Is Tesco Supermarket online sales platform a good return on investment in terms of sustaining sales during the Covid 19 pandemic?

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Is Tesco Supermarket online sales platform a good return on investment in terms of sustaining sales during the Covid 19 pandemic? 

Runninghead: RESEARCH PROPOSAL

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RESEARCH PROPOSAL 6

Research proposal: What is the Impact of Product

and Process Innovation in TESLA Organization Performance

Name:

Institution:

Research Proposal: What is the Impact of Product and Process Innovation in TESLA Organization Performance

Background of the Research

Tesla is among the most popularly known firms for its innovation and technology. Its missions are mostly futuristic, involving inventions of new ways to solve the problems that the world is currently facing. Being a successful organization, its performance is closely linked to product and process innovation. By understanding how the process and product innovation in Tesla relates to its performance, it would be able for other firms investing in the tech field to apply the same principles and enhance their performance. This would mean that the number of tech firms failing during their initial stages would dramatically go down if they apply what would be learned from Tesla.

The research to investigate how Tesla’s performance is impacted by its product and process innovation was selected because of how the company is focused on making new inventions or enhancing the existing ones, to solve some of the problems that humanity has been facing or likely to face in the future if something is done. For example, to overcome the problem of global warming, Tesla has been in the frontline in reducing the emission of green house gases through the manufacture of electric cars and solar systems to replace the fossil fules (Cornell & Damodaran,

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012). Electric cars are also likely to solve the problem posed by the possibility of having the petroleum reserves exhausted in the future.

The current research is necessary for unveiling how innovation is linked to organizational performance. As aforementioned, the findings of the research would benefit other tech-based firms that have their missions closely related to that of Tesla. The organizational performance of many establishments fails because of the lack of innovative products and innovations or the inability to decrease costs (Bartman, 2015). The findings of the study would also add to the existing body of knowledge regarding organizational performance and innovation. They will show how Tesla has managed to operate in different fields ranging from engineering to the fashion industry in different nations without failing (Knights, 2017). The findings will also inform the startups on how best they can prevent organizational failure during their initial stages.

Scope of the Research

Problem Statement

The problem that necessitated the current research is how the lack of a clear understanding of how the product and process innovation in Tesla impacts its organizational performance. Many firms are limited within a given industry and yet some still fail at their initial stages due to either lack of appropriate marketing strategies or lack of enough resources. However, Tesla has been successful in most of its endeavors and the world has been welcoming its inventions wholeheartedly due to their potential to solve current and future problems. Without a proper understanding of how Tesla has managed this, it may prove difficult for similar firms to solve innovation challenges that may compromise their performance. Organizational performance and innovation are inseparable and without knowing how they influence each other, it would remain difficult to unravel how Tesla has managed to remain successful despite having been taking highly unpredictable investments. The research question guiding the proposed study would be: – How do the product and process innovation in Tesla impact its organizational performance?

Aims

The proposed research aims to achieve the following:-

i. Determining how product and process innovation in Tesla impacts its organizational Performance.

ii. Determining how Tesla deals with hurdles associated with product and process innovation to retain its performance high.

Objectives

The proposed research will be guided by the following objectives:-

i. Determining how Tesla promotes an innovative culture in the organization.

ii. Determining the role played by Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk and other leaders in the company in ensuring that the innovative organizational goals remain aligned to its futuristic mission.

iii. Determining the role of communication in Tesla in promoting its performance.

Proposed Methodology

The proposed research will follow a qualitative approach involving conducting interviews to help determine how Tesla’s product and process innovation impacts its organizational performance. This means that the data to be collected would be non-numerical (Adams, Khan, & Raeside, 201

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). Interviews are preferred because they would provide first-hand information regarding how the products and process innovation in Tesla relates to its organizational performance (Bryman & Bell, 2015). The selection of the participants would be random to ensure that all executive officials of the selected firms and the employees of the company’s branch in Silicon Valley, San Fransico have equal chances of participating.

The interviews will be conducted in two phases with the first one involving interviewing five leaders from Tesla through phone and employees through online questionnaires. The interviewing of the organizational leaders is preferred as it would provide information regarding the company that the interviewees may not be aware of. The phone conversations with the randomly selected executive members of the selected branches would be recorded for use during the analysis. The conversation would be recorded ensures that the information is not distorted or lost (Ghauri & Grønhaug, 2020). All the Tesla leaders must be from the United States, specifically from its branches in Nevada, D.C Washington New York, east coast USA, and San Francisco. The interview with each leader would go for fifteen minutes.

Thirty employees will be interviewed and all will come from Silicon Valley, San Francisco. They will be issued with online questionnaires with open-ended questions which they would also be required to submit online. The participants would be allowed to leave questions that they would feel uncomfortable with them (Denscobe, 2017). The open-ended questionnaires would be preferred because they would allow the interviewee to express their views thoroughly and thus providing rich information (Gill, Johnson, & Clark, 2010). The questionnaires would consist of twelve items to ensure that they do not consume a lot of time.

Various ethical issues would be considered during data collection. First, all the participants will be issued with an informed consent form, explaining the purpose of the study and the risks involved (Brewerton, & Millward, 2010). Participation in the study would be voluntary and they would be allowed to quit at any stage without giving any explanation. To ensure the privacy of the participants, the questionnaires will be coded to ensure that they do not capture the actual names of the participants. They would also be advised not to include any personal information in the questionnaires (Robson, & McCartan, 2016). Privacy and safety of the participants are among the most important ethical considerations in studies involving human beings.

A thematic analysis would be used to analyze the data. The analysis would involve comparing the responses from different participants and interpreting their patterns (Silvermann, 2011). The data from the organizational leaders would be analyzed separately from that obtained from the employees. Within each category of data, responses with similar information will be grouped to develop themes. The themes developed would help answer the research question or show the need to conduct further research.

Proposed Plan of Work

Figure (i) Gantt chart showing the Plan of Work

References

Adams, J., Khan, H. T. A., & Raeside, R. (2014). Research methods for business and social science students. New Delhi: Sage Publishers.

Bartman, T., 2015. Why Tesla Won’t Be Able to Scale. Harvard Business Review, 2-5.

Brewerton, P., & Millward, L. (2010). Organizational research methods: A guide for students and researchers. Thousand Oaks: SAGE.

Bryman, A., & Bell, E. (2015). Business research methods.New York: Oxford University Press.

Cornell, B., & Damodaran, A. C. (2012). Tesla: Anatomy of a Run-Up. Practical Applications, 43-46. Crane, D. A. (2014). Tesla and The Car dealers’ lobby. Regulation, 10-14.

Denscombe, M. (2017). The Good Research Guide: For small-scale social research projects. London: Open University Press.

Ghauri, P. N., & Grønhaug, K. (2020). Research methods in business studies: A practical guide. Cambridge: Cambridge University.

Gill, J., Johnson, P., & Clark, M. (2010). Research methods for managers.London: SAGE Publications Ltd.

Knights, C. (2017). Tesla planning up to three additional gigafactories. Corporate Knights, 16.

Robson, C., & McCartan, K. (2016). Real-world research: A resource for users of social research methods in applied settings. Hoboken: Wiley.

Silverman, D. (2011). Interpreting qualitative data: Methods for analyzing talk, text, and interaction. London: Sage Publication.

Stringham, E. P., Miller, J. K., & Clark, J. (2015). Overcoming Barriers to Entry in an Established Industry: TESLA MOTORS.

https://doi.org/10.1525/cmr.2015.57.4.85