Question

I have a literature review to do for BUSI 740 and I do not know how to do this.

The instructions state:

You will research and write a literature review on a topic relevant to your course. You will have approximately 7 modules/weeks to research and write the paper. At the beginning of Module/Week 2, your instructor will provide a list of approved topics for this assignment. Be sure to check the Announcement page and your email for the approved topics. Simply select a topic, and then begin working on the project. Do not “recycle” any work from any previous courses you have taken. Your research paper will be a comprehensive thematic review of the scholarly literature related to your topic.

I picked the topic of: Customer Satisfaction and the Supply Chain.

Please help.

Thank you.

Answer 1

A literature review process involves 4 steps:

1. Formulating a problem: What are you planning to study? In other words - What's your research topic and what are its component issues?
2. Literature Search: Finding material that's relevant to your research topic
3. Data Analysis: Deciding which of the various literature sources you've searched, contributes significantly to your research.
4. Evaluation & Interpretation: Summarising your findings and conclusions in the form of a discussion.

You must:

• Determine the word limit for your review in advance (unless specified by your teacher). Literature reviews could be endless otherwise!
  • Problem formulation should ideally constitute around 10% of the whole. Literature search and data analysis together should make up for 65-70% (as it's the main part)...and the remaining 20-25% should be a summary of your findings and recommendations.
• Choose your topic wisely. Avoid general - broad issued topics..
• Use evidences when advancing a point
• Use scholarly sources - mainly from academic journals, published work, scholarly databases, well-regarded organisations, governments websites and other tangible sources
• Maintain your own voice while presenting others’ ideas
• Avoid using unnecessary jargon or slang.
• Avoid plagiarism

Now, your topic is - Customer Satisfaction and the Supply Chain.

The first step is to formulate a problem statement.

How about you pick an aspect of supply chain management and study its impact on customer satisfaction?

Like-

How about studying the feature of "On-time" delivery and its impact on customer satisfaction?

OR

How about studying the reduction in set-up timing and its impact on customer satisfaction?

OR

The impact on customer satisfaction from automated warehouse activities

OR

How customer satisfaction has increased/decreased over the years from changes in supply chain management processes... etc.

The second step is to search for literature

Search among reputable academic journals, published work, scholarly databases, well-regarded organisations, governments websites etc. and list some 12-15 good sources. Selectively read for your chosen research topic and gain a perspective. Put it down on paper as a summary per source - and what you think of what's been stated and why. Remember to follow a pattern - either theme-wise or period-wise... For example - there are various themes in customer satisfaction - things like - quality, dependability, efficiency, service etc. Study each aspect under a separate sub-heading. If you're doing a time-series analysis e.g. how delivery times have reduced over the years and raised satisfaction- then cover these under separate time periods - eras, decades, years, months and so on...as the case may be.

The third step is to analyse the data

Building upon the "what you think and why" - progress towards some critical evaluation. Try and interconnect topics and scholars for brownie points. Show where scholars have disagreed or criticised each other and give your opinion on the discord. Provide evidence for and against these arguments. Also provide a conclusion basing your decision on what you think are the most important factors and justify yourself.

The last step is to briefly discuss your findings

Summarise your review and your overall opinion. Windup by giving some recommendations for future research [Note: This is basically where you differentiate yourself from the various scholars. Your opinion is going to be a mixed bag or something new maybe - a point/position that no one's ever thought of or researched sufficiently...]