This chapter included six sections: (1) conceptual framework (2) research methods (3) research participants (4) data collection and analysis (5) validity and reliability (6) research procedures.
Conceptual Framework
The figure below describes the picture and process the study tries to find out. Through the input of the literature built the groundwork of the study. Conclude and find out the result by doing the process of interview.
Figure 3.1.Conceptual framework
Research Method
This study will conduct document analysis and face-to-face interview for this study. The researcher will choose interviewees to conduct pilot interview. After pilot interview, the researcher can find out the missing stuff and improve in the future study. Therefore, the study will increase the rate of successfully collect right and full information. Through document analysis it can help the researcher analyze and interpret data records which are relevant written material. The researcher will find document through public records on official website of iCAP. In order to get more information of requirements and relevant regulation the document analysis is necessary.
The consequence got from the method of literature review led to design the concept of research questions and interview questions.This study is an exploratory study. It is significant for relevant institutions to be reference materials so that relevant institution can save
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exploratory time. According to the significance of the study there is no strong relevant study.
Therefore, this study will find put benchmark cases and analyze them. Finally, this study will find out critical successful factors of implement iCAP requirements.
This study was an exploratory, qualitative study. The qualitative researches are based on exploratory, discovery and inductive logic. Find important scope among the data without do assumption before data collecting.
This study will adapt qualitative approach to find out relevant information and answers.
The qualitative research has specific strengths and is different from quantitative research. It can find out detail and rich information through interviews. Moreover, when asking questions, the interviewees will not limited by the questions. The researchers can find deeper information by using quantitative research.
This study will conduct direct interview to the participants. The interview process will comprehensively describe in data collection.
Research Participants Population
The competency-based course accreditation established by Workforce Development Agency in Taiwan for 3 years, from 2014 to date. The applicants chose form the list of official web site of iCAP with 44 passed cases. The researcher chose cases from the official website and searches the phone number of institutions or companies from website and called them by phone to ask if they agree to join the face-to-face interview. After their agreement, the researcher sent the draft of interview questions and makes sure the date to interview. In the seven applicants, there are there form government institutions and four from private company. For the other category of target interviewers, it was a little bit harder to find, because there is no open information on the official website. The researcher found the consultant name list on the official website of Workforce Development Agency. Consultants
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in this name may be potential interviewer in this study. The researcher called by calls to ask if they are reviewers of competency-based course accreditation. Then the researcher found two reviewers from that list. After the interview with reviewers, the researcher used snow-ball method asking reviewers recommend name list of reviewer to have interview. Finally, six interviews of reviewers were found, three of them are school professors and the other three are from practical firms. The reason why competency-based course accreditation would request them to be reviewer is because they have knowledge of course development, competency and knowledge of some particular industry.
Criteria of Participant Selection and Interviewees
The participants in two different dimension in this study selected the following criteria selection: (1) they had experienced of leading or involving whole process to fulfill the competency-based course accreditation and passed the accreditation; (2) since the competency-based course accreditation have been run for three years, the cases were reviewed is in big amount. The selection of reviewer was at least reviewed five cases of competency-based course accreditation.
Based on the criteria applications and reviewers were chosen. Details information were showed at Table 3.1. and Table 3.2. Applicants were named from letter A and reviewers named from letter B.
20 Table 3.1.
Information of Applicants
Interviewee Location Industry
Aa Taipei Education
Ab Taoyuan Hotel
Ac Taipei Education
Ad New Taipei City Medical Treatment
Ae Hsinchu Technology
Af Taipei Consultant
Ag Taipei Insurance
Table 3.2.
Information of Reviewers
Interviewee Profession Review Cases
Ba Professor More Than 10
Bb Professor More Than 10
Bc Professor More Than 10
Bd HR Profession More Than 5
Be Training Consultant More Than 5
Bf TrainingConsultant More Than 10
Bg HR Profession More Than 5
In order to make it more convenient to describe and make it clear to describe the
transcribe at the layer chapter, the researcher name the fake name for all the interviewers. the fake name were showed at Table 3.3.
21 Table 3.3.
Fake Name of Reviewers
Code Fake Name Code Fake Name
Aa Abby Ba Bob
Ab Alice Bb Ben
Ac Andy Bc Bill
Ad Alan Bd Bella
Ae Adam Be Bonnie
Af Alex Bf Betty
Ag Angus Bg Brown
Data Collection and Analysis Data Collection
This study conducted face-to-face 14 interviews in 4 weeks. The fourteen interviews were scheduled from May 30 to June 20 in 2016. The researcher interviewed participants based on interview questions. Before the interview, the researcher sent instructions to interviews describe about the time period and promise to keep confidential using code to represent participants when it mentioned in the study, data collected were only used in academic field. The interview process was speaking in Chinese and transcripts were typed down in Chinese. The transcripts were finished with the type-recorded which recorded when interviewed with consent. The researcher used oTranscribe as a helping tool to type down the transcripts and made it into Microsoft word file.
Instrument
The interview questions were designed followed by the founding of literature review and based on research questions. The interview questions were designed to explore the applicants'
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and reviewers' experience of the factors benefit of successfully passing the competency-based course accreditation.
A pilot study was conducted with two interviewees, one was reviewer and the other one was applicant. The pilot interview question for reviewer included seven questions showed in Appendix F; for the pilot interview question for applicant in eight showed in Appendix G.
After the interviews, the research found that the research questions needed to be revised. The questions cannot be too narrow; it should be wide enough to let interviewees to share more information. It was inappropriate to put the factors in the interview questions which led interview to answer in a narrow way. Second, it was inappropriate to out yes or no questions and only two choice questions. In this way, the information got from interviewees would be limited. The final interview questions were revised by collecting data from pilot study and showed in Appendix B and Appendix C.
Before the interviews the advice and guidance were consulted by expert, advisor professor and classmates who had experience of interview. The modified interview questions were validated by experts. The questions were translated from English to Chinese since the interviewees are all Taiwanese.
Procedure of Interview
This study will use phone call and e-mail to contact participants to make a reservation for face-to-face interview. Participants will receive the guideline and be introduced the content of the research before the face-to-face interview. The interview will be an hour-long oral, voice-recorded and hand-write-recorded interview. Doing both tape-recorded and hand-write-recorded together is to increase reliability. When interviewing the researcher need to build a relaxed atmosphere, which make it possible for interviewees to share freely about their opinions. After the interview, the data will be transcribed verbatim, and the transcribed verbatim will be sent back to interviewees to make sure if all context are right and if there is
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any misunderstanding. This behavior is to enhance the validity of this study.
Data Analysis
The researcher used five steps stage to analysis the data.
First, transcripts were typed in original language.
Second, after the transcripts were finished, the researcher coding with key word and key sentence in Chinese to avoid the translation-related difference in language. The research highlighted the keyword and key concept on the transcripts.
Third, the researcher reviewed the data a second time looking for potential patterns and found out the missing coding data.
Then, in forth stage, the researcher reviewed organized coding data, see figure 3.2, and categorized them. It was easier to identified data in cluster.
At the last step, coding data was translated into English. In order to remain its mean, the researcher took peer review together to translate, all of them were good at English and some of them graduated from English major.According to the transcripts, code it by sentence with coding numbers. Then, use the coding numbers to find out the keywords. Next step use keywords to categorize the data. This study used oTranscribe (http://otranscribe.com/) as a help tool to type down transcribe more efficiently. After typing down the entire transcript, the researcher read it carefully and checked if there is any mistake. After that, the researcher coded it and categorize down the same meaning in the transcript. The researcher compared differenttranscripts and clustered the same category. At the last step, the researcher identified the relevance meaning in the cluster and answered the research question.
24 Aaa01
The number of interview questions The category of interview questions The order of interviewee
Category of interviewee Figure 3.2.Coding category
With the interviewees’ permission of voice-recorded, the basic processes for data organize and analysis will conduct as the following steps:
1. Transcribing data into transcripts 2. Reading and revising transcript 3. Categorizing and coding the data 4. Comparing and inducing
5. Identifying the relevance and answering the research questions The following figure shows the category number of this study:
Validity and Reliability Validity
In validity, it refers to whether the information makes sense. Usually, the studies use the method of members review. The importance of validity in qualitative study refers to be plausible, trustworthy and defensible. To avoid the bias from researcher, it is important to do the interview process, procedure and analysis carefully. To ensure the validity, all of the interviewee will receive the transcripts and findings to make sure if they agree or not or there are any misunderstanding. When coding the data, the researcher highlighted the meaning first and categorized it. After the process of categorize, the researcher clustered it.The data collection from pilot interview can answer the research propose. all the interview questions
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were perfectly answered by the pilot interviewees.After pilot interview, most of questions were changed and redesigned which answered the research propose.
Reliability
To ensure the reliability, this study use both tape-recorded and hand-write-recorded method to organize the information and also provide audit trail to do the data coding.
In addition, the researcher use the same procedure to collect, categorize and analyze in order to reduce the biases that may happen in the study.When it mentioned to the coding part the researcher had two members for peer review of coding.Theresearchergave members all transcribe and described the purpose of collecting the data and the meaning. Then, asked them to identify the same meaning of the main factor.After coding, the researcher and members discussed together. The researcher finally organized all the coding and compared it.
The result form three members include the researcher used average method to make the result.
Research Procedures
This study started from reviewing and searching for the relevant literature.Whole Process shows as Figure 3.3.After having previous analysis, the researcher conducted the research title as “Critical success factor of successfully pass the competency-based accreditation.”After determined the topic, the researcher collected the relevant literature form local and foreign databases. Due to the comprehensive realized of the study, the research framework was conducted. Before the interview, the researcher conducted the interview questions and discussed with advisor to ensure it is complete and effective. The study collects the practical data about critical success factors through the face-to-face interview. The analysis will organize according to the research questions. The final step is to conclude the finding which answered the research questions.
26 Figure 3.3. Research procedures
This study used in-depth interview method to collect data. By sharing information through the whole process of accreditation from participants and after finishing organized and coding data, the researcher found some important factors. The results were showed in the next chapter.
Identify the Research Topic
Conduct Literature Review
Develop Research Framework
Design Interview Questions
Interview
Analyze Data
Conclude Research Findings
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