Category: MBA Projects

Questioner to Operational manager

1. What is your recent production strategy implemented across the operational unit?

2. How many units are produced per month across the production unit?

3. Do you set targets to the employees towards the number of units to be produced?

4. Do your employees understand the operational strategies implemented across the company?

5. How do you communicate the operational strategies to your employees?

6. Do you think conveying the operational strategies really improve the employee performance across your unit?

7. Do you involve the employees in the strategy development process?

8. Do the employees show their interest towards understanding the operational strategies of the company?

9. How do you develop the interest of the employees towards understanding the operational strategies?

10. Do you think employee job satisfaction depends on the level of understanding towards the operational strategies?

11. How the employees react towards the frequent changes in the operational strategies if any?

12. Do you observe any improvement in the employee performance if the strategies are communicated well in any case?

13. How do you measure the performance and job satisfaction of the employees against the operational strategies implemented?

14. Do you seek the advice’s and concerns of the employees regarding their job satisfaction against the strategies?

15. Are there any future steps to be taken to improve the performance and job satisfaction of your employees against strategy communication process?

Questionnaire for Employees: 

1) To what extent do you understand company strategies? (For example: the number of shops we are going to open and the changes in the operations team etc)? Please circle the answer that applies to you. 

a) Very Good       b) Good      c) Average      d) Poor

Comments:

2)  Employees play an important role in making strategy successful. To what extent you agree? Please circle the answer that applies to you.

 a) Strongly Agree       b) Agree      c) Disagree      d) Strongly Disagree

Comments:

3) Is Descriptive Strategic planning (such as providing information on Amt is the first national coffee company to go 100% fair trade and expanding the brand by introduction of AMT naturally) important in converting organizational goals into reality? Please circle the answer that applies to you. 

a) Strongly Agree       b) Agree      c) Disagree      d) Strongly Disagree

Comments: 

4) How good is the Management of your company in explaining strategies related to company’s aim and objectives? (For ex: what does fair trade mean? What difference does it make to AMT by going 100% fair-trade.)  Please circle the answer that applies to you. 

a) Very good      b) Good      c) Average      d) Poor

Comments:

5) Do you feel you are doing something meaningful when you know the company’s long term goals? Please circle the answer that applies to you.

 a) Yes       b) No

Comments: 

6) Do you get recognition/appreciation from your manager when you follow your company strategies effectively? Please circle the answer that applies to you. 

a) Yes       b) No        c) Sometimes    d) Never

Comments: 

7) “The success of any strategy begins with effective communication and good training.” Do you agree? (For example: Do the new staff receive proper training and do you have a special member in team who trains the new staff and retrains the present staff?).

 a) Strongly Agree       b) Agree      c) Disagree      d) Strongly Disagree

Comments: 

8)  How satisfied are you with the communication and transparency of the strategies? (For example your manager having regular meetings and briefing the team about changes or improvements in daily duties.) Please circle the answer that applies to you. 

a) Very Satisfied       b) Satisfied      c) Dissatisfied      d) Very Dissatisfied

Comments: 

9) Do you get a chance to voice your opinion or concerns in strategic planning? (For example: Do you recommend your management in delisting a product, adding a new product or changing a product lay out, etc)? Please circle the answer that applies to you. 

a) Yes           b) No      c) Sometimes       d) Never

Comments: 

10) Do you get frequent feedback from your management about the success of the strategy (For example: how does it increase the sales, speeding up the service or customer satisfaction rate)? Please circle the answer that applies to you.

a) Yes   b) No      c) Sometimes         d) Never 

Comments:

11) How many years you been working in AMT Coffee? Please circle the answer.

a) 0-1    b) 1-2      c) 2-3       d) 3-4    e) 4-5    f) 5 or more 

One of the most important problems for the organizations in strategic planning is converting their goals into reality. Without a strategy organizations don’t know where they are going. Every organization in the world, small or big, has some sort of strategy.  Strategy develops an organization with a structure for evaluating where it stands in different markets, a path to progress in terms of recognized directions and motives. To develop an organization and to reach its goals a manager must ensure that every strategy reaches the roots of the organization.

This is generally called “strategic alignment”  Strategy is developed by limited number of individuals, normally the managers. While a certain degree of concealment may be necessary for competitive motives, the basics need to be demonstrated to the employees so they can perform better. Having a clear strategy is very important so that the employees can understand the organizations aim and the part they have to play for the organization to reach its desired goal. If the strategy is not implemented effectively the goals of the organization will not be reached. The Phrase “a strategy is only as good as its implementation” is suitable in this respect. A strategy brings outcomes when it is clearly and carefully implemented.

By this we can understand the strategy is always seen as a two ways process, creating a strategy carried out by top management or a group of middle managers in the organization.  Without aligning employees with strategy even a small step will be difficult. The research is based on aligning the employees with strategy and how the company performance and job satisfaction is related to understanding of company strategies by the AMT COFFEE employees.

PROPOSED RESEARCH DESIGN

Initially the access was denied when the author contacted the Area manager of AMT COFFEE LTD as the area manager mentioned it’s the busiest season of the year when the author want to do the research. Later the author contacted the Human resources manager, Permission was then granted when author satisfied to the management that their will be no interruption in the daily jobs of the employees and the managers.

The research design used in this study is both exploratory and descriptive. This is done with the primary objective of aligning the employees with company’s strategies. The study will involve managers and the employees of AMT COFFEE LTD. The data collected will be both qualitative and quantitative. Qualitative researchers depend mostly on using of documents and literature, detailed interviews, direct observations and involvement.

Quantitative research involves the planned questionnaires and large numbers of respondents. Quantitative research deals with the interpretation of numerical data. All the aspects of the research are carefully formulated before the information is gathered. Some of the social science researchers believe both the qualitative and quantitative approaches as mismatched. But the other says that the talented researchers can combine both the approaches successfully.

The most common methodologies used by the researchers are questionnaires, interviews, panels including focus groups, behavioural and observations. In this research the author has chosen questionnaires and interviews.  The advantage of interviews is the ability of the author to explain the question by repeating, to change the question according to the situation, to clear the doubts at the same time. Interviews are more likely to allow the researcher to identify quicker the respondent’s attitudes and behaviour.

In the particular case of AMT Coffee interviews help the author to save time in data collection as most of the interviewees are easily accessible, they can be found in the Coffee bar and their cooperation is ensured due to the position of the researcher in the company. In the same way, questionnaires are cheaper, quicker to analyse. Questionnaires will be tested to check for clarity of meaning and corrected if necessary.

PROPOSED METHODOLOGY: 

The study is based on primary and secondary data collected at AMT COFFEE LTD. Interviews and questionnaires prepared will later clarify results. This paper brings collective argument from operational, sociological and idealistic investigation to the subject assumptions about the importance of employees understanding company’s strategies. The research helps to analyse why management should align the employees to its strategies, how it improves the employees job performance and satisfaction and the methods AMT COFFEE LTD is using to explain its strategies to employees. 

The research will be as follows:-

1. Interviews will be conducted with one of the operational manager, two area managers and three general managers to analyse the vital information expected to be encountered in the research.
2. Later on interviews with three assistant managers and two supervisors will be conducted from different departments.
3. A questionnaire will be given to 40 of the front line employees who are customer care representatives, cleaners, cash handler, stockers etc. The purpose is to illustrate the similarity between attitudes of the different staff by age, gender, experience, career and position.
4. The questionnaires will be clear and uncomplicated. They will be tested before being administered, initially on a group of students who are friends, then improved and finally given to the respondents.
5. A sample will be selected from the front line employees for the questionnaires from different department such as customer service representatives, cleaners, cash handler, stockers etc. 
6. The sampling method used is random sampling method. Total sample size is 50, covering all the departments in the company. Simple random sampling is a procedure of selecting a sample in which every item in a population has an equal chance of being included in a sample.

Importance and key outcomes expected 

The main purpose of the research is to analyse why the employees AMT COFFEE LTD should understand the company strategies, the best and easiest way to explain the strategies to the employees and the consequences on employee’s job satisfaction and company performance. Other expected outcomes involve the company’s growth and performance, what are the measures taken to check whether the strategy is understood by the front line employees or not and how the feedback is collected by the management from the employees on the newly implemented strategies and how should they handle the feedback. To make employees know what they are doing, why they are doing and how can they do extremely well. The role of top management in implementing strategy successfully.

Time plan 

Doings	Beginning date	No of days	Finishing date
Proposal		36
Dissertation literature Review		32
Supervisor Meeting		9
Questionnaire Preparation		7
Data Gathering		15
Data Interpretation		5
Results and Conclusions		5
Supervisor Meeting		5
Formation		26
Assessment and Criticism		3
Final Report Submission		3

 

The term Strategy is derived from Greek word ‘stratos’ which was used by army as sort of future planning for success by the higher level. The strategy is originally related to military campaigns as an art of planning, operating and directing military operations during war. The organisations started using the word strategy after the second world war when the army chiefs from both the sides of Atlantic came together to analyse some of the successful fundamentals of the war which can be applied in business.

Traditionally a strategy is be developed by senior management and it is passed on to all the levels. Like successful sports coaches, top directors of the business should have the right capability at the right time to implement strategies. Like rely race where there are four legs, there are four different levels in most of the organizations: senior level, middle level, low level and non management level. Just like a victorious rely team where they pass their baton carefully and successfully the strategy has to be passed like baton from senior level to non management level.

The senior level and the middle level management should be very clear in defining and implementing the strategy. When there is too little involvement from the senior level or when communicating the strategy takes too long, the result can be confusion which can lead to miscommunication of the strategy, and ultimately a failure of the strategy to be implemented. 

Strategy is developed by any organization to achieve its long term or short term goals. “The success of any strategy begins with skilful recruitment and human resources policies and work through internal debate and effective communication.”  We analyse strategy as the organizations plan to improve competencies and abilities, through which the organization achieve its goals. Sharing the organizations strategies to employees in a convincing and attracting way is a key to success. At the end of the day employees who know about the strategies will work towards a common goal.  This will have a progressive effect on the front line employees and will improve the efficiency of a company. 

 As in the Lewis Carol’s poem, if employees are not clear about the company strategies or the reasons behind those strategies they don’t conjugate their efforts to make the strategy successful. The employees should understand the strategy and internalise it. When the employees know where they are exactly heading to they feel more confident and satisfied. Strategy is defined as “plans, programmes and intentions to develop the human capability of an organization to meet its future needs of its external and internal environment” . Effective strategy communication to the employees is vital to any successful organization. Earlier research suggests that organizations with clear and formalized strategies explained and made available to the employees are more successful than those where strategic goals are not known by the employees. . Strategy should be aligned with all the departments like financial, operational, marketing and human resources.

The strategy is created and implemented in different ways and that there should be clear role in achieving organizations goal. When it comes to business terms the strategy shows the future of the organizations, showing us   products and the services we will take to the particular markets. There is little research suggests on implementing and measuring company strategy. The concern of how the different departments in an organisation understand and communicate its strategies shows the strength and success of the organisation.

Many studies relating to the importance of strategy implementation and communicating strategy to the employees in effective way is based on real time experiences. Study of successful and failed organisations and their way of approaching developing and implementing strategies have been used by the other researchers such as Bird Approach and Squirrel Approach. Fewer studies have been conducted through interview and questionnaires.

Rather they were conducted through scenarios and observations. Arguments show that the earlier studies have importance on how to develop strategy and not in the way of implementing the strategy. The Bird Approach means the company acts like a bird and tries to find a branch on the tree suitable for it to land because the decision is one cannot stand in the air forever. Such a decision is random, and because it’s random it’s risky. It’s like trying to find the best from what you have. The other approach is The Squirrel Approach. The Squirrel Approach is where the company has particular skills and strengths and that it builds on ignoring other aspects that might prove crucial for its survival.  These approaches to strategy although rare are still happening in practice with disastrous results for the company.

 Most of the authors have mentioned that employees understanding the company strategy are important for an organization but few authors have created some measures to implement and measure its performance. These differences have been created because of different backgrounds and the literature which lead to different definitions and the importance of implementing the strategy.

Within the literature review definitions related to effective strategy communication to the employees and the importance of employees understanding strategy have been considered, compared and contrasted as a means of informing this research and identifying different paths to follow. In gathering the definitions and articles various books and business database related to strategy alignment and strategy communication to the employees have been used. In carrying out this literature review, guidelines received in lectures and tutorials as well as in research textbooks have been followed. By analysing the above literature the author research stand on “How does understanding of company strategy improve company performance and job satisfaction?“

The topic of this research proposal is the importance of employees understanding the company’s strategies. The study is based on AMT COFFEE LTD. The main research question is how managers can explain and make use of company strategies to reach the roots of the organisation and how in doing so they improve employees job satisfaction and company performance.

The research will be conducted in AMT COFFEE LTD where the author has been employed for four years as a store manager. For the literature review the author has analysed more than 50 definitions which relates to the importance of strategy implementation, strategic alignment of the employees and the connections are made where possible with the definitions and different research paths are developed and incorporated. By analyzing books and articles related to importance of strategies, strategic alignment and communicating strategies to the employees a literature review has been prepared. In the literature review the quality has been maintained by using most clear definitions that are most relevant to the research.

Initially permission was denied when the author contacted the Area Manager of AMT COFFEE LTD. Later when the author met the Human Resource manager and explained that the conduct of the research will bring no interruption in daily routines of the employees, then permission was granted.

The research design used in this research is both exploratory and descriptive. The author has chosen a mixture of questionnaires and interviews to collect primary data. Interviews will be conducted with one Operational Manager, Area Managers, General Managers and Assistant Managers. A questionnaire will then be given to 40 front line employees. The author has explained in detail why this methodology has been chosen in the section Proposed Research Design and Proposed Research Methodology. The key outcomes of the research are to explain why employees need to know companies strategies, the best and the easiest way managers can explain strategies to the employees and how does it affect employee’s job performance and satisfaction. More outcomes expected are explained in conclusion.

MBA General; Banking; Finance; HRM; Marketing
Student No	Surname		Forenames				Date submitted:
Title of Dissertation							Supervisor:
FIRST MARKER’S NAME:		Mark	SECOND MARKER’S  NAME		Mark		Agreed Mark
Bases of Assessment		Comments						Marks
Abstract  (Summary of Study) The Focus of the study How data was collected Methodology used to analyse data Main Conclusion & major Recommendation Relationship of findings to the literature								(5%)
Chapter 1: Introduction Structure of the study a)      Research problem identification. b)      Research objective(s). c)      Logical layout of the study; outline of each chapter								(10%)
Chapter 2: Literature Reviewa)      Up-to-date acquaintance with literature in the field. b)      Knowledge of theoretical issues and discussion/debate in the field. c)      Comparing, contrasting, and linking theoretical concepts. d)      Consistent, appropriate and effective use of text references.								(25%)
Chapter 3: Research Methodology & Methodsa)      Awareness of various methods of research. b)      Justification of research methods adopted in the study. c)      Appropriateness of quantitative d)      and qualitative data analysis techniques proposed. e)      Consideration of ethical and professional issues.								(10%)
Chapter 4: Data Presentation and Analysisa)      Proposed research methods employed effectively. b)      Clear, informative data presentation. c)      Application of proposed data analysis techniques, with description of process appropriate to the techniques adopted. d)      Comprehensive, convincing analysis.								(25%)
Chapter 5: Conclusions and Recommendationsa)      Conclusions consistent with research results? b)      An appreciation of problems encountered in the study or the need for further research? c)      Specific business-focused recommendations related to conclusions, with clear action plans for implementation? d)      Implementation issues (cost, resources, timing, etc) considered?								(15%
Overall Presentation & Referencesa)      Clarity, coherence, appearance. b)      Ability to discuss, analyse and present arguments in straightforward and good English. c)      Appropriateness of appendices. d)      Presentation of references at the end of the study, corresponding exactly to those cited in text.								(10%)
First marker (signed):				Date		TOTAL

 

 

 

Name of student:				2nd Marker
Bases of Assessment		Comments					Marks
Abstract  (Summary of Study) The Focus of the study How data was collected Methodology used to analyse data Main Conclusion & major Recommendation Relationship of findings to the literature							(5%)
Chapter 1: Introduction Structure of the study a)      Research problem identification. b)      Research objective(s). c)      Logical layout of the study; outline of each chapter							(10%)
Chapter 2: Literature Reviewa)      Up-to-date acquaintance with literature in the field. b)      Knowledge of theoretical issues and discussion/debate in the field. c)      Comparing, contrasting, and linking theoretical concepts. d)      Consistent, appropriate and effective use of text references.							(25%)
Chapter 3: Research Methodology & Methodsa)      Awareness of various methods of research. b)      Justification of research methods adopted in the study. c)      Appropriateness of quantitative d)      and qualitative data analysis techniques proposed. e)      Consideration of ethical and professional issues.							(10%)
Chapter 4: Data Presentation and Analysisa)      Proposed research methods employed effectively. b)      Clear, informative data presentation. c)      Application of proposed data analysis techniques, with description of process appropriate to the techniques adopted. d)      Comprehensive, convincing analysis.							(25%)
Chapter 5: Conclusions and Recommendationsa)      Conclusions consistent with research results? b)      An appreciation of problems encountered in the study or the need for further research? c)      Specific business-focused recommendations related to conclusions, with clear action plans for implementation? d)      Implementation issues (cost, resources, timing, etc) considered?							(15%
Overall Presentation & Referencesa)      Clarity, coherence, appearance. b)      Ability to discuss, analyse and present arguments in straightforward and good English. c)      Appropriateness of appendices. d)      Presentation of references at the end of the study, corresponding exactly to those cited in text.							(10%)
Second Marker (signed):			Date			TOTAL

 

Data collection techniques 

Data collection has the significant role to play across the research methodology irrespective of the type of research chosen or nature of research chosen and it can be considered as the important step in the research methodology. In general the data collected for the research can be either of two types like primary sources or secondary sources or both. Primary source of information is gathered from the direct sources related to the research problem and the secondary source of information deals with the indirect sources of information that is helpful in evaluating the research. The actual primary source of information and secondary source of information used in this research as given as below

Primary source of information

Primary source of information can be considered as the direct source of information and in general it is gathered in different varieties as discussed in the previous section. The level of accuracy is more with the primary source of information as the data is gathered from the source or related source of the problem and thus the chances to gain the unnecessary data is very less.

When the primary source of data is gathered from different sources it is analyzed and reviewed to check the accuracy of the findings derived from the primary data and thus it can be considered as the key aspect across the total research. The most common tools used to gather the primary source of data include questionnaires and interviews and with this implementation the data is gathered from the respondents who all are involved in the research. The required primary source of information is gathered from semi structured interview process and the key respondents involved in this research are provided in the research sample size section of this chapter.

All the respondents are interviewed using some questionnaires and the questions are prepared in a manner that the key information related to the RBS HR outsourcing strategies is gathered from the interview process. Based on the behavior and nature of the respondents who all are involved in the research, the primary data is gathered and analyzed further to evaluate the research against HR outsourcing and this primary source of information is compared with the secondary source of information to evaluate the accuracy of the research done.

Secondary source of information

Secondary source of information also plays an important role in estimating the quality and accuracy of the research done. In general this secondary source of data is gathered from different sources like internet, articles, journals and books and the information is reviewed against the key findings from the primary source of information. Few websites and articles are used as the secondary source of information in this project and these articles are related to the HR outsourcing and the strategies followed by RBS and they are listed in appendix section. The information reviewed form these articles is compared against the primary source of information to evaluate the quality and accuracy of the research done.

Research Sample size

Research sample size is the actual size of the respondents involved in the research and in general the sample size can be chosen in three different manners like probability sampling, random sampling and non probability sampling. In this project a non-zero probability sampling is adopted such that each and every respondent involved in the research will get an equal opportunity to involve in the research. As mentioned semi structured interviews are used in gathering the primary source of data the key respondents involved in this research are two HR managers, one business development manager and 10 employees. HR managers are interviewed with the core aim to understand the key HR activities being outsourced and the level of benefits they see with this practice. Business development manager is interviewed to gather the information related to cost benefits and Return on Investment aspects while outsourcing the HR. Employees are interviewed to understand their opinion on the HR outsourcing aspects implemented by the bank and gain the knowledge related to their performance and welfare with respect to the HR outsourcing practices implemented by the RBS.

Validity of the research

Any research in general should be valid and the validity of the research should be checked before making some interpretations. In this research the validity of the research is done by comparing the key findings from the interview process with the respondents involved against the review done in the literature survey section. All the research questions identified in the introduction chapter are answered against the findings and the analysis derived is compared with the author’s opinion as given in the literature review chapter.

Findings

Findings from the interview process are included in this chapter and all the responses and views of the respondents involved in the interview are collected and given a structure in this chapter. The key respondents involved in this research are HR managers, business development managers and employees. Human resource managers are interviewed to gather the key information related to the HR activities being outsourced and their benefits in outsourcing, business development managers are interviewed in the perspective to understand the business value of the bank against the HR outsourcing and the employees are interviewed to gather their opinion towards HR outsourcing pros and corns against their performance. All the corresponding findings are listed in to different sections and a set of questions are discussed and presented as below

Different research strategies 

In general any research involves both the primary and secondary source of information and in this context the actual strategies followed to gather the primary source of information can considered as the research strategies. There are different types of research strategies and they are as explained below 

Experimental approach 

A perfect scientific and systematic approach is followed to gather the required information is adopted across the experimental approach of research. In general the researchers are provide an ample freedom to change the attributes of the experiments research and also has scope to change the variable that were affected with the change in the core attributes of the experimental research approach. A wide range of experiments are conducted across this approach and the key findings are furnished for the analysis of the results and also few aspects like what and how are covered in detail across the experimental research. Actual predictions are extracted from the experimental results and these predications are compared with the basic assumptions made and the accuracy of the results and also the predications is estimated using the experimental research approach and when the considered research phenomenon is achieved all the experiments are closed and the detailed conclusion to the experiments is given across this research approach. In general a sampling technique is required to refine the experiments and these include the major sampling techniques like probability sampling, random sampling and non-experimental sampling and all these sampling techniques can be used to define the inputs for the experiments conducted across the experimental research approach and based on the results of the experiments will lead to the solution to the research problem considered and thus this approach will give accurate results against the solution for the research problem considered(Lanir,2007). This approach is not followed in this project as there is no freedom to change to attributes of the experiment and also there is no scope of experimental research in this project as well. The sample size is considered is also small and due to all these aspects this approach is not well suited in this research.  

Survey approach 

A survey based research is more popular across many research areas and this type of approach is followed when the sample size is more than around 30. Quantitative research methodology is followed in this context and the surveys are conducted on a large sample and the data gathered is analyzed using the empirical analysis. Few statistical tools are used to analyze the data and the gatherings are categorized in to different sections for the analysis purpose. A questionnaire is prepared and the same is distributed to the large sample and based on the answers provided by the sample the required analysis to the problem considered is done using the survey based approach. In general there are different types of surveys and these include oral survey, written survey, electronic survey and manual survey and type of survey depends on the nature of research problem considered (Ross, 2009). As the aim of this project is to understand the impact of HR outsourcing a very small sample size is considered and thus the qualitative methodolgy is suited and this approach where conducting the surveys is not suited and thus this approach is not considered in this research. 

Grounded theory 

A detailed research data is required for this research and based on this data the grounded theory is developed. An iterative based methodology is implemented across the grounded theory and the research patterns are repeated till the accurate results of the research are achieved. Few general questions are prepared across the grounded theory and the desired linking is done to the actual research problem and the data collected using the grounded theory. In general the grounded theory is less used across the research philosophies due to the complex nature and it is mainly implemented across the scientific research strategies (Albert, 2002). In this research there is no scope of repeating the research based on few iterations and thus this theory is not suited for this research and thus not considered at this level.

Case study 

If the research sample is less and the research problem considered need a close attentions towards a specific area this case study approach is implemented. Source of the problem is directly visited with this case study approach and thus it is easy to measure the accuracy of the research done with the case study approach. Direct source of data is provided with the case study approach and all the respondents involved across the case study approach can be interviewed and the impact of the research problem at their site can be easily understood in this context. In general the qualitative research methodology is the best one to apply while going for the case study research approach and the information gathered from the case considered can be evaluated and analyzed against the key assumption and the actual findings from the case chosen. A detailed level of investigation can be done in this context such that the secondary and primary source of information can be compared to understand the actual hidden facts behind the reality considered while implementing the case study approach. The information gathered with the case study can be considered as the trusted one and also accurate when compared to the other sources of information and thus in many researched where the sample size is less than 20, this case study approach is chosen. 

Action research approach 

Action research has the significant role to play across gathering the required data for the research. In general the actions of a particular group or team is observed and based on their attitude towards the research problem considered this action research is built. The best example site where this action research is done is at the organizations, universities, colleges and schools where the actions of a particular group are observed and from this the basic analysis to the research problem is constructed. 

Ethnography 

Behavioral aspects of the human involved in the research are considered as the main input for the ethnography based research approach. Cultural aspects of the humans involved in the research are considered for this type of research approach and in general this is purely based on the observations and assumptions. In general this research approach involves lot of time and the researcher should be patience enough to collect the data in the form of interviews, document analysis and observations done against a group of humans and their cultural behavior. Few aspects like traditions and customs that drive the complete cultural aspects of the humans are studied at a detailed level in this type of research approach and in general a lot of assumptions are considered in this context.

Research strategy followed in this project

A normal case study approach is chosen as the research approach for this project, as the information gathered mainly should deal with the pros and corns of HR outsourcing. In this context if a case study is chosen then the level of reliability in gathering the information is increased and thus Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is chosen as the case study. It is proved that RBS is the most reputed bank in Europe and has almost 1, 00,000 employees and even they are outsourcing the key HR activities like payroll, recruitments, training and development and thus I have chosen RBS as the required case study. I have interviewed the key respondents from the bank to understand their strategy and logic in outsourcing the HR activities and all the findings and analysis are provided in this research in the next chapters.

Inductive research approach is followed in this context, where the actual theory of the research is derived from the observations with respect to the research problem considered. Importance of HR outsourcing and the key pros and corns of it are studied at this research level and the solution to the research problem identified requires proper observations without any assumptions and thus always the inductive research approach is suited for this project.

As a case study level research is required in the inductive research, Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is considered as the case and in this context few roles in the bank are chosen as the respondents and based on the inductive approach the research findings are derived in the form of a theory and this theory is purely derived from the observations against the interview process with the official of RBS.