DB9803 is where the DBA project's analysis plan meets real data — requiring students to execute the planned analysis rigorously and report exactly what was found, including results that complicate or don't support the original expectations.
Executing the analysis and reporting results objectively
DB9803 requires students to complete their full data analysis according to the plan finalized in DB9802, and to write a results chapter that presents findings clearly and completely — including non-significant statistical results or unexpected qualitative themes that don't align with the original hypotheses or theoretical expectations, since selective reporting undermines a dissertation's scientific and practical value.
Connecting results back to the research question
The course requires explicitly connecting the reported results back to the original research question and proposal, demonstrating that the analysis genuinely addresses what the study set out to investigate. Students practice presenting quantitative results (tables, statistical output) or qualitative findings (themes, illustrative quotes) in a way that is both rigorous and accessible to a business-practitioner-oriented committee, not just a purely academic audience.
Key topics in DB9803
- Executing the full analysis plan against collected data
- Writing an objective, complete results chapter, including non-supportive findings
- Presenting quantitative results tables and statistical output clearly
- Presenting qualitative themes and illustrative data excerpts effectively
- Explicitly connecting reported results back to the original research question
- Avoiding over-interpretation: keeping the results chapter descriptive, saving interpretation for discussion
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Worked example: reporting a non-significant but informative result
- Hypothesis: Remote-work flexibility significantly predicts employee engagement scores
- Actual result: The relationship is not statistically significant overall, but a significant interaction effect emerges specifically for employees with young children at home
- Results chapter reporting: Both the non-significant main effect and the significant interaction effect are reported clearly, with appropriate statistical detail for each
- Lesson: A "disappointing" non-significant main result doesn't mean the study failed — the interaction finding itself may be the study's most interesting and useful contribution, but only if it's honestly and fully reported
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Frequently asked questions
Separating the objective reporting of what the data showed (results) from the interpretation of what it means (discussion) helps ensure the results are reported completely and neutrally, without the researcher's expectations or hoped-for conclusions subtly shading how the raw findings are presented. DB9803 teaches this separation because prematurely interpreting results within the results section itself — for example, explaining away a non-significant finding by speculating about measurement error before that speculation has been properly contextualized against the literature in a discussion section — risks readers (including committee members) not being able to clearly distinguish between what the data actually showed and the researcher's explanation or spin on those findings, which is exactly the kind of blurring that undermines a dissertation's credibility and makes its findings harder for future researchers to build on accurately.
A non-significant result is still genuine scientific information — it tells the field that, at least within this study's sample and conditions, the hypothesized relationship wasn't detected, which has real value for future researchers deciding whether and how to pursue a similar question, and it also protects against a body of literature that's biased toward only reporting positive findings (publication bias), which can make an effect look more robust and consistently supported across studies than it actually is. DB9803 teaches that a DBA candidate's job in the results chapter is to accurately represent what the analysis found, not to manufacture a story where a hypothesized relationship must have been detected — a rigorous doctoral committee expects to see complete reporting of results whether or not they matched the original expectations, since that completeness is precisely what distinguishes legitimate scientific reporting from a persuasive but selectively-edited narrative.