Alternative Energy and Green Improvements Essay

Research Questions

The topic selected for this research is alternative energy and green improvements that are conducted by the business operations to improve their impact on the environment. The following are the three research questions that have been

1. What developments are being made in the market for using alternative energy for business operations?
2. Do green improvements in technology help reduce the impact of businesses on the environments?
3. What are the most popular alternative energy sources that are being targeted by businesses and the developing green technologies?

Selection of Primary Data Collection

In order to answer the above depicted research questions a combination of primary data collection techniques would need to be employed. A questionnaire based survey would be used to gather quantitative as well as qualitative information from the respondents in the market while interview based questions would be inquired from project managers that are involved in the alternative green energy projects.

1. The first research question pertaining to the developments being made in the market for using alternative energy for business operations can be targeted with interview based questions asked from project managers of such developmental projects.
2. The second research question pertaining to the green improvement in the technology that reduces the impact of the business on the environments can be targeted through the primary data collection technique of questionnaire based survey.
3. The third research question aimed at determining the most popular alternative energy resources being sought after by businesses can be targeted through the primary data collection technique of questionnaire based survey.

Strengths of Primary Data Collection Method

There are two main primary data collection techniques that have been selected for gathering data to analyze the information that can be used to answer the highlighted research questions. The strengths of the primary data collection through the use of interviews is that they are more specific and can target the issue at hand in a more direct manner. The respondent of the interview can be queried in extensively on the topic at and by keeping the interview questions open ended.

A range of questions can be answered and explored while the mannerisms, the facial expressions as well as the attitude of the respondents can also be used to determine the quality of their responses. The strengths of the survey based questionnaire is that they can target a large number of respondents, and both qualitative as well as quantitative respondents can be attained using the survey instrument. Moreover as the responses for the research questions 2 and 3 would require data to be gathered form numerous respondents while the responses can also take the form of qualitative as well quantitative information. As a result the survey based questionnaire using both open and closed ended questions is best suited for gathering data.

Weaknesses of Primary Data Collection Method

The weaknesses that exist in the selected primary data collection methods is that the interview method is applicable only where the respondent can be contacted for face to face questions and interviews. As a result those respondents who are unable to schedule meetings for the interview cannot be targeted.

Aside form this as the interview based method normally has only one respondent per interview, the number of respondents that can be targeted using the method is limited as increasing the number of respondents can increase the expense of the research. The weakness of the questionnaire based survey is that while it does target multiple respondents, the integrity of the answers provided by the respondents can not be ensured. For this as a result the triangulation questions can be employed to cross check and verify the answers provided by the respondents.

References

(2009), Strengths and Weaknesses of Electronic Surveys, Colorado State University. Web.

Davis, D., (2005), Business Research for Decision Making, 6^th Ed., University of Central Florida.

Davies, M., Conducting an Interview for Data Collection, The University of Melbourne. Web.

Owens, L.K., (2005), Introduction To Survey: Research Design. Web.