Communicating in an IT Environment - Essay Example

Running Head: Communicating in an IT Environment Communicating in an IT Environment: A Research Paper goes here Professional Specialization Name of your professor Date Literature Review We are living in an intensely information driven world where knowledge of information sources, their location and retrieval can make a difference in what we learn and communicate. Learning the information sources may help us to distinguish between useful and irrelevant sources of information. A Literature Review may leverage the final selection of sources to be employed for future research or to fill the gaps found in the knowledge domain under consideration.

Literature Reviews are classified in two major groups on the basis of their purpose, that is, a “self contained” or “preface” Literature Review (Wisconsin, 2012). Self contained review of literature is a complete work on a subject of knowledge domain while a preface only provides the basis for further research by acknowledging the existing knowledge and gaps in the knowledge. Fink (2010) while defining the Literature Review states, “A research literature review is a systematic, explicit, and a reproducible method for identifying, evaluating, and synthesizing the existing body of completed and recorded work produced by researchers, scholars, and practitioners.

” There are numerous uses of literature review which not only define scope but also the methodology of the review. The scope of a literature review is usually derived from its prompt which may ask for the assessment, investigation and presentation of available research work on a subject or may demand the appraisal of gaps within existing domain knowledge and area where further research can contribute towards the higher objective of knowledge creation. A literature review has to be comprehensive, unbiased, and inclusive to accommodate all pertinent issues, perception, ideas and practices about the subject area.

A partial review will generate confusions and can be misleading at times. The literature review is an important activity both in a “self contained” mode to reach certain conclusion in the light of existing knowledge and evidence presented in academic papers and in “preface” mode when it provides the preliminary academic evidence to ascertain the need and scope of a full length research activity to discover the undiscovered and to bridge the gap between the known and unknown in specific domain of knowledge.

Literature Review is also important to keep the research effort intact while keeping pace with the research timeframe. Literature Review will keep the effort and direction focused while conducting a research for journal article and can help in meeting the time constraints of the overall research. Literature Review keeps the pace and help to meeting the “fixed and immoveable deadline for completion of dissertation” (Bryman & Emma, 2007). The excessive use of World Wide Web in research has expedited the overall process but it has also raised ethical and quality issues.

Ackermann (1998) highlights these issues of Internet based research as, “confusing, somewhat disorganized technology that will result in quick, efficient, and in-depth research results.” Likewise Alexander (1999) refers to the internet based research being an “extra ordinary abundance of resources”. Still World Wide Web constitutes a major source of research and plays an overall important role in literature reviews. Process of Literature Review In order to consolidate the discussion and present the overall process of Literature Review, activities that surround the process are presented diagrammatically; References Ackermann, E.

, & Hartman, K. (1998). The information specialist’s guide to searching and researching on the Internet and the World Wide Web. Wilsonville, OR: ABF Content. Alexander, J. E., & Tate M. A. (1999). Web wisdom: How to evaluate and create information quality on the Web. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Fink, A. (2009). Conducting Research Literature Reviews: From the Internet to Paper, (3rd Ed.). USA: SAGE Publications, Inc. Winconsin. (2012). The Writer’sHandbook, The University of Winconsin, The Writing Center, Retrieved from http://writing.wisc.edu/Handbook/ReviewofLiterature.

html Alan B. & Emma B. (2007). Business Research Methods, UK : Oxford University Press