Using Qualitative Data to Learn About Customer Needs: Understanding Employer Desires When Designing an MBA Program

Abstract

When studying customer expectations, qualitative data can be as rich in information as quantitative data. In this article, the authors illustrate one way of using both qualitative and quantitative data to understand the needs and wants of customers. Specifically, they show the process by which the administrators and faculty of a business school learned about the needs and wants of their customers, namely, the employers of their MBA graduates, as part of an effort to redesign their MBA program. The authors explain how their inquiry was guided by the “customer-in” perspective, how they used the “voices into choices” approach to collect qualitative data, and how they supplemented this with quantitative data collected through surveys. In addition, the authors provide an example of how this information was translated into actionable goals and the steps taken to improve the MBA program. The methods illustrated in the article can help faculty of business schools as well as managers in obtaining information to improve any service.

• qualitative methods
• understanding customer needs
• verbal data

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Steven Hillmer

Steve Hillmer is a professor at the Business School at Kansas. His doctorate is from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research interests immediately after finishing his doctorate were in the area of time series analysis. He spent the 1979-1980 academic year at the U.S. Census Bureau modeling U.S. economic times series and modifying the seasonal adjustment methods that were first developed in his dissertation. Most of his research over the next several years was a result of his experiences in the analysis of data at the Census Bureau. In the late 1980s he became interested in the role statistics played in quality management and his intellectual interests shifted. He has published several papers on the theoretical foundations of W. E. Deming's principles of management. His current research interests related to statistics are involved in the use of statistics in applied problems. Hillmer can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].

Canan Kocabasoglu

Canan Kocabasoglu is an assistant professor in decision sciences at the School of Business, University of Kansas. She holds a doctorate in operations management from University at Buffalo, State University of New York. Her research interests are in collaboration in forward and reverse supply chains, competitive priorities, purchasing practices, buyer-seller relationships, and the implications of information technology on operations management. She has published in the Journal of Operations Management, OMEGA — The International Journal of Management Science, and the Journal of Supply Chain Management.