Chapter 3 of Dissertation on SMEs Growth Topic – Term Paper

Limitation of Sampling

Stratified sampling where the firms were divided into subcategories based on their size (age) and where the participants were divided into subcategories based on their managerial levels was used in this study. This posed a limiting factor to the study in that there was a lot of time taken to determine the levels of management the respondents were and also it consumed much time determining the size of the firms and pick pointing the eligible firms (McLeod, 2014).

3.7.3 Data Analysis

This study will involve an interpretive analysis method based on the Hermeneutics qualitative content analysis method (Zuilhof, 2013). In this case, a textual data analysis/ interpretation will be employed. On the other hand the quantitative content analysis will be done using IBM SPSS software where relevant graphs will be developed (Binsbergen, 2013). The graphs will then be used to portray the trend of SMEs in Korea.  

Zuilhof (2013) defines content analysis as the type of analysis based on making meaning out of a given phrase or a set of words. In this case, this study will involve analysis through critical understanding of the responses during the interviews. The list of responses will be assessed and coded such that a pattern of the related responses to the questions tackling the same theme will be categorized under the same theme. Notably, this themes will tend to tackle each and every research and objective as stipulated in chapter one. Eventually, each category will be discussed accordingly followed by a generalization of the themes so as to meet the objectives and goals of this study.

The Hermeneutics qualitative content analysis method is a perfect analysis method since it only requires an in-depth understanding of the subject matter and concurrently, the ability to link up the generalized findings with the initially explored literature theory.   

3.8 Reliability and Validity

Reliability was observed in the study when the respondents were assured that their responses, even after Korean-English translation, would retain the original magnitude and insight they intended to deliver. Therefore they were assured that the research was reliable enough to air their grievances to their individual firms and of all to the Korean wedding sector at large. Validity on the other hand was ascertained by employment of primary data whereby as depicted in the advantages of primary research, interviews offer a good source of valid data since it is first hand and it is collected within a short time frame in which the information acquired is of good quality in the realm of time (Thakker and Read, 2010).

3.9 Ethical Considerations

Throughout this dissertation, all the information and data acquisition was done governed by specific ethical issues. Ethics are defined as the guidelines of the code of conduct or behavior ensuring the wellbeing and protection of all subjects (Thakker and Read, 2010). This definition hardly covers the whole subjects of ethics as Yu, Abdullah and Saat (2014) defines it in a more detailed manner where they consider the fact that ethics though having a common definition are dependent on the environment of application and also highly dependent on the culture of the subject individuals. This research therefore considered two sets of ethical issues related to the primary research and the secondary research (literature review). This ethics were divided into these categories so as to fit in the considered environments involved in data collection.

3.9.1 Ethical issues

As hinted out in section 3.6.3 the following are the major ethical issues considered during the study.

Transparency- the topic was first elaborated to the respondents of the interviews prior to the questioning. This was to ensure that they had a good knowledge of what was expected of them and the purpose of the study. Fouka and Mantzorou (2011) claim that this is a major ethical issue in researches. The main aim of addressing this issue is ensuring that there is no deception from or to the respondents during the course of the interviews.

Informed consent- during the course of the study, the researcher ensured that he had acquired enough knowledge of the subject matter and the details he required from the respondents. This means that he mastered all the required pieces of information such that he had no trouble when conducting the interviews and explaining the ‘ambiguous’ portions of the interview during the field work. This ethical issue ensures that the researcher is competent enough during the field work which saves on time during the interview session (Fouka and Mantzorou, 2011).

Confidentiality- the major ethical issue addressed during this study was the issue of confidentiality. Fouka and Mantzorou (2011) say that confidentiality is paramount in any qualitative research. In this case, the respondents were assured of privacy and secrecy of any piece of information they offered within the course of this research. Under no circumstances was their information going to be disclosed.   

Plagiarism- any material sourced from research journal and any other secondary source was fully cited with the full references being indicated in the reference section (chapter seven). Hill (2013) has published a journal detailing the ‘right’ way to cite and refer in academic work. Hill’s research considers plagiarism as the act of ‘academic theft’ in which one uses information from another researcher without acknowledging the original source. Plagiarism as an ethical issue was therefore highly regarded in this research and all the measures required to avoid it were considered.

3.10 Conclusion

The methodology has been successfully outlined whereby a perfect framework highlighting the research onions has been well formulated. The framework is expected to yield reliable and valid set of results which will help develop well generalizable findings and conclusions for this study. The acquired data will be presented, analyzed and discussed in details in the next chapter, such that  the major objectives and aim of this study will be accomplished.