Doctoral 
Seminar

DOCTORAL SEMINAR REPORT

TUESDAY, 2 NOVEMBER 2004

This workshop provided students with the opportunity to present their ideas, problems and issues in an academically rigorous but supportive environment. Working in small groups and reporting to the whole workshop 25 participants discussed different aspects of undertaking a doctorate from developing research topics, undertaking a literature review, fieldwork, methodological issues, writing up and the viva itself.

The doctoral day was facilitated by Professor Robert Blackburn with five key presentations from eminent scholars in the field of SME and entrepreneurship research. The following notes are a summary of some of the discussions held during the day and are based on the flip chart notes discussed at the event. The power point slides are also available via the Doctoral Seminar timetable. Click here to go to the relevant page.

Delegates and Speakers at the ISBA 2004 Conference doctoral day

The initial session started out by asking students to outline the major issues they currently face. These were to act as points of reference for delegates as the day developed but as can be seen the issues faced were diverse:

Crossing disciplines/ interdisciplinarity

Dynamism of topic

Managing the mass of empirical material

Managing the balance between practitioner and academic material

What is my contribution to knowledge?

Understanding Terminology

Combining methods

Measuring learning

Designing Questionnaires

Validity/reliability

Choosing right supervisor

Managing the literature

Developing a writing style

Overcoming isolation: physical and intellectual

In addition to the individual issues raised, group discussions led to a number of collective issues of concern for the students:

Sampling issues and sampling frame

Definitions

Narrowing the topic down

Social constructionism – validity and reliability issues

Managing narrative data

Relative value of theoretical vs policy orientated research

Mixed methodologies

Quantitative and qualitative analysis

Use of existing databases

Specific issues facing part-time researchers, such as balancing competing demands

Isolation – need to network

Managing supervisors

Publishing from your PhD

Students were keen to learn from others and indeed one of the many successes of the day was the amount of interaction taking place between students at different stages of research. As a result of group discussions the workshop came up with a number of ‘top tips’ for successfully doing a doctorate. These included a range of activities, some in relation to conducting literature reviews, method styles and others in terms of managing one’s own effort and resources:

1 Look up past doctoral theses

2 Develop key words for scanning databases

3. Identify databases – use of www

4. Set out a clear timescale with objectives

5. Develop research skills to enable you to learn and critique literature

6. Strike a balance between focus and exploration

7. Get and be organised in terms of your research management and style

8. Systematic literature review (Pittaway)

9. Use Procite and Endnote

10. Present results early on for peer review

11. Scan papers and abstracts

12. Look at references in latest papers

13. Manage time and costs

14. Careful choice of your supervisor/institution

15. Join mailing lists (www.smallbusinessportal.co.uk)

The ISBA doctoral day was very successful and following the analysis of the delegate evaluation forms the majority gave the day 4 out of 5.

Suggestions for future themes for future events can be emailed to Professor Robert Blackburn, Vice-President of ISBE: r.blackburn@kingston.ac.uk or to Professor Colin Gray, President of ISBE: c.w.j.a.gray@open.ac.uk