Project Management Dissertation, Chapter 3: Research Methodology

This dissertation chapter, focusing on research methodology, provides a comprehensive overview of the research process undertaken to investigate the relationship between project manager competencies and project success rates within the Ghanaian mining sector. The chapter details the research philosophy, approach (interpretivism with an inductive approach), and design (case study). It outlines the study population, sampling methods, and the use of questionnaires (LDQ and PSQ) for data collection through interviews. The methodology justifies the use of a qualitative approach and addresses ethical considerations. The chapter also provides a profile of the respondents and concludes with a summary of the research design. The study employed a case study design with five mining companies registered with the Ghana Chamber of Mines in the Western Region to gather data from project managers and contractors, with the intention of generalizing findings to the broader mining sector.

PROJECT MANAGEMENT
(Dissertation Chapter – Methodology)

Table of Contents
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY.............................................................................1
3.1 Introduction......................................................................................................................1
3.2 Research approach and design..........................................................................................1
3.3 Study population, samples and units of analysis..............................................................6
3.4 Research tools and questionnaire.....................................................................................7
3.5 Justification for using qualitative approach......................................................................9
3.6 Data collection method...................................................................................................10
3.7 Interview for data collection...........................................................................................11
3.8 Validity of the research method.....................................................................................12
3.9 Ethics and confidentiality...............................................................................................12
3.10 Description of Respondent’s Profile and Demographics.............................................13
3.11 Conclusion....................................................................................................................13
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................15

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction
Research can be defined as a scientific or detailed investigation to thoroughly study and
analyze the chosen research problem. Methodology is one of the crucial chapters of the
dissertation that presents a systematic plan for carrying out research and exploring the issue in
detailed way. Alternatively, it describes broadly philosophies, approaches and other key tools
undermining the research methods whether quantitative, qualitative or a mixture of both. This
section of the dissertation clearly explains how the investigation has been carried out, source of
data extraction, data collection methods and techniques used for analysis. Thus, the main purpose
of the thesis is to introduce used research strategy, empirical methods with enough justification.
3.2 Research approach and design
Positivism and interpretivism are the two kinds of philosophies that might be used by a
scholar for investigating the issue. Understanding knowledge, belief and justification to manage
problem is important for research studies. Epistemology plays an important role in selection of
research philosophy to manage the problem and prepare mitigation plan. It is concerned about
providing a philosophical ground to decide the possibility of knowledge and assures its adequacy
and legitimacy (Petty, Thomson and Stew 2012). Every investigator needs to obtain information
related to the epistemological perspective.
Positivism is a scientific approach that is well-structured, organized and measurable
natural world. Positivist researchers discover regularities and pattern of social world using
scientific methods. They have an objective point of view without interfering all the research
phenomena. It often comprises manipulating reality with some variations only on one
independent variable in order to determine regularities and relationship with the social world.
They believe that predictions can be performing using historical observation, explained realities
and their interrelationship with others. Knowledge claims are not grounded in positivist theories
as they are dismissed as scientific. It has perfect successful association with the natural and
physical science (Bergold and Thomas, 2012). Such scholars believe that relationship between
human and social reality is totally independent and work objectively to assess cause-effect.
However, this paradigm is criticized in literature for organizational reality that is too complex
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and not easy to amend to statistical deduction. Moreover, it is deeply rooted philosophy in
functionalism that is extremely concerned with assessing causal analysis for generalization.
Interpretivism philosophy, on the other side, collects qualitative dataset and use methods
i.e. unstructured interview, participant observation and others. They believe that they influence
and effected by the research strategy. Thus, their involvement affects research result because
different investigators interpret inferences differently. The epistemological stance in such
research believes that knowledge about reality can be acquire only via social constructions
including shared meaning, language and others (Bernard and Bernard, 2012). It does not have
any pre-specified dependent and independent variable; still, the core focus of researcher is on
thoroughly exploring the complexity of the issue to make it clear. Interpretivist claim that social
phenomenon must be explained and analyzed in social context, in which, they constructed. They
believe that only subjective interpretation helps to explore reality.
The current research paper targeted to explore the relationship between competencies of
project manager and the project success rate in the mining sector of Ghana. Researcher
investigated such relationship in with a constructivism viewpoint. Underpinning its assumption,
scholar believed that research problem can be only investigated through original interactions
with the target individuals to know their belief, opinion and views. It permit scholar making their
own viewpoints along with the comprehensive details of all the participants within subjective
context.
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Approach of the research present the detailed and systematic plan comprises a list of
steps that scholar had followed. There are two popular research approaches that are inductive and
deductive. The nature of the problem has a significant impact on the appropriateness of
approach. It is because, qualitative studies that are based on constructivist or transformative
knowledge use inductive approach, quantitative, however, is based on post-positivist claims,
hence, prefer deductive approach.
Inductive researches aims at generating new theory by exploring new phenomena,
deductive, on the other hand, uses hypothesis, begins with social theory and apply test to find the
result implications. Former are often used in qualitative studies, later is preferable in quantitative
researches.
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Referring the current research issue of studying the impact of project managers,
excellence, competencies and knowledge base in the respected field on project success rate,
inductive seems suitable. Based on constructivism theory followed in the interpretivism
paradigm, inductive approach had been used by the scholar that starts with the open mind with
no preconceived thoughts and aims to develop new theory. Its reasoning works on defining
pattern, develop explanation and create new theory (Eriksson and Kovalainen, 2015). In other
words, it first undertakes detailed evaluation and then moves towards developing abstract
generalization as illustrated below:
It enable scholar to undertake a coherent and thorough analysis by obtaining considerable
quantum of data through interview the chosen target respondents of selected mining companies
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of Western Regions of Ghana. It helps gathering data that are particularly relevant to the field of
interest by direct questioning with them. Inductive approach, results can be generalized to a
wider population to the mining sector and other industries too to explain that how PM knowledge
and skills affect the success rate. However, the main problem with inductive logic is that
researchers are prone to multiple biasness which affect results. Moreover, although it seems quite
reasonable, still, ignorance of some variables questioned its results and certainty aspect.
Research design is one of the major part of the methodology that integrates multitude
components or research elements logically and help researcher in hypothesis or question
formation (Smith, 2014). Although, there are number of researches such as descriptive,
analytical, cross-sectional, experimental, case study and other designs that are explained below:
Descriptive design: As name itself, this design is just used to deeply or thoroughly
present the prevailing aspects about the target phenomenon. Thus, it extract huge quantum of
data to study existing situation and delivery deeper valuable insight towards the issue.
Analytical design: Unlike above, this design critically examines and analyzes the issue
from all the perspectives or aspects. Thus, it undertakes critical judgement to evaluate the
interested area of issue (Hussain, 2016).
Exploratory design: When research is carried out in a newer area that is never earlier
researched is called exploratory design. Thus, it is about exploring the problem to gain
familiarity with the issue, so that, scholars can investigate it thoroughly in future period.
Cross-sectional design: Scholar prefers such design to investigate the issue at a given
point of time within a very short duration. It finds out differences from and between a set of units
or subjects.
Case study design: According to its name, when a particular company or group of
companies are investigated to gain deeper insight towards the issue, then case study design is
used. It narrowed the wider scope of research targeting only the specific phenomenon (Petty,
Thomson and Stew 2012).
The research investigation is about examining the impact of project managers or
professional skills on the success rate of the project. The thesis targets mining companies of
Ghana that are registered with the Ghana Chamber of mines and located in Western Region. For
this, scholar had used case study design by narrowing down the broader scope of the study
selecting five leading mining companies of the region that are Adamus Resources Limited,
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Anglogold Ashanti Iduapriem Mine, Ghana Manganese Company Ltd, Gold Fields Mine
Tarkwa, and Golden Star Bogoso/Prestea Ltd. Scholar had only interviewed the chosen
companies project managers, coordinators, superintendent, third party contractors and did not
pay attention to the other mining firms. However, the main limitation with this design is it needs
a lot of time compare to other approaches. Besides this, as it targets only few companies, thus,
narrow focus or area which undertake limited presentation is another drawback.
3.3 Study population, samples and units of analysis
Universe can be defined as collection or group or various items that are grouped together
underpinning some key characteristics or features. Thus, it represents entire units, objects or
individuals that have certain specific properties. Sample, however, is a sub-set of finite number
of units that is drawn out by researcher following a systematic process. It is useful to derive
useful conclusion or results about the parent set. It clearly indicates that universe is large, while,
sample contains only few items, respondents or units (Lorino, Tricard and Clot, 2011).
Population presents parameter, sample, on the other hand, is used for statistical purpose to make
inferences about entire universe.
The current problem aims at investigating how the level, knowledge, skills and
competency of the manager affects the success rate of various projects. the study pays particular
attention to the mining sector of Western Region of Ghana. Thus, all the large scale mining
companies operating in Ghana is the universe/population for the study. They all must be
registered with Ghana Chamber of Mines and running their functions in the Western Region.
Mining companies undertake various projects and considering the chosen field of study, project
departments working within the firms are the target person. As it was not possible to gather data
from all the mining companies, therefore, sampling frame is used, wherein, a subset of target
population had been selected.
Out of population, a sample of 5 large-scale mining firms registered within Ghana
Chamber of mines with the conditions of location in Western Region has been selected. It
includes adamus Resources Limited, Anglogold Ashanti Iduapriem Mine, Ghana Manganese
Company Ltd, Gold Fields Mine Tarkwa, and Golden Star Bogoso/Prestea Ltd. From all of the
five companies, project managers and third party contractors who offer contract services to the
mines had been chosen for the purpose of interview. Survey and findings about the selected
sample had been generalized to the entire mining sector. From the chosen sample size, 2 project
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professionals from the parent company and one from the third party contractor had been chosen.
Thus, total of 15 participants or target respondents had been interviewed by investigator from
whom necessary data has been extracted.
3.4 Research tools and questionnaire
Every research uses various tools for gathering required quantum of data set. Appropriate
research tool enable or facilitate modelers to develop theories and support hypothesis creation,
inferring mechanism and creating experimental results. Questionnaire was first introduced by
Statistical Society of London in 1838 for statistical analysis of the gathered responses. Now, it
seems one of the famous or widely used research tools that comprise a series of questions
targeting the aims and objectives of the research study. It is not always necessary to use
questionnaire for the statistical analysis only and can be used for other purposes as well. The
main advantage associated with the questionnaire is that it is one of the cheaper sources of data
collection over any other survey (Lorino, Tricard and Clot, 2011). It is because, it does not take
too much time and do not require excessive efforts of the developer. However, at the same time,
it has certain limitation, as it is necessary that reader must be able to understand the question
correctly to give right response.
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For the current study, questionnaire had been used as research instrument for the purpose
of interview. It comprises two set of questionnaires, one is LDQ (Leadership Dimension
Questionnaire) and another is PSQ (Project Success Questionnaire). The questionnaire has total 3
sections. 1st section provide demographic details about the participant, 2nd section indicates
manager competencies targeting three categories including 7 emotional competencies (EQ), 5
managerial competencies (MQ) and 3 intellectual competencies (IQ) and the last section focuses
on measuring project success.
Demographic details includes information relating to gender, age, educational level,
project size and experience, job position in the project department i.e. superintendent, supervisor,
coordinator and project manager. However, self-awareness, emotional resilience, intuitiveness,
sensitivity, motivation and conscientiousness are the 7 EQ targeted by scholar. Managerial
competency category includes resource, communication, empowering team, train and develop
team and leadership competency. Lastly, IQ constitutes of critical analysis, judgement, vision &
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imagination and strategic perspective. However, project success is measured in terms of timely
completion, budgetary limit, scope, client satisfaction and other factors.
3.5 Justification for using qualitative approach
Qualitative versus quantitative are the two researches that an investigator can carry out
to explore the interested field or problem. In a nutshell, first method generates numerical
information or other data that is convertible into numbers whereas qualitative, on the other side,
uses data that is non-numerical, statistical, financial and measurable (Mertens, 2014). It uses
verbal data which is examined and analyzed in the form of subjective interpretation. Qualitative
studies aims at providing a comprehensive, complete and detailed description about the chosen
topic. Thus, it is more exploratory nature, that explains the issue thoroughly. Unlike this,
quantitative focuses on classifying feature and research phenomenon numerically or in numbers.
It construct statistical models and uses figures to explain things. It has narrow scope due to
focused attention, hence is of conclusive nature (Johnson and Christensen, 2008). However,
qualitative studies have wider scope that presents whole picture with an exploratory view. In-
depth interview, focus groups, documentary analysis, archival research and participant
observation are the instruments used in qualitative studies. However, quantitative studies use
survey, questionnaires and other tools that easy to express in numbers or any other measurable
data. Researcher remains objectively detached from subjective matter and seeks only precise
tools of measurement and analysis (Sale, Lohfeld and Brazil, 2002).
Referring the current investigation, it was qualitative investigation that aims at analyzing
the relationship between project professionals IQ, EQ and MQ on the success rate. The reason
behind this is the particular study is based on analyzing the managerial competencies, their
knowledge, skills, motivation and other factors. Self-awareness, emotional resilience,
intuitiveness, sensitivity, motivation and conscientiousness all are qualitative factors that cannot
be presented in numbers. Moreover, how well managers are able to develop resource
management, communication management, workforce administration and empower or motivate
their team members are qualitative aspects based on their experience, competency and talent.
Thus, due to the presence of all such elements, qualitative research had conducted through
personal interview. The major benefit associated with such method is that it permits investigator
performing broader research incorporating subjective matters.
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3.6 Data collection method
Data collection, as name itself, present various ways and methods how researcher has
gathered information about the selected research phenomenon. Data gathering attempts to reach
at an abstract typology including stimuli, responses and methods for deriving essential
information (Best and Kahn, 2016). The data gathering procedure starts after a clear define of
research problem. Every researcher has two choices to extract required information for analyzing
and deeply evaluating the chosen field, that are primary and secondary data.
Former refers to those which are about gathering fresh or firsthand information which is
original in nature because no one else gathered it earlier. Secondary sources, however, refers to
information which already collected earlier by someone else and passed through statistical
procedure to derive some useful findings about the universe (Chilisa, 2011). Primary sources are
used for descriptive researches where data is obtained via observation, survey or any other
method that directly communicate with targets respondents i.e. personal interview. In contrast to
this, secondary data may be either available in the form of published or unpublished sources.
Investigator need to work carefully in secondary research because sometime, it may be possible
that available data do not match the current research requirement due to distinctive nature of the
problem. Thus, it requires necessary precautions before using secondary database.
Under primary source, observation can be defined as a method of systematic viewing
coupled with various consideration of physically observed phenomenon by observer. It eliminate
subjective biasness, but expensive and requires more time. Moreover, observation extract limited
information and unforeseen factors may affect the outcome. Interview, on the other hand, is a
useful way of collecting information via oral stimuli and reply or responses by the people. In this
procedure, interviewer asks certain pre-specified questions to all the respondents who are
supposed to express their opinion and views on the same. No-doubt, primary techniques are
perfect, which assure high credibility, validity and authenticity, still, requires too much effort,
time and resources which make the method expensive.
However, secondary data source includes sources like books, newspaper, articles,
academics literature, online sources, company’s reports, governmental association reports and
others. It takes lesser time in data extraction but not suitable in case, when data are not easily
available and the topic is new that is never researched earlier. Besides this, lack of specific
details about the interested field also is a major drawback of secondary research.
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For the current research study, scholar had used primary method of data gathering. In
this, he conducted interview of selected 15 professional managers and third party contractors
from five mining companies of Western Part of region. It was face-to-face conversation between
interviewer and chosen audience and took about 20-30 minutes in making in-depth interview. As
scholar had conducted personal interview thus, it helps extracting information targeting the
predetermined questions contain in the questionnaire. It follows rigid procedure, in which,
interviewer asked the question following the mentioned order. Such gathered information is easy
to analyze as it is obtained in prescribed manner. Greater depth, availability of flexibility in
questionnaire restructuring and deriving personal information of project manager opinion is the
primary benefits associated with it (Smith, 2015). Moreover, it assure high rate of response and
researcher can use his or her own skills to overcome resistance. The method helps investigator to
tailor specific dataset necessities by deriving information about their emotional competencies,
managerial skills and intellectual competencies as well. Such skills and competencies were
examined in the context of project success targeting cost, schedule, scope, consumer satisfaction
and other success determining factors.
3.7 Interview for data collection
Although researcher had choice to use questionnaire survey either through mail,
telephonic and field survey, still, for the present study, scholar had decided to conduct interview
of the selected participants. The reason behind the same is that it enable investigator in gathering
correct response by clearly explaining the formulated questions to the target audiences and
recording their responses accurately. Thus, the risk of information asymmetry or confusion
among target respondents in developing clear understanding of the questions is totally avoided.
Besides this, with the help of interview, investigator became able to gather extensive set of data
through open-ended questions. It helps scholar knowing project professionals views, opinion and
their thoughts deeply (Taylor, Bogdan and DeVault, 2015). Thus, the key benefit associated with
the interview is that it is useful to derive detailed information regarding personal opinion, feeling
and perceptions. It enables scholar gathering supplementary information regarding personal
characteristics of the target people which gains significant value in results.
However, it is not possible when questionnaire is conveyed to the target audience who
are supposed to give their responses and send back it to the surveyor. Thus, it expands the
amount of data gathered targeting the chosen area or field for thorough examination and gain
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deepen understanding by allowing superintendent to ask the research question in more detail.
Furthermore, questionnaire survey has a risk of less response rate, unlike this; interview helps in
achieving high response rate that enable scholar in attaining target objectives. However, the main
downfall side with this is that it is a time-consuming process, which requires interviewing,
transcribing, evaluation, feedback and reporting. In addition, there is a risk that manager may
deliver bias information which could be only judge by the own skills and knowledge of
interviewer. Systematic error may also take place while interviewing the target people.
3.8 Validity of the research method
Validity can be considered as a sort of indication of how reliable the research remained. It
can be applied for the designing as well as in case of methods (Glesne, 2015). In this research,
the data has been collected through the means of interview and questionnaire, so it is considered
as the current data. If the data would be collected from some other source like books, journals or
online, then there may be the possibility that the data collected is old, so it may create some
discrepancies in the whole research but in this case, the data has been collected through the
means of interview taken from the samples (Khan, 2011). Sampling is considered as a method in
which few samples are being taken from a huge number of population, so the data and
information was collected from that, so it is fresh and completely authenticate to use. Consistent
data is being used and there is no possibility of old data that may decrease the quality as well as
the whole research. Therefore, it cannot be considered as unreliable because it has been taken
from authentic source. So, this assures the validity as well.
3.9 Ethics and confidentiality
Ethics are considered as the morals or principles that help in analysing the behaviour of a
person or any other factor or operation. There are five basic ethics that are considered in the
research and these involve decreased risk or any possibility of risk or harmful factors. Asking for
object consent is another important principle as the data and information are two important
factors that needs to be considered in the research (Best and Kahn, 2016). So, it is very essential
to obtain a great and efficient amount of data in the research. Protecting the privacy is also
another major concern because in case if the data and information will be leaked, so it can be
used by some external body for their own personal use which should not happen because the
researcher will contribute a huge amount of time and hard work in collecting the whole data, so
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if that data is being lost and used by some other external party, the whole contribution of the
researcher will result in a complete waste.
3.10 Description of Respondent’s Profile and Demographics
For seeking all the views and beliefs, an interview has been conducted in which the target
population will be a set of mining companies, which are working on a large scale and already
registered with the Ghana Chamber of mines. So, interview will be taken for attaining a proper
and relevant information. The data collection from interview can act as a beneficial factor for the
research as it can ensure the validity of the data rather than using any secondary source. There
must be some sample frames as well which will be including all the third party contractors as
well as the subsets of the population that has been targeted. These are being chosen because they
provide various types of contract services that are in association for the mines.
3.11 Conclusion
It can be concluded from the research that the interpritivism approach has been used in
this research which involves the domain of processes and operations of a specific part. It can also
be termed as a means of construction with the help of various actors taking part in the research.
The actors will be involving the researcher as well. The data can be collected from two sources,
either the primary or the secondary. The primary data is the data that is being collected for the
first time and its sources includes the data by means of interviews, focused groups surveys etc.
and the secondary data is the data that has already been collected by some external body and its
sources includes the data from books, journals, online etc. In this research, the researcher has
make the use of primary data, interviews and questionnaires because by using the means like
books, journals or online, there is a probability that the data and information may be old.
So, for this the researcher has make use of the primary data in this specific research for
getting effective and appropriate results. Out of the two approaches, inductive approach is being
used in this research because the inductive one deals with the exploration of the topic, especially
in the initiating phase, it tries to explore very wide. Also, out of the approaches, qualitative
method is being used by the researcher because the quantitative one involves the data from
tabular forms or by means of charts etc. which can create a sort of discrepancy in the whole
research as by using the quantitative data, there are chances that the collected data can be old or
not relevant according to the current situation, so, the researcher will make use of the qualitative
methods.
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