process.