Orientation: how to choose between theory-oriented or practice-oriented research

and “solutions” i.e. ideas about what can be done about problems; and ■ discussions with practitioners who deal with the chosen topic in practice to identify what knowledge they need in order to act. Would there be interest in research aiming at providing these practitioners with knowledge they need? It is helpful to think about different possible outcomes of a theory- oriented or practice-oriented study, and to judge how valuable specific outcomes would be. A useful tool is to write at least two different fictional press releases about the study results before even having started to design the research, one of them reporting the expected “positive” results and the other reporting very different “negative” results. Would any of these results make any difference to theory or to practice? Is it desirable to get results that contribute to the development of a theory that, in the event, after many more tests, might be “general- izable” to many more situations theory-oriented research, or is it more desirable to contribute to the knowledge of practitioners who will ideally be able to act upon your results practice-oriented research?

3.2 Principles of theory-oriented research

Theory-oriented research aims at contributing to the development of a theory. Although a theory might be used as a basis for advice in prac- tice, what matters only in theory-oriented research is whether the study’s results contribute to one or more steps in the theory develop- ment process, as will be discussed in 3.2.2. Before that we first discuss the characteristics of theory 3.2.1.

3.2.1 Theory

A theory is a set of propositions about an object of study. Each proposition in the theory consists of concepts and specifications of relations between concepts. Such relations are assumed to be true for the object of study defined in the theory and they can, therefore, be seen as predictions of what will happen in instances of the object of study under certain cir- cumstances. The set of instances to which the predictions apply is called the domain i.e. the field to which the predictions can be “gen- eralized”. Therefore, a theory has four characteristics that need to be defined precisely: the object of study, the concepts, the propositions relations between concepts, and the domain. The object of study is the stable characteristic in the theory. The object of study can be very different things, such as activities, processes, events, persons, groups, organizations. If, for example, a theory is developed about “critical success factors of innovation projects”, then innovation projects is the object of study. This object of study is the characteristic of the theory that is “stable” – other characteristics are not stable: the values of the concepts vary hence “variables” when operationalized in a specific study, and the expected relations between concepts, and the domain to which they apply, can change over time because of new insights. The concepts of the theory are the variable characteristics of the object of study. The aspect described by a concept can be absent or present, more or less existing, etc. For instance, if the research topic is “critical success factors of innovation projects” the factors that presumably con- tribute to success are variable characteristics. In each instance of the object of study, these factors can be present or absent or present to a certain extent. Also, success is a variable characteristic of the object of study that can be present or absent or present to a certain extent in an instance of the object of study i.e. in one specific innovation project. Concepts need to be defined precisely to allow for the measurement of their value in instances of the object of study. When we measure the value of a concept in such instances, we call it a variable. For instance, if we deal with a theory of critical success factors of innovation projects, the concept “success” needs to be defined such that it is clear what counts as “success” and what does not. Also, the different “factors” need to be defined so that we can measure the extent to which each factor is present. Most often, defining concepts involves making assumptions about their meaning. For example, when defining the “success” of innovation projects, it must be decided whether this is an aspect that “belongs” to the innovation project itself, or that it is an evaluation attributed to it by stakeholders and, thus, “belonging” to them. Such a decision deter- mines how “success” could be measured in actual instances, e.g. as a return on investment which could be calculated from financial data or as a personal or institutional judgement. Appendix 1 “Measurement” contains a more detailed discussion on measurement. The propositions of a theory formulate causal relations between the variable characteristics concepts of the object of study. A causal rela- tion is a relation between two variable characteristics A and B of an object of study in which a value of A or its change permits or results in a value of B or in its change. A proposition does not only state that there is a causal relation between two concepts but also what type of causal relation is meant. For instance, a success factor could be “neces- sary” for success, or it could be “sufficient” for success, or the relation