Joseph KK Ho's work diary

A case study on social class: Person A: my lifestyle is lower class; my income is upper class; I tell people I am a middle class.. Person B: in this case, could I call you an All-family class?

When formulating a meaningful dissertation project proposal on the subject of Project Management using Case Study Research Method , a student has to accept the current  problem situation that he/she is facing. I provide two examples: Situation 1: A e-learning project has been introduced for a year in an organization; there is a need to review the project with a view to recommending future enhancement in e-learning practice. Suggestion: A dissertation project with the following objectives: To conduct a post-implementation review of the e-learning project of ABC Ltd. To formulate a feasible and desirable e-learning process improvement project with a concrete project plan to ABC Ltd, with the existing organizational e-learning platform Situation 2: An organization is considering to introducing a corporate compliance system to process all corporate requests on establishing various forms of incorporation, e.g. formation of wholly owned subsidiaries or joint venture...

Contemporary ISD lecture agenda, Feb 2013: Introduction to Systems Analysis and Design The Systems development Life Cycle Systems Development Methodologies Project Team Roles and SKills Introduction to OO Systems Analysis and Design with UML OO Systems: classes and objects; methods and messages; encapsulation, information hiding; inheritance; polymorphism and dynamic binding The Unified Modeling Language OO Systems Analysis and Design: Use-case driven Architecture centric Iterative and incremental The Unified Process A minimalist approach An introduction to soft systems methodology; also re: http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2012/07/basic-steps-to-construct-rich-picture.html ; also refer to https://www.facebook.com/#!/media/set/?set=a.10150261845082090.378645.713727089&type=3 ; some rich picture diagrams examples from students: https://www.facebook.com/josephho33/photos#!/media/set/?set=a.10150196289562090.347036.713727089&type=3 Class exercise: build a ...

Dissertation proposal is not just a proposal or a promise to read some identified articles or to study a research method with a view to come up with a research design later. A related issue: For Independent Study students about multiple regression analysis: If you intend to use multiple regression analysis in your report, you need to provide a specific mulitple regression formula in your proposal, ie. Y = a + b1X1 + b2x2... etc ; then you need to label what is Y , X1, X2...etc.... E.g. Y can be property price index, X1 can be GDP, X2 can be effective interest rate...etc...   Do not just state that you intend to use multiple regression analysis. To write a proposal, a student needs to do preliminary literature review and needs to study Research Methods so as to come up with a preliminary Research Design in your propsal document. A proposal needs to provide some preliminary review to indicate the academic value of the study, the relevant concepts and methods invo...

Some Independent Study students do not know the difference between Management Theories and Research Methods . I think a satisfactory answer can be found via reading Research Methods textbooks. I want to provide a brief idea here: Examples of Management Theories are motivation theories, CAPM, agency theory, and Porter's Five Force Model; students should be able to identify a few relevant management theories to be applied in their reports via the literature review effort. Research Methods are about data gathering methods (e.g. primary data gathering via interviews, observations) and data analysis methods (e.g. qualitative data analysis with Linguistic methods and quantitative data analysis with multiple regression analysis). The Management Theories, especially in the form of certain management technology implementation methodologies, drive the research methods used and the overall research design. If students really want to improve their knowledge on this topic, they need t...

Quite a number of Independent Study (IS) proposals sent to me only offer to use secondary data and do not specifically mention a proper/ decent quantitative data analysis technique, e.g. multiple regression analysis or a chi-squared test. Many students do not understand what is literature review nor what is research methods.  I highly recommend IS students to pick up a book on Research Methods to do some serious reading; if students have no intent ion to gather primary data, they should at least offer a decent quantitative analysis on secondary data, e.g. multiple regression analysis. If there is no primary data and no proper data analysis skill offered, the whole proposal quality is very low. If the literature review skill is also low; then quality of the proposal is very very very low... so low that the proposal can be rejected by the UK lecturer or that the report so produced will fail nor get a very marginal pass (if very very very lucky)!

The following list of resources is on Business Performance Measurement as a subject in Management Accounting : http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/business-performance-measurement.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/key-performance-measures-in-business.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/stakeholder-perspectives-in-business.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/a-critical-resource-perspective-of.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/integrated-performance-measurement-tools.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/relating-performance-measurement-and.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/a-contingency-theory-for-business.html

The following discussion agenda is on the subject of Business Analysis : Strategic Management Strategic position, strategic choice, strategic action, strategic development, strategic change Forcefield analysis Change management styles Harmon's process-strategy matrix: http://accalecturenotes.blogspot.hk/2011/02/what-is-processstrategy-matrix-for.html Forecasting Scenario analysis Linear regression, time series analysis, exponential smoothing Product Life cycle and related cost implications Cost efficiency in Strategic Management Marketing Mix, with special  reference to pricing strategy Business Process Change Business Process Re-engineering Business Process Outsourcing Software package selection Invitation to tender Information Technology Management Principles of e-business Barriers to ebusiness adoption Varieties of e-commerce: b2b, b2c, c2b, c2c, g2g, etc.. Disintermediation Types of intermediary e-Business models Internet, intranet and ext...

Some students have difficulty to understand the difference between research objectives and research questions . Let's start with an example: Your research topic can be: a study of the property market in Hong Kong Your research objective can be: to evaluate the impacts of property price movement to Hong Kong residents In order to meet your research objectives, you formulate the following research questions : Research Question 1: How does interest rate affect property price? Research Question 2: How does GDP affect property price? Research Question 3: How do Hong Kong residents feel about recent property price movement in Hong Kong Research Design: For Question 1 and Question 2: correlation analysis will be conducted based on secondary data gathered via the Internet. In this case: Interest rate (independent variable) -> property price (dependent variable); GDP (independent variable) -> property price (dependent variable). For Question 3: Interviews will be co...

The following list of resources is on the topic of Technological Innovation : http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/technological-innovation-basic-topics.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/innovation-and-economy-discussion-agenda.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/innovation-and-national-systems.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/innovation-research-discussion-agenda.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/innovation-and-corporate-r-discussion.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/innovation-and-market-discussion-agenda.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/innovation-and-product-development.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/innovation-and-strategy-discussion.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/technology-and-business-strategy.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/technology-invention-discussion-agenda.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2013/02/technology-systems-discussion-agenda.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk...

The following resources on Marketing are relevant for Marketing students doing dissertation projects : http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2012/01/basic-ideas-on-qualitative-market.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2012/01/example-of-quantitative-research-in.html http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2011/12/on-marketing-literature-in-journals.html Facebook forum on Marketing: https://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/282669242406/

The following resources are for the 2013 Feb Business Systems Analysis workshop: http://josephho33.blogspot.hk/2011/11/business-systems-analysis-and-design.html https://www.facebook.com/#!/media/set/?set=a.10150196289562090.347036.713727089&type=3 ES: SDLC SA roles: https://www.facebook.com/josephho33/photos#!/photo.php?fbid=10151449849092090&set=a.10150196289562090.347036.713727089&type=3&theater DFD: https://www.facebook.com/josephho33/photos#!/photo.php?fbid=10151450308017090&set=a.10150196289562090.347036.713727089&type=3&theater CASE tools: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer-aided_software_engineering ; fb notes: https://www.facebook.com/josephho33?ref=tn_tnmn#!/notes/joseph-kk-ho/contemporary-isd-notes-case-tools/10150585220212819 RAD - timeboxing: https://www.facebook.com/josephho33/photos#!/media/set/?set=a.10151465115937090.549087.713727089&type=3 RAD-JAD: https://www.facebook.com/josephho33/photos#!/media/set/?set=a.101514650983570...

From now on, GW students in business management/ marketing need to fill in the ethical approval form from the University; I will discuss it in Research Methods workshop Ethical Approval Form Business School Application for Ethical Approval for Taught Degrees June 2012 This form should be completed for any research involving primary data collection conducted by students on taught degrees of the Business School.   This procedure particularly aims to minimize ethical issues where the primary data involves human data and includes human beings and their records (such as medical, genetic, financial, personnel, criminal and test results including scholastic achievements).   Please note that no research may be conducted in the Business School where participants are children. A copy of this application will be retained by the School for up to 6 years.   The Business School will provide summary information to University’s Research Ethics Committee (UREC) and wil...