Writing a Research Proposal – PART 1

by RC 23:48 1 comments

(Taken from http://tradesensation.com/)

"RIGHT PROPOSAL GETS YOU HITCHED WITH!!..WRONG PROPOSAL GETS YOU REJECTED"...rc

It’s the first step anyone takes or faces when entering the universe of research. I have chosen Two words in my first sentence which are ‘takes’ and ‘faces’, one who has willingly chosen the path of research, whom has done some background work, knows the expectations, while the latter are those who took the plunge, its sort of an acid test. The third category will be the ones whom have done their graduate final projects diligently, they will also be in the former definition. Irrelevant which field research is being done, science or non-science, the rituals and oblations are the same.

Getting into the proposal, what are the main sections’ which needs to be written?:

i.                     Introduction/Overview/Background

ii.                   Problem Statement

iii.                  Objectives

iv.                 Scope

v.                   Methodology

If you have noticed, buffet protocols are never adhered, majority rush in, start piling up and building mountains on their plate. When congregated back on their table, you will see another mini-buffet arranged in the table itself, and rest is history. In the end food is wasted, missed some small crucial items, stuffed with their favourite food and rest becomes waste. WHY I chose this example, because the same happens in early stage of research and proposal writing. Lucky ones with a good articulate supervisor will be guided well, but in research it is believed the boat must be sailed alone, thus another common buffet debacle waiting to happen.

HOW do we start the Introduction section? Let’s pick a common layman discussion topic for this purpose. Hmmm  lets write a research proposal on a ‘A Study On Choosing An Appropriate Hobby For Either A Blue Or White Collar Working Class Person’. The topic is neither biased to technical nor arts, it’s a daily common social interactive scene in a human’s ecosystem. Getting now to writing, how are we going to start this?, lets zoom into the topic, WHATS the most general and common substance. We can either start with ‘HOBBY’ or ‘WORKING CLASS’, if its hobby than, the first paragraph should start describing about hobbies. Hobbies ranging from kids to adults, past times to serious ones and there some which has become a business. THIS is what I call roaming around from an aerial perspective, the first phase of narrative should just be on the superficial depth of hobby. If we are going to start with “WORKING CLASS’, than a general description of working class and its definition. Once this is done, segregation and explanation between both the white and blue collar will come in.

My advice would be, start with the ‘HOBBY’ and later explain about the ‘WORKING CLASS’, you guys can ask now WHY such?. Hmmmm…it takes time you see to put in the right words to explain so it will be easier to comprehend and digest. It goes like this, a sales man has to explain all his products than lets the customer choose accordingly within their specified constraints. So in this case we have to explain ‘HOBBY’, than get into ‘WORKING CLASS’, and the latter also has the embedded tip in extracting the “PROBLEM STATEMENT”. In this aspect, the flow of narrative is smooth……to be continued (tight schedule...will be back)