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The Empirical Research Approach

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Teamwork for Innovation in Sub-Saharan Africa

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Abstract

After the previous chapters have laid the theoretical background and developed a theory of team level innovative performance in sub-Saharan Africa, this chapter introduces the empirical research approach. It explains why the case study method was used to test the theoretical model developed in Chapter 3, how the entire study was designed, and finally discusses the important issues of validation and ethics for this research project.

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References

  1. In middle range theory building, the researcher disaggregates complex constructs and situations into more discreet, carefully defined chunks. These parts are then reintegrated with an explicit analysis of their context; see Pauwels and Matthyssens (2004), p. 126.

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  9. Similar approaches are reported by Marschan-Piekkari and Welch (2004) and Wilkinson and Young (2004).

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  15. This phrase is used by Marschan-Piekkari and Welch in their Handbook of Qualitative Research Methods for International Business (2004). It is based on the traditional definition of the global economic triad formed by Ohmae (1985), which refers to the USA, Western Europe and Japan as the major world markets.

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  25. For explanations of different case study designs see Yin (2003), p. 39–53.

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  26. Hellriegel et al. (2004) define the optimal team size as being between 5 and 12 members, depending on team tasks. Hoffmann et al. (2004) suggest that an international team should not have more than 10 members. Like Högl (1998) explains, as the number of team members increases, the probability of direct (face-to-face) interaction decreases. As a consequence, subteams are formed to enable sufficient exchange of task relevant information among team members.

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  30. Ibid.

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  32. Includes Austria, Germany (former East and former West), the Netherlands and Switzerland; see Gupta and Hanges (2004), pp. 190–191.

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  35. Macdonald and Hellgren (2004), p. 266. The researcher’s experience here was consistent with Macdonald and Hellgren’s note that an hour of interview requires about ten hours of transcription.

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  46. As described by Pauwels and Matthyssens (2004), p. 135.

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  48. This has also been observed by De Geer et al (2004), p. 333.

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  52. Adapted from Yin (2003), p. 34.

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© 2007 Deutscher Universitäts-Verlag | GWV Fachverlage GmbH, Wiesbaden

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(2007). The Empirical Research Approach. In: Teamwork for Innovation in Sub-Saharan Africa. DUV. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-8350-9588-5_4

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