In the bachelor thesis, for example, you have to argue why you preferred an expert interview to the survey. Since your method does not, of course, reveal the entire knowledge on the topic, it should also be sensibly limited. In this article I show the advantages and disadvantages of each methodology.

Tip: Use the advantages to justify your choice and pack the disadvantages into the limitation of your work.

Literature analysis

Literature analyzes form the foundation of any research and summarize similar findings. It helps in understanding, structuring existing knowledge and finding research gaps.

Nevertheless, the following points should be limited:

• Novelty: Often literature analyzes only summarize existing knowledge and do not generate any new knowledge.
• Incompleteness: Depending on the procedure, you can only find part of the literature and you have to concentrate on certain papers as you cannot read all of them in full. They are always just a selection of findings.

Reading tip: Literature analysis

Expert interviews

The advantage of the method is the free and natural situation of the interviews. You can interpret results in depth with the test subjects and ask questions. They also control the interview situation and ensure that the test subject is not stressed, for example, and that statements are therefore to be interpreted differently. They also offer a high level of information through the detailed answers given by the test subjects.

Nevertheless, the following points should be limited:

• Social undesirability: test subjects can “beautiful” answers through the presence of the researcher
• Sampling: You only interview a small group and are therefore not very representative
• Subjectivity: The evaluation of the answers is subjective and can be interpreted in various ways

Reading tip: Expert interviews

Group discussion

The great advantage of the group discussion is that the interaction of the participants can lead to new insights (collective intelligence). You will find new perspectives and suggestions. You can also ask questions and get different perspectives on the same topic through the group.

Nevertheless, the following points should be limited:

• Frequent speakers: Individual frequent speakers can dominate and falsify the discussion
• Low representativeness: You only interview a small target group
• Evaluation: Due to the large number of opinions, it is difficult to present the group consensus.

Reading tip: Group discussion

Case study

Case studies present complex issues quickly and easily. You do not disturb processes or the natural situation. They therefore provide a detailed description of a complex individual case.

Nevertheless, the following points should be limited:

• Limited generalization: Often findings only apply to this case study
• Extreme cases or individual cases cannot be clearly identified: For example, did you happen to catch the only project of this type and it is otherwise not the case
• Subjective data: They represent the case study from your point of view or the observer and are therefore subjective

Reading tip: Case study

survey

The great advantage of surveys is that a large number of people can be reached quickly. In contrast to interviews, large amounts of data can be evaluated quickly. In addition, the questionnaire can be used to exclude the influence that the interviewer has on the test person (an interview usually makes test persons nervous).

Nevertheless, the following points should be limited:

• Insufficient control of the interview situation: You do not know whether the respondent is currently under stress or is just skimming the questions
• Honesty of the respondents: it could happen that questions are not answered completely honestly
• Different views on the question: each participant will interpret your questions differently
• Answers cannot be interpreted qualitatively: the results provide facts and data that should be interpreted using qualitative methods

Reading tip: survey

Reference modeling

Reference models simply represent complex issues and generalize them. Above all, they serve for a better understanding and transferability of complex issues.

Nevertheless, the following points should be limited:

• Transferability: The model cannot be used exactly as it is in every context. They do not give a ready-made solution scheme
• Abstraction: Often these models are very abstract and make no contribution to the solution, only to understanding

Reading tip: Reference modeling

Grounded Theory

The advantage of the methodology is the constant restructuring of research and the high level of applicability. It is therefore suitable for unknown research areas without much literature or a strong foundation (“grounding”).

Nevertheless, the following points should be limited:

• Depending on the researcher: As you work very freely, the evaluation depends on the researcher, as each researcher would evaluate the data differently. This methodology needs a very good researcher.
• Complexity: Due to the often fuzzy research topic, the results are usually only guidelines and so complex that they may still be very imprecise and further iterations are necessary.
• Binding: Due to the selected data sources, the grounded theory is bound to a certain social reality and is not transferable

Reading tip: Grounded Theory

Conclusion

It turns out that every research method has certain advantages and disadvantages. It is therefore important to select and limit this sensibly for good scientific work.

Reading tip: Build research design

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The strength of case studies lies in the fact that complex processes and procedures within a company can be clearly illustrated and can be used as examples.

A point of criticism of a case study is often that general deductions from the individual case to the whole are not always possible or only possible under certain aspects. The reason for this is the strong contextual relevance to the respective case.

Types of case studies

There are two types of case studies. Case studies consider a case with a mostly critical, unique, typical or previously inaccessible nature over a longer period of time (Bodendorf et al. 2010). In doing so, you examine a company or a case very carefully and in detail. Often this is done in cooperation with just one practice partner.

The second case is the comparative case study. Comparative case studies have the advantage of critically illuminating the knowledge gained by looking at several cases in parallel and thereby discovering case-specific similarities and differences (Bodendorf et al. 2010). For example, it becomes clear how different companies use SAP or Scrum.

Tip: don’t forget yours Cleanly limit methodology.

Collect data and conduct a case study

The task now is to depict the case study through interviews or observation. If the project has already been completed, you can have the story of the project told you in 2-5 interviews. I recommend asking several roles, as this gives you a comprehensive view.

If the project is still ongoing and you are given permission to attend the project, have a piece of paper with you and write down your observations. These notes are attached to your work. So you write a kind of diary. Of course, this should be supplemented by interviews with the project managers. You should also try to take pictures if you get permission to do so.

Written down a case study

Now it is time to write down the case study. Remember: you are not writing a novel, you are still writing a factual report, which does not have to mean that it is boring. However, you should avoid saying: “It was a mild summer morning and the project manager is on his way to the next meeting”. Instead, stay objective and describe the following points:

• event : When and where does the case study take place and how why did the project start? Eg project with Scrum due to a new customer
• person : Which people and roles were there in the case study and what is their relevance? e.g. Scrum Master, Product Owner, …
• place : What are the characteristics of this place and is it relevant to the case study? e.g. New Work Office or Open Space
• phenomenon : Are there cause-and-effect relationships in the case study? Eg introduction of a daily led to better communication in the project

Furthermore, I generally recommend illustrations and, in any case, a schedule of the case study. This greatly helps the reader to better understand the case study.

Evaluation of the case study

Now it is important to derive meaningful results from the existing case study. There are numerous approaches to this. On the one hand, you might ask yourself: What approaches are there in the literature on your topic and which have been implemented? or even simpler: What best practices or tips can you derive from the case study?

You can also derive hypotheses based on the case study and then evaluate them using interviews or surveys.

Conclusion

A case study has the strength in the detailed presentation of an individual case and is often exciting for the practitioner and scientist to read. Interesting impulses relating to the research question can be derived from the case study. A case study is therefore ideally suited to take a detailed look at phenomena from practice.

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Bodendorf, F., Löffler, C., & Hofmann, J. (2010). Research methods in business informatics. business Informatics , (1), 1-44.

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Tip: If you cannot find any literature in general, then read my article: Help, I can’t find any literature!

However, the fact that you are researching a specific niche is often of value in practice, as many results are not transferable to any industry. I have e.g. Researched SMEs and often heard about general results: this only applies to corporations or it is too expensive for us, … There are also almost no studies on agility in SMEs. It is therefore important that you work out the specific framework conditions of an industry or an SME. For SMEs, for example (Lindner 2019):

• Short decision paths
• Small process landscape
• Low budgets

Now I would like to give two examples in the following, which will help you to work on a topic in a meaningful way. The first is in the figure. You want to examine agility. Now your practice partner is a manufacturing company. But you won’t find any literature on agility in production. The idea is now as follows:

• Gather general insights into corporate agility.
• Then you collect information: What are the framework conditions of my context?
• Which of the general findings fit the framework of my context?

You will notice that, for example, knowledge work and production are very different. While production is more concerned with Industry 4.0 and Lean, methods such as Scrum dominate research in knowledge work. It is therefore important to carry out a consideration taking the context into account.

I would like to give a similar example for an industry. You will find the automotive and financial sectors below. Agility means something completely different in both industries and the results are not all transferable. However, you will hardly find any information on agility in the industries directly. It is therefore important to derive general findings and evaluate them in the context of the framework conditions: Does that fit my industry?

Tip: you should Literature for a practice partner search then you can proceed in the same way:

• Find and summarize general literature
• Analyze the general conditions of the practice partner
• Investigation: What suits my practice partner?

Conclusion

Researching a niche is very valuable in practice, as numerous managers have books on e.g. Read agility and think: That doesn’t fit my industry / company! You should therefore summarize general literature and ideally have a list: theses on agility. Now use the industry criteria to evaluate: Does this thesis fit my industry or not? In the end, you get a dedicated analysis for your context.

You can find a great example for SMEs in my study:

Lindner, D., Ludwig, T., & Amberg, M. (2018). Work 4.0 – Concepts for a new way of working in SMEs. HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik , 6th (1), 17.

source

Lindner, D. (2019). SMEs in the digital transition: results of empirical studies . Wiesbaden: Springer Gabler.

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Reading tip: Build research design

Deduction: The standard for theses

Deduction means transferring information from theory into practice. In other words, deduction means concretely to derive / derive. For example, you know: goldfish live in water. I have a goldfish. So this goldfish has to live in the water too.

Reading tip: Find literature

I would like to show you this using the example of change strategies in companies. You can find out more in the literature: What change strategies are there (Kotter, Lewin, …). Now you ask experts: How relevant are these and can they be used? You then derive recommendations for action from this. From theory to practice!

Usually this is the absolute standard case in a thesis. I also usually don’t recommend deviating from it, otherwise it will be very complicated. So, in a nutshell, do the following:

• Read something
• ask practitioners how relevant this is and
• derive recommendations from it.

Induction: pulling through the topic without literature

Induction means bringing about or causing and is generalized thinking. Let’s stay with our goldfish: My goldfish lives in the water. My goldfish is a fish. So all fish have to live in the water.

Reading tip: Grounded theory

Now, however, you definitely want to work on a topic even though there is no literature. Then start with expert interviews and see: What findings are available on my topic in practice. To do this, you conduct several rounds of interviews. For example, you could ask: “How are you currently digitizing?”. As soon as you have enough information, check the literature to see if something already exists. You then derive theories and models from the findings. So you are in charge from practice in theory!

This case is quite complicated and not easy. You should know that you have an increased effort and ask yourself, “Do I want this? Am I so motivated? “

Conclusion

You have two options in research. I basically recommend that you prefer the first case. For you as your first research work, the second case is a tough nut to crack, but it brings much more exciting results. Decide for yourself! An example of both research can be found in my studies. The deduction is the study on work 4.0 and the induction is the study on leadership.

Lindner, D., Ludwig, T., & Amberg, M. (2018). Work 4.0 – Concepts for a new way of working in SMEs. HMD Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik , 6th (1), 17.

Lindner, D., & Greff, T. (2018). Leadership in the age of digitization – what do managers say. HMD – Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik , 7th (1), 20.

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• Literature research (search, reduction and possibly clustering)
• Literature analysis (content analysis and presentation of the literature)

Tip: An example of a literature analysis with many suggested topics for a thesis can be found in my study from 2019.
Lindner, D., & Christian Leyh. (2019). Digitization of SMEs – questions, recommendations for action and implications for IT organization and IT service management. HMD – Praxis der Wirtschaftsinformatik , 4th , 21.

Overview of the procedures and authors

You will also have to provide a description of the methodology for your literature analysis. I would therefore like to give you four sources which are considered to be the “original papers” of literary analysis. You can quote these:

• Webster and Watson 2002 (is the original paper for literature analysis)
• Fettke 2006 (a good addition to business informatics)
• Vom Brocke et al. 2009 (Deepens the search for literature again)
• Mayring 2000 (Deepens the evaluation of the literature again)

A literature analysis always has two steps. You go in search of literature and evaluate it. I’ll give you a pretty extensive explanation for both steps. In short, in the first step you select the database, journals and quality criteria. Von Brocke et al. best represented. Then you can optionally start a forward or backward search (more later) and evaluate the literature according to Webster and Watson (2002) or Mayring (2000). I don’t count the last step, the writing, directly as a step, but I notice that students have problems here again and again and therefore explain this as well.
PS: You can download the template here and like to quote in your work.

Literature search

In the literature search, selected literature databases (e.g. scholar, springerlink, etc.) are searched in order to answer the central research question. Here I strictly follow vom Brocke et al. (2009). So you set journals, databases and variables such as time period (I recommend 3-5 years), focus and research method.
In the first step, search strings are specified such as

• digi * AND (workplace OR “knowledge work”) AND (mobil * OR individu * OR agile *)
• (company OR “organization”) AND (taylor * OR agil * OR digi *) AND (“transformation” OR “framework”)

These are entered into the various databases and you can see how many results have been found. For example, search string 2 currently delivers 1,169 results. Finally, all abstracts were examined and pre-sorted for consideration. Now comes the reduction .
In this case, I examined 97 articles more closely after reviewing the abstracts. The study can be found here, by the way . After a closer examination of the content, 13 primary sources remained as relevant papers for my research, which I used for the conception of my study.
This means that I took a closer look at all 97 posts and rated them according to their relevance. Enclosed is a large selection of relevant academic databases. I then used these 13 sources as part of the Clustering classified in 4 categories (workplace, agile methods, NewWork and Activity Based Working).
Reading tip: Book scientific reading

• EBSCO (ASC, BSC, EconLIT)
• ScienceDirect
• Emerald Web of Science
• ACM
• AISel
• EconBiz
• IEEE
• ProQuest
• Springer link

Excursus: what is academic?

The supervisor must have told you to use academic literature. But what is academic? Of the VHB-JOURQUAL3 is a ranking of economically relevant journals based on the judgments of the VHB members. The VHB4 should also come soon.
Over 1,100 members of the VHB have made a total of 64,113 reviews of magazines in the last few months. Of the 934 journals that were up for review, 651 journals exceeded the threshold of 25 reviews and received a rating. These are divided as follows:

• 22 outstanding and globally leading scientific journals in the field of business administration (A + = 3.4%),
• 72 leading academic business journals (A = 11.1%),
• 217 important and respected scientific business journals (B = 33.3%),
• 273 recognized academic business journals (C = 41.9%) and
• 59 scientific business journals (D = 9.1%).

Alternative: backword and forward search

In addition, there is the possibility not only to examine the results of the database but also to do a forward and backword search. I oriented myself to Webster and Watson (2002). Backward search is defined as the search for relevant literature from the cited sources of the article in question. Forward search is defined as searching for literature that cites this article. In concrete terms, that means: Look who is quoting the author and who is quoting the author.
The difference in the method is that, for example, you only search through the A + journals of business information systems and then recursively identify further papers from these.

Literature evaluation

In the analysis, all papers are sorted and best described by year or category. You start first with the content analysis and then with the presentation (writing) of the literature.
Reading tip: Literature search in 7 steps

There is more than one content analysis

Overall, I am familiar with four different elements of content analysis. These are:

• Structuring content analysis (Mayring 2000)
• Summary content analysis (Mayring 2000)
• Explicit content analysis (Mayring 2000)
• Concept matrix (Webster and Watson 2002)

The structuring content analysis identifies existing content and sorts it into categories based on a defined procedure. This type is very suitable if you have a fairly broad and complex subject.
example : Take leadership, for example. There are various debates about agile or virtual leadership. You will also find professional and disciplinary guidance. So it’s a very open discussion. You therefore divide the literature into the categories mentioned and describe the relevant content in each category. Example is the Study by Lindner et al. (2018).
The summary content analysis reduces the text material to such an extent that essential content is captured and a clear short text is created. This type is suitable if you have a fairly straightforward and linear topic or if it is a topic that is constantly being discussed in new contexts. For example, the term innovation, which in the 90s was more of a mechanical product and is now researching more digital services. Example is the Study by Lindner et al. (2017).
example : The aim is to present the debate about the research topic from the first mention of the examined context. The last few years can be briefly summarized here, e.g. computers at workplaces have been around since 1985 and we have not examined them until then. Then from around 2000 onwards there are numerous publications on this and these are summarized in the debate about the workplace IT. Now at the end of the analysis (last 2-3 years) the current opinions are presented more broadly. Example: In the IT workplace, research diverges. Some research into home office workplaces, others into flex desks and third into ergonomics in the workplace and so on.
The goal of the Explicit content analysis is to identify additional information (background information) on the research topic in order to achieve a higher level of understanding. I think this is used more in the natural sciences and I only mention it for the sake of completeness.
example : While you previously reduced the literature and limited it to the essential content, the goal now is to describe targeted content in great detail. I have never experienced this directly, but I could imagine the following: You are investigating the influence of the introduction of agile frameworks. Now you could do a very detailed analysis of, for example, two selected frameworks (Holacracy and LeSS). However, I have never seen such an analysis in economics or business informatics. The example can also be wrong, but I haven’t found anything better on Google either. If you have a study or example for me – I’m very welcome!
The concept matrix is the original method of Webster and Watson (2002). The two authors recommend using concepts to explain a research area. Based on the concepts of a subject area, it is checked which work pursues which concepts.
example : You want to investigate the introduction of agility and organize the literature according to research methodology. For example, you can find Case studies and expert interviews and find that there are hardly any quantitative surveys. You can also structure the literature according to the theory used. For example, look which change model an author used when introducing agility (Kotter, Rogers, …).

Presentation of the literature

Regardless of which of the four types of content analysis you choose: You have to present the selected literature, i.e. write it down. After the reduction, you have read a number of sources in full and evaluated them in the form of your chosen type of content analysis.
Now you represent source by source. The important thing is that there is no continuous text that mixes up the sources. One source after another comes. For each source answer the following questions:

• What was the author’s goal / context?
• How did the author research?
• What are the most important results in terms of my research question?

To make this clearer for you, I’ll show you a small example based on three sources on the subject of “efficiency of agile teams”.
example : O’Connor and Kelly (2012) interviewed the agile teams of 300 SMEs in the food sector in Ireland. The most important results are that, according to the SME managers surveyed, agile teams show increased employee and customer satisfaction and work speed. In 2017, Srivastava and Jain interviewed 75 Scrum Masters from India online with the same focus. The most important results are that agile teams bring higher project successes and customer satisfaction with them. The study by Lindner and Leyh (2019) provides a further perspective. In a group discussion with 12 SME decision-makers from Germany, the authors conclude that complex projects such as process digitization require greater autonomy in the execution of work and exploratory procedures, which is given by agile methods and leads to greater success.
You will notice that I have always named the authors and the research goal. Then I presented the methodology (e.g. interviews with 300 agile teams from SMEs in Ireland) as well as the most important results for the research question. You pack source to source according to this scheme.
Tip: don’t forget yours Cleanly limit methodology.
Tip: “Help! I can’t find any literature!”
I often receive emails asking me the following: I am writing about topic X and cannot find any literature . Do you have any tips? In 99% of the cases I also send literature back. However, this is not to your advantage. The reason for this is that you have to state in your thesis: Why did you use this literature. An answer like: If Mr. Lindner sent me or came by chance at Google, your supervisor will probably not be very happy.
For this reason I would like to help you how to find literature. For example, a student wrote to me who was investigating Scrum in production. So build yourself a search string that contains all the relevant words as well as synonyms: Scrum AND (Manufacturing OR Production OR Industry) and search Google Scholar first. Then also with the other databases, which I have listed above. With this search string I found some papers on Scrum in production on the first page.
Reading tip: I can’t find any literature!

“But I still can’t find anything!”

You followed my steps and still can’t find anything? Then it could be due to different points. You should rethink your topic and possibly change something together with the supervisor.

• Your topic is too new and there is no literature yet
• Your topic is not relevant in the academy, it is purely a practical topic
• You write for a company and the topic is company-specific
• Your topic will be explored in a different context

Reading tip: Search literature for specific contexts
For almost any reason, you have no choice but to turn the subject or pursue the Grounded Theory below. However, you should first try to turn your topic around by thinking outside the box. Perhaps your topic will be explored from a different perspective. For example, I would change the topic of the student (Scrum in production) by examining the influence of digitization on agility in production. There are already numerous sources and the Scrum point of view can then be derived from the data. In this way, research starts with the current discussion and the original focus can still be retained.
Reading tip: Go through the topic without literature

Alternative: “Grounded Theory”

If you still want to go through with the topic because your practice partner pays for it or you simply love the topic, then of course you can. Simply generate information yourself by starting with interviews or collecting case studies yourself. Thus, you are not building on a literature analysis, but on empirical data. So you start out on the green field without literature. I have already supervised such a master’s thesis. It’s a lot of work, so think twice about whether you want to go through with it. If you want to know more, I have written an extra article about it.
Reading tip: Grounded Theory

Conclusion: Tips on the literature analysis method

The method is very suitable for almost any research and focuses on structuring the current state of knowledge. In this way, a researcher can show that he is working on the current state of knowledge. The evaluation takes a long time, but is an important cornerstone of any research. My tips should give an initial orientation to the methodology. Definitely look too in my other book tips!
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Research methods

If you look in Wikipedia a research method is defined as follows: When Research methods In the sciences, processes and analysis techniques are used to clarify scientific questions. In the social sciences in particular, there is a distinction between quantitative Research methods and qualitative Research methods common.
Since a research design is nothing else than a meaningful “ stringing together “of research methods I would therefore like to give a brief overview of the various research methods. They are divided into qualitative and quantitative methods.
Reading tip: How do I classify my research scientifically?

Qualitative research

Qualitative research tries to capture a previously unknown problem. Here the researcher slowly “approaches” the object and, thanks to the openness of the method, leaves room for the discovery of new facts. Basically, the idea is to let the object of investigation, such as a project manager, have their own say and to listen a lot. Common methods are:

• Interviews
• Group discussion
• Qualitative content analysis
• observation
• ethnography

Quantitative research

This method is geared towards facts and figures and follows a fixed pattern. Methods and models for research must therefore be available at the beginning. For example, it must be clear how to measure employee satisfaction. Using analysis methods such as significance tests, regression analysis, etc., hypotheses are derived from the data.

• survey
• Data analysis
• Data collection
• Experiments

Interim conclusion and choice of method

Of course, research does not have to be one-sided, but can consist of a mixture of both methods. The choice of methods depends heavily on the research object and also on the preference. I myself have used three methods in research, which I have also mastered. It is not easy to be able to use every method perfectly, but to specialize in 2-3.
Tip: don’t forget yours Sensibly limit research design !
Reading tips :

• Literature analysis
• Group discussion
• Quantitative survey
• Book tips

Research design structure

The current illustration shows the abstract research design. You can see that on the basis of a research question, common methods are put together which should produce a research result. This is of course very abstract, which is why I would like to give two examples.

The next figure shows a research design for qualitative research. In this case, challenges of executives are examined and approaches to solving them are sought together with executives in a group discussion. This is then evaluated by creating a transcript from which specific statements are derived. In the design, I always recommend the purpose of conveying the goal of the method in the small boxes. In this way, on the one hand, the choice of research method is justified and the meaning of the combination is clear.

In contrast to the first graph, here is quantitative research. This examines the current relationship between employee satisfaction and home office. So I choose a survey in which I ask about the current job satisfaction on the one hand and how much and whether home office is operated. I can use regression analysis to examine the relationship between variables. For example, whether the number of home office days is related to job satisfaction.

Of course, the methods are not black and white. You are also welcome to combine qualitative and quantitative methods. So, for example, you can determine hypotheses from a survey, which you can use together in Expert interviews evaluate. There are actually no limits to the combination.
PS: You can download the template for the design here
PPS: A template with a topic can be found here.
Reading tip: Book tips on research

Special case: Grounded Theory

There are cases in which you are working on very complex topics that cannot be covered by literature. In such cases the grounded theory can help. The grounded theory is derived inductively through systematic collection and analysis of data related to the examination subject (Strauss and Corbin 1996, p. 7). Data collection, analysis and the emerging theory are arranged in a cycle that is run through several times as part of a research process (Bodendorf et al. 2010)

In this example, you are looking for a research question and, in the first step, ask test subjects about it. You then evaluate and analyze this information. Now plan the next step and interview test subjects again to deepen the research results. Read more in a separate article.
Reading tip: Grounded Theory

Conclusion: Tips for building research design

In this article I explained the difference between qualitative and quantitative research methods. A research design can be created from this. The methods can be combined in any way and it should be clear to the reader, for example by means of the small boxes below, why you are using which methods and what the result is. Finally, I’ll show you an example of such a mixed method. In the first step, data is collected here, which is then evaluated with project managers. The research question would be: Is a lack of software equipment a success factor for projects? There are certainly many other options and my tips should provide an initial orientation. Definitely look too in my other book tips!
By the way, feel free to include these images in your thesis. A short one Source reference enough. I am happy to share this with you. You can download the template here.

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Advantages of an expert interview

The purpose of the interview is to ask a selected expert about hypotheses. It is therefore not used to get an overview of a topic, but to evaluate specific points of the literature analysis. So it’s exploratory because you never know what kind of knowledge will be gained. The expert interview therefore has its strength in In contrast to the survey, in unstructured and open questions. To Group discussion it is differentiated by the fact that it is a dialogue between two people.

Differentiation from journalistic interviews

An expert interview means: asking someone about their knowledge. In contrast to the journalistic interview, the interviewer has a factual and less public interest. The approach is constructive. One would like to query the expert’s knowledge neutrally and not “put statements in his mouth”. So it’s about technical statements and a neutral view. Also ask real experts and not provocateurs such as some book authors. So it makes little sense to ask the author of a bachelor thesis on HR: “Why HR is to be asked in the end”. He is certainly not very neutral and wants to provoke.
Reading tip: Book to Expert interview

Different types of expert interviews

There are several types of interviews that I would like to briefly introduce:

• Structured interview
• Unstructured interview
• Semi-structured interview
• Narrative interview
• Problem-centered interview

On structured interview is like a questionnaire with fixed answers such as yes / no or information such as sales: 1-3 million. , 3-5 million, …. – It requires questions to be asked very precisely. The aim of the questionnaire is to ask as many people as possible identical questions in order to compare the results.
It is the opposite unstructured interview. Here it is better to ask 3-5 experts. The questions are very open, for example, what do you think of agility? How do you find the trend of digitization? You can also go into depth here on specific topics. Such an interview requires a quick grasp of the subject and experience and is recommended if little is known about the topic.
If you want to combine the best of both worlds, it’s worth it semi-structured interview . You define some of the questions beforehand and then ask 3-5 open questions. In general, the semi-structured interview is the most common and very flexible. I recommend 4-5 closed and 3-4 open questions for the bachelor thesis. One also likes to say guided interview, but this is a sub-form of the semi-structured interview. Here the focus is on reasonably formulated questions and frequent deviations from the questionnaire.
Another special form is that narrative interview . The narrative interview is like a narrative and focuses on a person’s story and subjective experiences. It helps especially with case studies and observations as well as with a high level of practical experience (participation in the action through narration). It is highly subjective, however. An example is a story about the first agile project.
The problem-centered interview serves to record the experiences and subjective perceptions of an expert. You commit yourself to a problem and the expert tells his experience on the topic quite freely. It is much more structured than the narrative interview, since a specific problem is brought into focus, e.g. the experience of failure in projects. So it’s not about the project history but only about the part of the defeat.
It is important that you briefly explain the type of interview and also give a brief explanation in the thesis. In each paragraph I have mentioned some advantages that you can use as a justification.

Selecting and finding the experts

I always recommend asking at least 3 and preferably 5 experts. It must be precisely justified in the work why you have chosen exactly these people. It is not enough to say that you know them or that they happened to be standing around at the bus stop.
Your experts should therefore be precisely defined. Depending on the research question, it must be justified whether this person needs long professional or management experience or whether he has to be a young professional. An example would be when interviewing the application process, it may make sense to interview young professionals. Or in a survey on workplace equipment, professional experience is irrelevant. It is therefore important to check the following dimensions, among others:

• Certain age or generation?
• Do you need some professional experience?
• Manager or employee?
• Medium-sized companies, SMEs or corporations?
• Industry important or not?
• Certain competence required (e.g. Scrum)

The experts can be easily found on Xing. The premium search can be used to search for “I offer” and the experts can be contacted. One or the other expert can also be found through groups. Incidentally, this also works with LinkedIn. Furthermore, questions can be asked in the private environment (parents, friends, …). It also makes sense to simply write to the authors of specialist articles that you can find in the literature analysis and ask for an interview.
Tip: Write politely in the e-mail: why you chose the expert, how long it will take, what it is about and three suggested dates.

Content of the expert interview

The exact content of the questions depends of course on your research question. However, you should precisely conceptualize the nature of the question. As a rule, you have put forward hypotheses that you want to check. In a quantitative survey, you try to substantiate these theses with concrete figures. In the qualitative expert interview, however, you want to understand the theses better. Examples of theses are:

• From a team size of 12 people, the Kanban method is better suited than Scrum.
• In SMEs, Kanban is more efficient than Scrum because of the small process landscape.

You derive one question for each hypothesis. You want to know: Do you agree with this thesis and why? You can also support the theses with open questions and thus provide background information on the theses, e.g. “What is your opinion on Kanban?” In a thesis, 5-10 questions are usually sufficient.
Reading tip: Prepare theses

Conducting the expert interview

It is best to do it in person, otherwise by phone or Skype. You have to prepare a questionnaire with 5-15 questions. You go through this one by one and take notes or, better still, record the interview. It can make sense to set up a data protection agreement for this. Don’t forget to introduce yourself briefly before the interview. You can choose whether or not to send the questionnaire beforehand. Often spontaneous answers are better or most experts are very busy and don’t look at them anyway.
Tip: don’t forget yours Cleanly limit methodology.

How many people should I interview?

This is a good question, and in general, the more you ask, the more meaningful the results. My tip is to ask yourself after every interview: How significantly have the results changed since the last interview? For example, if the 5th participant tells you that agile methods in IT are great for digitization, then you can slowly stop asking even more experts this question.
To do this, add the following sentence to your work: 5 participants were interviewed. To Wilde and Hess (2006) the saturation criterion of a research method is reached if, after a certain number of participants, no significant new knowledge has been gained after an iteration. After evaluating the interview results, no significant new findings could be identified in the last 2 iterations.
Overall, however, I can say as a guideline that 5-10 people were often interviewed in my bachelor thesis.

Evaluation of the expert interview

The first step is to type in the interview and smooth the language. You can also express the content in bullet points or shorter sentences. However, this is usually decided by your supervisor. Otherwise the minutes are attached and are similar to the interviews that you can find in newspapers.
In the evaluations, first indicate question 1, for example, which equipment you would like at the workplace. Then present the answers: Example: Experts a and b agree that they want a smartphone. Expert C wants to go there a tablet. This is how you systematically go through the questions.
Reading tip: Book on qualitative content analysis

Data protection and consent

When you interview the experts, share this sensitive information. It is important that you point out what data you are using. You can also sign a privacy policy. You can find numerous templates on Google. Also let us know whether the interview is anonymous or not. Interview minutes or transcripts should also be approved beforehand.

Conclusion: tips for expert interviews

The method was very well suited for a lot of research and focuses on surveys on current knowledge. The preparation and evaluation takes a long time, which is why the interviews have to be properly prepared and planned. My tips should give an initial orientation to the methodology. Definitely look too in my other book tips!
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What is the Grounded Theory?

To this end, Bodendorf et al. (2010): The grounded theory is derived inductively through systematic collection and analysis of data related to the research object (Strauss and Corbin 1996, p. 7). Data collection, analysis and the emerging theory are arranged in a cycle that is run through several times as part of a research process. The following figure shows the control loop.

By and large, it means that you choose test subjects, question them, evaluate the whole thing and plan how to proceed. The real thing that is difficult to understand about grounded theory is the evaluation, i.e. the coding. There are 3 ways to do this:

• Open coding
• The axial coding
• Selective coding

With open coding, the data is analyzed in small pieces by being broken down into units of meaning and thus transferred to a first level of abstraction. This is useful when you have absolutely no plan on how to structure your research. With axial coding you have a research scheme as a basis, which already provides categories. Check these and develop them further. A framework such as Porter’s Five Forces or something similar is usually suitable here. With selective coding, you already have categories and want to subdivide them as a goal. For example: workplace bullying to active and passive bullying.

When do I use the Grounded Theory?

The Grounded Theory takes some time and is really very complicated. It requires perseverance and a lot of motivation from the researcher. So really only use this for your work if you are really up for it and if you really want to drive the topic and there is no literature.
Book tip: Grounded Theory

Example of grounded theory

I did not apply the Grounded Theory myself, but supervised a master’s thesis. Depending on the practice partner, the bimodal IT should be researched. Unfortunately, at this point in time there was no other literature besides the Gartner paper and one of the only journal papers. So we decided to choose the Grounded Theory.
Tip: don’t forget yours Cleanly limit methodology.
In the first step, the student then carried out 5 interviews in the company. It should be said that the practice partner was a very large corporation and therefore the interview partner resource was virtually infinitely available.
In the first step the question was asked: What do you understand by bimodal IT? We evaluated and discussed this together. Now, in the second step, you asked: What use cases do you associate with bimodal IT in your company?
After we also evaluated this, we went in a third cycle with another 5 interviews. Since digital transformation was constantly being talked about in the second cycle, we decided to ask in the third step: What does bimodal IT have to do with digital transformation? This can be continued indefinitely, but three cycles were enough for a master’s thesis. So my master’s student used the following cycle:

• Problem-centered interview
• Open coding
• Qualitative content analysis

In summary, it is therefore important that data is collected and evaluated in every step. The next step is only planned after each step has been completed. I recommend 3-5 interviews per step.
Reading tip: Book suggestions for theses

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Advantages and pilot test

The advantage is that a high mass can be achieved quickly. The links to the questionnaire can be distributed specifically to already known participants and recommendations in their networks. In contrast to direct methods such as telephone interviews, the layout and design of the questionnaire is very important, as the researcher cannot provide explanations (Porst 2014). For example, a question can be misinterpreted. For this reason, my questionnaires were always tested with 5 pilot people, who then sent direct feedback to the research team.

Define target group

Every survey has a specific target group, which you should define. On the one hand you should limit the professional group and on the other hand justify in the thesis why you are questioning them. It also shows whether you should conduct the survey online or offline. For example, I wanted to interview disciplinary managers because I wanted to investigate leadership behavior in virtual teams. That was perfectly possible online. In another study on the digital workplace, my target group was small businesses. Most of them could hardly be reached via e-mail or the Internet, which is why we asked offline. So define and justify precisely the target group before the survey.
Tip: don’t forget yours Cleanly limit methodology.

Formulation of the questions

The exact content of the questions depends of course on your research question. However, you should precisely conceptualize the nature of the question. You derive a variable (measured variable) for each question. This can be, for example, turnover of the respondents, team size, preferred agile method, type of company or much more. The important thing is: every question creates a variable. You can then generate confirmed hypotheses from the variables. If you already have hypotheses in advance of your work, the questions should of course be adapted to the hypotheses.
If not, you can derive theses from your survey, for example, from a team size of 12 people, the interviewed managers prefer Kanban or managers from SMEs prefer Kanban and corporations prefer Scrum. The wording is based on the selected evaluation method. I’ll tell you something about this below. In a thesis, 5-10 questions are usually sufficient.
Reading tip: Prepare theses

Excursus: online vs. offline

There are two possible types of survey: online and offline. You can print out the survey and offline carry out. This has the advantage that you can reach participants whom you would otherwise not reach and that you can follow the distribution very closely. For example, a questionnaire can be distributed specifically to managers or project managers. For example, I wanted to interview exactly the same companies in a study that my co-author interviewed in 2016. We have therefore distributed the printed questionnaires specifically to them. Nobody else should take the survey. Limitation: Of course you can also protect the survey online with access codes, but this is never 100% secure.
In the Online survey you can reach a high mass very quickly, but you can hardly control how the link to the survey is distributed. Participants can also pass this on. You should therefore formulate an introductory question. In my survey of executives, for example, the initial question I asked was what number of employees the respondent currently leads. If the answer was: no guidance, the questionnaire broke off immediately. This is how you avoid wrong answers. Someone who does not lead can hardly say what managers think. In the same way, only project managers should answer a survey among project managers.

Construction and process

My online questionnaires are divided into small, thematically separated blocks and care is taken that, in addition to common answer types such as drop menus, lists, checkboxes, radio buttons, etc., there are not too many questions on one page, as too many questions can reduce the research participants’ concentration (Kuckartz et al. 2009) or an information overload for too many different topic blocks can occur for the participants. The questionnaire was therefore designed to last 15 minutes, which also turned out to be an acceptable length of time in the pilot tests.
I always schedule the surveys to last 4 weeks and have a minimum of 60 valid answers. The data is then exported from the questionnaire software and first evaluated for validity in a tool. After sorting out unsatisfied questionnaires, they are evaluated using SPSS so that the data can be visualized.
Reading tip: Book by Kuckhartz

How many people should I interview?

This is a good question, and in general, the more you ask, the more meaningful the results. My tip is that you look at the results and calculate: How significantly have the results changed since the last 5 participants surveyed. If there is no change, the results can be assumed to be stable.
To do this, add the following sentence to your work: 25 participants were interviewed. To Wilde and Hess (2006) the saturation criterion of a research method is reached if, after a certain number of participants, no significant new knowledge has been gained after an iteration. After measuring the last 5 participants, no significant new changes could be achieved in the survey.
In short: If I ask more questions, the result will hardly change, e.g. 80% prefer agile over traditional IT methods. Even if you interview 40 other participants, things should change under normal circumstances.
Overall, however, I can say as a guideline that 15-30 people were interviewed in my bachelor thesis.

quantitative survey – evaluation

After completing the simple evaluation, the data is exported from the questionnaire software. I have always examined the difference between SMEs and corporations. So I specifically wanted to find out whether, for example, special knowledge would arise for leadership in SMEs. In the SPSS analysis tool, the data is separated into the data for SMEs and non-SMEs and the responses per group are examined for a significant difference. In the check for statistical deviations, the previously specified, customary significance level of α = 5% is used (Kuckartz et al. 2013). It is derived whether a survey variable applies uniformly to all companies or whether there is a specific deviation for SMEs.

Reading tip: Book for evaluation

Four possibilities for evaluation

In addition to many other options, there are a total of four known options for evaluating large amounts of data. Of course, there are also many other methods such as difference analysis, con-joint analysis, neural networks and discriminant analysis. However, I will only describe these four procedures, as I see them most often in theses at my university.

Significance analysis

As already explained, it is described how a hypothesis deviates from the null hypothesis. Like in my example: SME and NON_KMU. This is worthwhile as soon as you interview 2 or more groups. There are differences between SMEs and NON_SMUs, for example in the number of home office days, etc. This makes sense as soon as you want to compare something or work out differences or as I specifically examine SMEs.

Regression analysis

Here you are trying to map the dependency of one independent variable on another. For example, a CEO would like to know how much money he has to invest in advertising in order for something to change in the company, such as sales figures or new customers. To do this, they create so-called scatter diagrams and see whether there is a connection between the selected variable and the others. In contrast to the next method, here the cause and effect is examined in detail. This enables predictions, which is useful for research questions when you want to make predictions.

Correlation Analysis

Here you look at the relationship between 2 variables. So whether these are related. For example, you can say whether employee satisfaction and days in the home office can be related. Does this increase or decrease with increased home office days? This makes sense when research examines an influence on something. In contrast to regression, no cause and effect is determined here, but only how similar two variables are. So here you are examining the connection in the here and now.
Reading tip: Study by me with correlation analysis

Cluster analysis

With a cluster analysis one can determine similarities in large groups and summarize them. Customer group analyzes are a great example. A marketing manager looks at which customer groups are shopping in his online shop. In a thesis, you summarize similar answers in groups. The result is then groups such as who founds startups. With the help of the cluster analysis it is possible to divide the data into groups.

Conclusion: Tips on the quantitative survey method

The method was very well suited for my research and focuses on data collection. I have used the method offline as well as online. The preparation and evaluation takes a long time, which is why every survey must be properly prepared and planned. It is also important to interview at least 50 people, since the significance tests in particular only make sense from 30 people, i.e. a total of 60 participants. My tips should give an initial orientation to the methodology. Definitely look too in my other book tips!
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The group discussion method

In a group discussion in particular, results can be obtained more quickly than in individual interviews and, in particular, the exchange of views between the participants can produce a broader understanding of the arguments. The goal of this method is also in collective decision-making. To better reach a consensus, I wrote in a paper by Prifiti et al. (2017) found a subspecies, i.e. the focus group discussion, as a method. For the evaluation, a so-called focus group consisting of equally valued and strictly selected experts is used. For this reason, the participants were specifically chosen from SMEs or corporations or, as in the 4th Roundtable, only managers from the project management area.
Alireza et al. (2017) see the interactions of the participants as an important source of information acquisition in addition to the evaluation of the language. Long periods of silence, conspicuous gestures (nodding, frowning, etc.), anger, sarcasm and conspicuous consent can also provide insights in terms of the group discussion. Thus, in addition to the audio recording, a log was also kept, but only via gestures.
Reading tip: Method book

Invitation of the participants

Since I chose a focus group, I specifically selected the participants from SMEs or corporations. I have also invited a representative from the union to represent the employee side. The participants were specifically invited on the basis of existing contacts or recommendations from my contacts and a Xing premium search. In addition to a managerial position, the test persons had to have been with the current company for at least 3 years in order to be able to make well-founded statements about the company.
Reading tip: Dealing with Xing

Moderation of the group discussion

The questions in the focus group discussion were asked very openly in order to be able to derive assumptions for the research question from the dialogues. The following questions are exemplary for moderating the discussion: What does good leadership mean to you , What do you associate with digital leadership and What challenges do you currently see for yourself as a manager?
Often I have always prepared theses such as: “Maintaining controllability and control is one of the main tasks of managers in agile teams.” I have provided each thesis with a timebox. For example, we talked about leadership for 60 minutes. We had 15 minutes per thesis. So only the most important points were mentioned and the dialogue could not drift away.
There are two types of moderation in total. The decision is based on the fact whether you have a special focus topic such as soft kills in the management of virtual teams (structured) or a broader topic such as leadership in the age of digitization (self-evident).

• Structured form: narrow topic limitation, elaborated questions and leading moderator,
• Self-running form: hardly any topic limitation, hardly any guidelines, cautious moderation.

Reading tip: Moderation tips

Content of the group discussion

The exact content of the questions depends of course on your research question. However, you should precisely conceptualize the nature of the question. As a rule, you have put forward hypotheses that you want to check. In a quantitative survey, you try to substantiate these theses with concrete figures. In the qualitative group discussion, however, you want to understand the theses better. Examples of theses are:

• From a team size of 12 people, the Kanban method is better suited than Scrum.
• In SMEs, Kanban is more efficient than Scrum because of the small process landscape.

You derive one question for each hypothesis. You want to know: Do you agree with this thesis and why? You can also support the theses with open questions and thus provide background information on the theses, e.g. “What is your opinion on Kanban?” In a thesis, 5-10 questions are usually sufficient. It is important that you always reach a consensus, i.e. a statement to which the group agrees by being silent, nodding or verbally (“exactly”, “true”, …).
Reading tip: Prepare theses

Evaluation of the group discussion

The roundtable was scheduled for two hours and was completely transcribed using the “f4” software. Basically you listen to each other minute by minute and with the help of a pedal you can pause and continue recording. So you write in sync with the recording. For a 4h roundtable I need an average of 18-20h to type it out. I am following the rules of Kuckartz et al. Proceeded in 2008, which allows a slight smoothing of the language. Thus, for example, filler words like “uh” o3 are smoothed out strong slip of the tongue.
On the one hand, drivers and on the other hand assumptions of the participants were derived from the dialogues and it was checked whether these confirm the theoretical literature. The group discussion was clustered for this purpose. Individual arguments were ignored, only arguments which were confirmed or rejected by at least four people by consensus. In particular, the statements with a focus on the core topics were taken into account for the clustering. Topics with very little discussion time were neglected.
Reading tip: Book for evaluation

Conclusion: Tips for group discussions

The method was very well suited for my research and focuses on consensus opinions. I applied the method more concretely through the focus group and thus got consensus opinions more easily. The preparation and evaluation takes a long time, which is why every group discussion must be properly prepared and planned. My tips should give an initial orientation to the methodology. Definitely look too in my other book tips!
Tip: don’t forget yours Cleanly limit methodology.
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