Preparing to Conduct Business Research
Preparing to Conduct Business Research: Part 3
Michael Griebling
RES/351
January 28, 2013
Benjamin Millard, Ph.D.
Preparing to Conduct Business Research: Part 3
UPS is an organization that depends on reliable and efficient employees and management. More importantly, the organization must maintain dependability and efficiency while upholding a strict set of safety procedures and guidelines ("Ups Enterprise Portal", 2013). It is essential that all employees are properly trained on all operating safety procedures and for management to continually enforce safety guidelines. In the recent months, it has come to the attention of UPS regional manager Bob Thomas that there has been a significant increase in employee safety violations at one of his company 's locations. With a strong focus on the importance of following safety procedures carefully, Bob 's concern leads him to investigate the issue further. Bob begins his investigation by proposing three possible research questions and hypotheses. He questions whether the issue is related to improper enforcement, inadequate training, or negligence. Bob then develops hypotheses stating that the safety violations are either related to improper enforcement, inadequate training, or negligence. With every research question and hypothesis that is presented, there are also a number of variables that can be linked to them in order to come to a conclusion. The variables in this case would be: what are the ages of the employees who made violations, the length of time the employees had been employed with the company when the violation occurred, which staff member(s) trained the employees, and under whose management did the violation occur? Understanding these variables will help narrow down whether the employee safety violations are a result of improper enforcement by a particular manager, inadequate training by designated trainers, or if the violations are a
Michael Griebling
RES/351
January 28, 2013
Benjamin Millard, Ph.D.
Preparing to Conduct Business Research: Part 3
UPS is an organization that depends on reliable and efficient employees and management. More importantly, the organization must maintain dependability and efficiency while upholding a strict set of safety procedures and guidelines ("Ups Enterprise Portal", 2013). It is essential that all employees are properly trained on all operating safety procedures and for management to continually enforce safety guidelines. In the recent months, it has come to the attention of UPS regional manager Bob Thomas that there has been a significant increase in employee safety violations at one of his company 's locations. With a strong focus on the importance of following safety procedures carefully, Bob 's concern leads him to investigate the issue further. Bob begins his investigation by proposing three possible research questions and hypotheses. He questions whether the issue is related to improper enforcement, inadequate training, or negligence. Bob then develops hypotheses stating that the safety violations are either related to improper enforcement, inadequate training, or negligence. With every research question and hypothesis that is presented, there are also a number of variables that can be linked to them in order to come to a conclusion. The variables in this case would be: what are the ages of the employees who made violations, the length of time the employees had been employed with the company when the violation occurred, which staff member(s) trained the employees, and under whose management did the violation occur? Understanding these variables will help narrow down whether the employee safety violations are a result of improper enforcement by a particular manager, inadequate training by designated trainers, or if the violations are a
References: Cooper, D. & Schindler, P. (2011). Business Research Methods (11th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill/Irwin. Ups Enterprise Portal. (2013). Retrieved from http://Upsers.com ITL.NIST.GOV Business Research Methods page 276