IS 7021: The Philosophy of Science & Qualitative Research Methods

 

Dr. Mary C. Lacity

233 Computer Center Building

(314) 516-6127 (work)

(314) 516-6827 (fax)

mailto:mary.lacity@umsl.edu

http:/www.umsl.edu/~lacity

 

Sample Qualitative Research Design Proposal

 

Note: This is extracted from Lacity, M., Iyer, V., and Rudramuniyaiah, P. (2008), “Turnover Intentions of Indian IS Professionals,” Information Systems Frontiers, Special Issue on Outsourcing of IT Services, Vol. 10, 2, pp. 225-241.

 

Title of Project:  Turnover Intentions Among Indian IS Professionals

 

Reason Why Research is Relevant: One of the major challenges facing the Indian IT services industry is the high rate of turnover among Indian IS professionals.  Turnover rates have been reported as high as 100% annually.  The lowest rates we found reported on turnover in Indian software services was 30% (Mitchell, 2004).  No matter which turnover number one considers—the low estimate of 30% or the high estimate of 100%, there is no denying that turnover is a major issue to Indian suppliers and their global clients. Supplier staff turnover delays the clients’ projects, reduces quality, and increases costs (Jiang and Klein, 2002).  Clearly, both clients and suppliers share the objective of high retention of the supplier’s most qualified workers. Despite the serious problem, no academic studies have studied the determinants of turnover among Indian IS professionals.  We aim to contribute to the literature by modeling Turnover Intentions of Indian IS professionals.

 

Proposed Research Method: We plan to interviews 10 Indian IS Professionals currently working in  India.  Our aim is to interview people with 2-7 years work experience because this experience level has the highest reported turnover rates in India.  Interviews will be done by phone.  We will use our personal contacts in several Indian firms to find people to interview.

 

Theoretical Background:

Because we do not know a priori which antecedents of Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment from the study of Western IS professionals might be the most relevant to Indian IS professionals, we sought a general but comprehensive model that would allow the Indian IS professionals to suggest the most important antecedents. We selected the Job Investment Model initially proposed by Kelley and Thibaut (1978) and applied to Turnover Intentions by Farrell and Rusbult (1981) and Van Dam (2005).  This model is comprehensive because it includes job factors (Job Satisfaction and Job Attraction), organizational factors (Organizational Commitment and Investment in Current Organization), and environmental factors (Organizational Alternatives). This model also appealed to us because it generically defines the determinants of Job Satisfaction as the individual’s overall subjective estimation of job rewards versus job costs.  Thus, we would ask Indian IS Professionals generic questions about the rewards and costs of the current job without limiting the scope to a few specific constructs.  We were very interested in specifically including Organizational Alternatives because the vibrant job market in India is likely to be a driving force behind high turnover. Our initial research model is thus found below and the constructs are defined in Table 1.

 

Initial Research Model

 

 

CONSTRUCT

DEFINITION USED FOR THE INTERVIEWS

REFERENCES

Turnover Intention

The extent to which an employee plans to leave the organization

Igbaria and Greenhaus, 1992; Kim et al., 1996; Ruby, 2002; Sujdak 2002

Job Satisfaction

The extent to which an employee likes his/her current job

Spector, 1996; Carsten and Spector, 1987

Job Attraction

The employee’s overall perception of job rewards versus job costs

Kelley and Thibault, 1978; Farrell and Rusbult, 1981; Rusbult and Farrell, 1983; Van Dam, 2005.

Organizational Commitment

The extent to which an employee feels emotionally attached to his/her organization

Meyer and Allen,1997; Joseph et al., 2007

Organizational Alternatives

The employee’s perceived availability of equal or better jobs in other organizations

Mitchell et al., 2001; Van Dam, 2005

Investment in Current Organization

The non-portable resources invested in or by the employee

Farrell and Rusbult, 1981; Cole and Bruch, 2006

Work Exhaustion

The extent to which an employee feels long term stress and burnout

Ahuja et al., 2007; Moore, 2000

 

References:

 

Ahuja, M., Chudoba, K., Kacmar, C., McKnight, D., and George, J/, “IT Road Warriors: Balancing Work-Family Conflict, Job Autonomy, and Work Overload to Mitigate Turnover Intentions, MIS Quarterly, March 2007, Vol. 31, 1,  pp. 1-17.

 

Carsten, J., and Spector, P., “Unemployment, Job Satisfaction, and Employee Turnover: A Meta-analytic test of the Munchinsky Model,” Journal of Applied Psychology,” Vol. 73, 3, 1987, pp. 374-381.

 

Cole, M., and Bruch, H., “Organizational Identity Strength, Identification, and Commitment and their Relationships to Turnover Intention: Does Organizational Hierarchy Matter?” Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. 27, 2006, pp. 586-605.

 

Farrell, D., and Rusbult, C., “Exchange Variables as Predictors of Job Satisfaction, Job Commitment, and Turnover: The Impact of Rewards, Costs, Alternatives, and Investments,” Organizational Behavior and Human Performance, Vol.28, 1, August 1981,  pp. 78-96.

 

Igbaria, M., and Greenhaus, J., “Determinants of MIS Employees’ Turnover Intentions: A Structural Equation Model, Communications of the ACM, Vol. 35, 2, 1992, pp. 34-49.

 

Jiang, J. and Klein, G., “A Discrepancy Model of Information Systems Personnel Turnover,” Journal of Management Information Systems, Vol. 19, 2, Fall 2002, pp. 249-272.

 

Joseph, D., Ng, K., Koh, C., and Ang, S., “Turnover of IT Professionals: A Narrative Review, Meta-Analytic Structural Equation Modeling, and Model Development,” MIS Quarterly, Vol. 31,3, 2007, pp. 1-31.

 

Kelly, H. and Thibaut, J., Interpersonal relations: A theory of Interdependence, New York. Wiley, 1978.

 

Kim., S., Price, J., Mueller, C., and Watson, T., “The Determination of Career Intent Among Physicians at a US Air Force Hospital, Human Relations, Vol 49, 1996, pp. 947-976.

 

Meyer, J., and Allen, N. Commitment in the Workplace: Theory, Research, and Application, Sage Publications, California, 1997.

 

Mitchell, T., Holtom, B., Lee, T., Sablynski, C., and Erez, M., “Why People Stay: Using Job Embeddedness to Predict Voluntary Turnover, Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 44, 6, 2001, pp. 1102-1121.

 

Mitchell, A., “Offshore Labor Markets Impact IT Outsourcing,” Technewsworld, September 28, 2004 available online at http://www.technewsworld.com/story/36949.html.

 

Moore, J.E., "One Road to Turnover: An Examination of Work Exhaustion in Technology Professionals," MIS Quarterly, Vol. 24, No. 1, 2000, pp. 141-148.

 

Ruby, A., "Internal Teacher Turnover in Urban Middle School Reform," Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk, Vol. 7, 4, 2002, pp. 379-406. 

 

Rusbult, C, and Farrell, D., “A Longitudinal Test of the Investment Model: The Impact on Job Satisfaction, Job Commitment, and Turnover Variations in Rewards, Costs, Alternatives, and Investments,” Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 68, 3, 1983, pp. 429-438.

 

Spector, P.,  Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Research and Practice, Wiley, New York, 1996.

 

Spector, P., Job Satisfaction: Application, Assessment, Causes and Consequences,” Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks, California, 1997.

 

Sujdak, E., An Investigation of the Correlation of Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, Perceived Job Opportunity, Organizational Communications, Job Search Behavior, and the Intent to Turnover in IT Professionals, Unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, Wayne Huizenga School of Business and Entrepreneurship, Nova Southeastern University, 2002.

 

Van Dam, K., “Employee attitudes toward job changes: An application and extension of Rusbult and Farrell's investment model, “Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, Vol.78, 2, June 2005, pp. 253-273.