Presenting a PhD research proposal: A guide for commerce students

Abstract

This paper provides commerce PhD students with advice on how to structure research proposals. In particular, the paper addresses the question: How should a PhD candidate in entrepreneurship (or another commerce discipline) present a research proposal? The paper guides students through the various stages of proposal writing. Firstly, the fundamental aspects of business research and their implications on postgraduate research proposals are discussed. Secondly, the focus of the paper turns to presenting some common proposal evaluation criteria used. Thirdly, the structure and components of a proposal are explained and specific guidance on how to present each component of the proposal is provided. The paper concludes by discussing technical aspects of academic writing including language, references and plagiarism.

Keywords:

• business studies
• commerce
• entrepreneurship
• PhD
• postgraduate
• plagiarism
• proposal
• supervision

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 This paper is an extended version of the guide initially produced by the author for the mobile application, Postgraduate Thesis Supervisor, which is freely available on Google Play Store.

2 A phrase popularised in the movie Jerry McGuire. The phrase basically means that the pursuit of profit is the ultimate objective of any business or entrepreneurial endeavour.

3 In Microsoft Word^®, to start a new page, press ‘Ctrl’ + ‘Enter’.

4 For a complete discussion of the LRM, please see DRS Consultancy (2016).