The rapid structured literature review as a research strategy

Abstract

A diversity of sources of literature encompassed by the management disciplines appears to result in a growing need for a systematic methodology to map the territory of management theory. As such, when scoping out a study, structured literature review (SLR) can be considered as a means by which any critical, central literature might be considered. However, there is little guidance, or evidence, of this being undertaken for the purposes of small scale projects such as undergraduate or masters’ dissertations. This paper reports four case studies of master’s degree students following management programmes of undertaking a structured literature review (SLR) and the issues and problems they had to encounter during their journey. The findings from the case studies suggest that in terms of time to complete and the volume of output required in terms of word count, Tranfield, et al’s approach to SLRs, whilst suited to doctoral level research is not appropriate generally when dealing with undergraduate and masters research projects. Therefore, this paper provides accounts of the experiences of four students who undertook SLR for their undergraduate or master’s degree dissertation. The paper identifies that these students had to deal with a new set of conceptual problems relating to this “unorthodox” approach to a postgraduate research dissertation in coming to terms with new paradigms of enquiry that are not normally taught as part of a traditional research methods course. This was despite gaining a greater depth of insight into the subject area through a more rigorous and structured manner. The paper presents alternative remedies by way of a rapid structured literature review (RSLR) model. This would appear to be more appropriate to the conducting of small scale literature based research projects when used with undergraduate and master’s degree students than SLR identified for other research activities.