RESEARCH BRIEF: What is survey research?

By Edgar Arias, earias@vt.edu

Survey research is an observational study mode in the social sciences that gathers information from respondents through the application of a questionnaire, with the purpose of making inferences about the population respondents belong to (Babbie, 2010).  This method is usually preferred when the unit of analysis is the individual person; however, it is also widely used for studies that involve groups or organizations, such as markets or companies.  Surveys are observational rather than experimental because their intent is to capture information without influencing the unit of analysis.  Survey research is an effective way to collect data because the observation can be carried out indirectly – the researcher does not need to be physically with the respondents, instead, it may be self-administered.  Additionally, only a sample of the total population can be observed to make inferences about the whole, as long as the sample is randomly selected.  It is considered as a quantitative method: its purpose is to make inferences about the population the respondents belong to.  Here, the respondent is the individual person that provides data by answering the survey questionnaire.

picture survey research
Figure 1 – Relationship between Purpose of Research and Appropriate Statistics

Goals of Research Survey

Survey researchers may have one or multiple goals to conduct a study.  According to the nature of these goals, studies can be classified as exploratory, descriptive, explanatory or a combination of these.  Exploratory studies are conducted when the researcher is interested in increasing his understanding of the relevance of a topic to a given population, or to assess the feasibility of conducting a larger study.  Descriptive surveys are designed to describe the characteristics and behaviors of the population.  Explanatory surveys area carried out when there is an interest in understanding why things happen (Vaske, 2008).

In order to achieve this objectives, survey researchers generally need to complete following phases:

  1. Specifying the research questions and hypothesis
  2. Design the survey and the implementation plan (i.e. survey methodology)
  3. Collect and analyze data

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RESEARCH BRIEF: Understanding the foundational causes of project failure in the cellulosic biofuel industry

By Jeremy Withers, email: jbuilditbigger@gmail.com
 

Cellulosic biofuel for transportation and energy is a renewable pathway to cleaner fuels and ultimately to independence from global fossil fuels.  This pathway is becoming more focused, but with increasing obstacles like: government regulations, supply shortages, and commercial scaling of technology. Thus, leading many companies to search for funding and stakeholder control of technology, the “valley of death (Alexander and Gordon 2009)” for many evolving companies striving to achieve profitable results as fast as possible. Since 2007, 60 biofuel projects have been developed and are currently in one of the three phases of commercialization, below in figure 1. Of those projects only 12% (7) projects have been able to move into late stage commercialization

Figure 1. Front End Loading for potential commercialization (FEL) (Wesner, B. Design for sustainability)
Figure 1. Front End Loading for potential commercialization (FEL) (Wesner, B. Design for sustainability)

The remaining 88% (53) are in the following stages:  38% (23) are stalled in planning, 35% (13) have been cancelled and (8) shut down, and 15% (9) under construction.   Thus, the goal of this research is to gain an in-depth understanding of the causes for the challenges faced by those companies in the cellulosic biofuel industry.

The seven cellulosic biofuel companies in operation currently have a total capital investment of $2.128 billion. Of the seven companies in operation, five technologies have emerged.  Additionally, with so many different technologies still in play the small private investors are backing away, even though the quantity and viability of the cellulosic technology is continually being improved. Essentially, the continuing uncertainty of the existing investment risk has pulled the plug on the many financial private outlets willing to lend money.

The added cost of less external investment has left the cellulosic biofuel industry to bolster a considerably larger part of the financial risk, as well as, having to fund aligning themselves within the cellulosic industry and within the biofuel market as a whole to secure the remaining funds.

References

 

RESEARCH BRIEF: Lean Product Development

by Sevtap Erdogan, email  serdogan@vt.edu

The implementation of Lean Product Development is based on applying lean principles to be able to gain more economic benefits. The goal is to focus on decreasing process variability, maintaining flow and reducing waste (Achieving Lean 2004).

Lean Product Development has been incorporated into organizations with the motivation of maintaining higher value and quality, shorten lead times, and lower costs This last one motivator was was not successful enough when conducting or implementing traditional product development process (Leon et al, 2011).

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Lean Product Development (Anonymous 2004)

Ward (2007) states that to provide better understanding in implementing lean product processes, manufacturers need to seek for the importance and the purpose of product development, product itself, good development system and value in product development.

Commonly, Lean is mostly found proper for manufacturing process related with material supply, component production, and delivery of products. Nevertheless, besides manufacturing operations lean thinking can also be applied to Lean Product Development (LPD) (Morgan and Liker, 2006). The difference between LPD and traditional product development is specifically the underlying of the numerous benefits by using the LPD’s own flow over the whole process (Karlsson and Ahlstrom, 1996). Supplier involvement is one technique used in the LPD that targets the incorporation of suppliers at the beginning of the process other than in some parts of the project. Simultaneous engineering (or concurrent engineering) term is used in this process and it can be defined in a simple was as driving in parallel different activities (Karlsson and Ahlstrom, 1996).

Most of companies have adjusted state-gate process in order to deliver value to all stakeholders by decreasing waste and smoothing the value stream in product development processes. There are two notable benefits with regard to this concept, (a)better design activities improvement with the adjustment of tools in lean and (b) integration with lean among marketing research, conceptual design, product design, test and verification, and ramp-up product (Wang et al, 2011).

References

  • Anonymous. 2004. Achieving lean product development. Strategic Direction, 20(7/8), 33.
  • Karlsson, C., & Åhlström, P. (1996). The difficult path to lean product development. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 13(4), 283-295.
  • León, H.,C.Mart, & Farris, J. A. (2011). Lean product development research current state and future directions. Engineering Management Journal, 23(1), 29-51
  • Morgan, J. M., & Liker, J. K. (2006). The Toyota product development system. New York: Productivity press.
  • Wang, L., Ming, X. G., Kong, F. B., Li, D., & Wang, P. P. (2011). Focus on implementation: a framework for lean product development. Journal of Manufacturing Technology Management, 23(1), 4-24.
  • Ward, A. C. (2007). Lean product and process development. Lean Enterprise Institute.

4th Innovation-based Manufacturing Workshop and Student Innovation Competition

Sponsored by:

VCE-logo 1     CIbM logo

Goal:

The purpose of this workshop is to inspire and motivate students, research faculty, and local entreprenours into developing their ideas into successful commercial products.

Key Values of Workshop:

  •  Updates on new opportunities to support the development of new businesses and innovations into successful commercial products
  • Case study presentations by national-recognized innovators on how they developed their business ideas into commercial products.
  • Update on current research and academic topics on innovation-based manufacturing.
  • Virginia Tech students will present selected business ideas as part of the student innovation competition.

Date

November 7, 2013. 8:30 am-2:00 pm.

Tentative agenda:

  • 8:00 am-8:15 am. Welcome and overview.
  • 8:15 am-9:00 am. Current research in innovation-based manufacturing topics. Dr. Elisabeth Reynolds, MIT Industrial Performance Center.
  • 9:00 am-9:45 am. State support programs for innovation-based manufacturing. Mr. Robert Brooke. SBIR/STTR
  • 9:45 am-10:00 am. Break
  • 10:00 am-10:45 am. Case study 1: Chad Schlaepfer. AMP Americas.
  • 10:45 am-11:30 am. Case study 2. Robert Sturges. Arc Ablation, Virginia Tech.
  • 11:30 am-12:00 pm. Round panel discussion, all speakers.
  • 12:00-1:00 pm. Lunch
  • 1:00 pm-2:00 pm. Student Innovation Competition. See guidelines here.
  • 2:00 pm- 2:10 pm. Closing comments and adjourn

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RESEARCH BRIEF: Geographic Information Systems (GIS) on Marketing Mix

by Melissa Brenes-Bastos, mbrenes@vt.edu

By combining conventional marketing techniques with geospatial methods enables users to picture the spatial distribution of data in maps -such as the distribution process, the market diverse- also complementing it with statistical graphs and diagrams will link marketing and GIS. (Musyoka, Mutyauvy, Kiema, Karanja,  & Diriba, 2007).

The main focus of this research is on GIS application for the marketing mix (4 P’s), which refers to the main element on a marketing strategic plan. Hess, Rubin & West (2004) research and present some ways in which GIS can support the activities of the four elements of the marketing mix.

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