Methodology

Figure 9. Research choices based on Saunders et al. (2009) research onion.

First when starting to conduct a research, the research philosophy should be considered.

This is important because the chosen research philosophy shows how the researchers views the world and approaches knowledge in the research. Important notion is that the chosen research philosophy also affects the research strategy and methods which are cho- sen as part of that strategy. Strategies and methods differ from one another and so will effect on what is viewed important and useful in the research. Thus the chosen research philosophy affects inevitably also to the outcome of the research. Research philosophies then are of four kinds: positivism, realism, pragmatism and interpretivism. Positivism here means that the research is conducted from a very objective viewpoint which can results in almost generalized theories. In positivism focus is on the observable matters that can provide valid facts, without interpretation. Thus the aim with positivism is often to explain phenomena. Second research philosophy, realism, then views the world in a way that the reality is independent of the mind – meaning that observable phenomena is

enough to provide facts. Pragmatism in turn takes a little bit different view. It argues that choosing the right research question is the most important factor for the research, and that using multiple methods, often both qualitative and quantitative techniques, will best ena- ble answering the research questions. Lastly there is interpretivism philosophy to the re- search. This approach argues that the world of business is more complex than physical science world, and thus what is needed in the research is to take into account more varia- bles, like people and organizations. (Saunders et al. 2009, p. 108-119.) This research takes an interpretivism philosophy as a viewpoint of the world. This is because the research topic relates very closely to organizations. RPA and AI surely have a technical side, which is also very important, but when we are considering the possibilities of combining these two, their perceived value comes from the acceptance of users. Thus this research takes subjective view on the possible benefits and challenges that relate to using AI technolo- gies with RPA.

When starting a research another important factor is how researcher approaches knowledge about the research topic. For this there are two kind of research approaches:

deductive and inductive. If the topic is not familiar for the researcher then he or she usu- ally turn to the inductive approach, where data is first collected and the theory is devel- oped as a result of the data analysis. The other approach to conducting research is there- fore deductive, where theory and hypothesis are designed in the beginning of the research and this theory is then tested with different hypothesis. (Saunders et al. 2009, s.124; Woo et al. 2017.) This way deductive approach is especially suitable for researches where researcher has already, before the research, obtained understanding on the topic and he or she is familiar with the subject. Inductive approach in turn represents the opposite ap- proach, where theory is designed based on research. This thesis have strong features of inductive approach and thus is the chosen approach for the thesis. There isn’t currently almost any theory related to combining RPA with AI technologies, thus this thesis aims to fill this gap by using qualitative data to create new understanding within the topic. This is one of the main purposes of inductive research, whereas deductive research is more about collecting quantitative data and finding relationship within the variables (Saunders et al. 2009, p. 124-127).

After the first two layers on the research onion have been pealed, and so philosophy and approach are decided, the research purpose and strategy can be decided. As one of the main purposes of this study is to gain new insight on how RPA and AI can work together, the purpose of this thesis is exploratory. Exploratory study in essence is about seeking to find new understanding and seeing things in new light. Exploratory studies are especially useful in cases where the problem itself might need clarifying. The three main principals in conducting exploratory study thus are search of literature, interviewing subject experts and conducting focus group interviews. (Saunders et al. 2009, p. 139-140; Woo et al.

2017). Two out of three of these methods, literature review and interviewing subject ex- perts, are used in this thesis. This combined with the aim, finding new insight, shows that purpose of this thesis is clearly exploratory.

Once the purpose of the research has been established researched strategy can be formed.

Different kind of research strategies are: experiment, survey, case study, action research grounded theory, ethnography and archival research. Each of these strategies can be used no matter was the chosen purpose for the study exploratory, descriptive or explanatory.

(Yin 2003.) This thesis has case study chosen as its strategy. Case study as a strategy means conducting a research which involves empirical investigation of a single or multi- ple phenomena using multiple sources of evidence, where the context is also present.

(Robson 2002, p. 178). What is however relevant is that the phenomena should form some kind of an entity. In this sense case studies can be used in very many ways. Case can be a company, single problem or practically any defined entity or entities. Case study as a strategy enables answering to question like “What?”, “How?” and “Why?”, thus it also suits well for exploratory research (Saunders et al. 2009, p. 146; Yin 2003). In this thesis all research questions also relate to “What?” and “How?”, and in this sense the research strategy of this thesis can be categorized as a case study also from this viewpoint (Yin 2003).

Next in the research onion is choosing the data collection method and time horizon for the research. Data collection methods can be divided into two main groups: mono method and multiple methods. In this thesis the data collection methods were literature review as well as theme interviews. As there were two different data gathering methods, which both are for gathering qualitative data, this thesis is a multi-method research. A multi-method research in essence means that multiple data gathering methods are used but they are both either quantitative or qualitative by nature. (Saunders et al. 2009, p. 151-152.) Time hori- zon in turn in this thesis is cross-sectional as this is a study conducted of a particular case at a particular time, as the time constraints itself already set the boundaries. (Saunders et al. 2009, p. 155-156.)