Enhancing learning support for Masters dissertation students in management and business.

Abstract

This paper reports on a project that has formed the pilot phase of a development initiative that aims to progressively enhance the learning support available to students completing postgraduate dissertations in management and business. The origins of the project lie in reflection on conversations with students, and with colleagues at Wolverhampton and elsewhere, regarding their experience of undertaking, or supervising, research at Masters level. There seemed to be quite a widespread perception of a developing gap between students’ general appreciation of the characteristics of a Masters dissertation, and their grasp of the generic process by which a specific, researchable project is formulated, implemented and written-up within an appropriate timescale. The evidence of a subsequent review of literature leant weight to the view that the rate at which methodological debate is evolving, particularly in the multidisciplinary domain of management and business, is resulting in some mixed and confusing messages on the characteristics and expectations of Masters dissertations being received by postgraduate students.