ABSTRACT
Few researchers involved in research in the business or marketing areas spend much time thinking about research methods or methodology. Fewer still show any concern with, or interest in, the philosophical bases for their knowledge claims. To an outsider this state of affairs might seem strange. After all, such researchers would, if asked what they were doing, make claims such as ‘we seek to gain understanding’ or ‘we are pushing back the frontiers of knowledge’. It is even stranger that we, who research what managers do, and often criticise them for making decisions based on few or dubious data, do not apply the same criteria to our own activities.
