To combine these issues, you can select a topic about " the strategic contribution of human resources", or Human resources strategy

try to link leadership with innovation, 

Hi Deidre, 

You have a really great and diverse range of possible topics in your listing. If you believe your resources (i.e. sample) are going to be a big issue for you, you should start with considering what kind of sample group you can get. If you live in a small rural area similar to where I grew up (small coastal town in Australia, about 7,000 people), then you could actually do research specific to the application/evaluation of some of the theory you're interested in within rural SMEs? 

Before you do select a topic, just double-check it hasn't been done. For example, the leadership-OCBs relationship has been established a number of times in authentic leadership (my focus area) and likely a number of other leadership theories, so that wouldn't be the best one to choose if you are wanting something unique. 

But, with a small sample I would consider reviewing your list for ones which would be logical and suitable for a qualitative study in the sample group you can find (quantitative works best if you can get reasonable sample sizes). 

I hope that helps,

Joey

Dear, Deidré Kleynhans

Perhaps, befor makind a decision about Your research,  You'll read the summary of the idea of "Global research project examining "Trust in the Workplace".

This research can unite interesting for You theams : The relationship between cognition, emotion and strategy behaviour; International Human Resource Management; Investigate possible interventions which can be used in organisations to help employees to cope in their work environment

The initiator of "Global research project examining "Trust in the Workplace" is Dominic Mcloughlin.

You can find the information here, on ResearchGate.

Hi Deidré.  There is good news and bad news.  The good news is that you have a wide range of interests from which to choose in doing this literature review.  The bad news is, well, the same!  Sometimes having some varied interests can be daunting.  So, I will try to be pragmatic in my answer here so take it for what it's worth.

First, my thought is that you are not committing yourself to this topic for the rest of your life by choosing one.  Your research interests will likely evolve as you do more research.  That's the fun of it!!  But, for the task at hand, you should choose one and run with it.  

Second, on a related note, I would guess that the intended purpose of this requirement for your Master's program is to evaluate your writing quality and your ability to research a topic with some level of competence.  I cannot image that any Master's program expects you to conduct a journal ready literature review prior to even starting the program.  They want to see if you can write well and if you can organize your thoughts in a concise and logical way.   

Third, if you are just doing a lit review, research questions, and contribution, it doesn't sound like they expect you to collect the data, at least not for the application process.  I wouldn't worry about that part yet (unless I am understanding things incorrectly).  Simply choose one of your interesting ideas and get started and don't worry so much about that next step just yet. Hopefully, if you get into the program and are expected to then carry out this research, you can rely on the resources available to you via your department faculty and university.   

I agree with Joseph on the Leadership-OCB relationship.  It's fairly well established.  But, that doesn't mean you can't still pursue it.  It just means that you are going to have to move beyond simply those two things.  For instance, research suggests that if you perceive that your leader cares about you and that you have an effective relationship with him/her, you are more likely to engage in OCBs.  But, over time, how does that relationship change?  So, if you perform more OCBs, does it then reinforce the relationship quality with the leader?  A well designed study that explores the dynamic nature of this relationship over time might be informative.  

This is just a quick example but what something like this does is show that you have researched the relationship and found what has been done already.  More than that, though, it shows that you have been able to identify where the literature needs to go in the future.  What questions still need to be answered?  That's what the selection committee will be looking for in this proposal.

It is a daunting task to get started on a lit review but it's an interesting process.  I wish you luck!  

Dear Deidre, hello.

I agree with Lance Frazier that this is not the end of the world. Research interests evolve as you are involved into more and more research. If I were in your shoes I would just pick up a topic suitable to my  main interests, experience (your experience mainly comes from human resources management), suitability to the needs of my region, and one that fits to the current research trends. You'd rather keep it simple I suppose. A qualitative research (e.g. employing interviews with employees or heads of organisations or examining documents, practices, functions of organisations), albeit not easy, may be a good solution for the task at hand.

In practice, you should first find out what topic you are really interested in; is it related to exploring the dynamics in organizational relationships or to analyzing the role of innovative tools at work or effectiveness of a service? Secondly, you can establish some meaningful research questions (2-3) since you have selected the topic. To do this, you have to review the literature in order to find interesting topics which have drawn little attention in the past or find gaps in the literature or confirm earlier findings (this is also a very interesting task). There is no need to form very sophisticated inquiries (keep them general and simple), have in mind that this is a selection process. All you have to prove is not that you have the ability of conducting prototype and autonomous research as in PhD dissertations but that you are able to write a complete research proposal, think critically on a scientific topic and generate ideas on analyzing it. 

Finally, in regard to the topics based on the given background I would narrow down the options in the following ones due to their impact on current research and their straight-forward nature:

The making of leaders: A review of the research in leadership development and education.

-Organisational citizenship behaviour-

-Organisational justice-

Fairness of HR practices such as selection, performance management, compensation, training.

-Employee and Organisational Well-being-

Employee and organisational well-being (Individuals/Groups/ Organisational and industry contexts)

Explore the well-being of employees in the workplace

-Employee and organisational health and wellness-

Maladjustments i.e. burnout / stress/ anxiety / frustration

Investigate the possible reasons why an employee is unable to cope in the work environment

Investigate possible interventions which can be used in organisations to help employees to cope in their work environment

I wish you good luck with your endeavours!!

dear Deidré Kleynhans

I advise you to write on topics of international administration or multinational companies and strategic directions in the strategic direction, integration or international leadership as they graduate from reality into the world with the availability of sources agree Thread

dr.salim

Thank you all for your answers :)

Very informative and inspiring.

I have one more question regarding doing a systematic review.

Am i correct to say that one do not need a sample for a review study? I will need to extract and analyse data from literature?

Hi Deidré.  From my understanding of what you are being asked to do, you will not need a sample.  You may, however, think about the sample you might need later and it's feasibility for the long-term, particularly if you plan to carry out the study later. I would certainly clarify with the university if you are not certain but based on what you have provided to us, it does not appear that you need a sample at this time.  

Deidré, hi.

Based on the information you shared with us it seems that the Master's committee needs from you a proposal for a future research design. Providing a thorough literature review seems to be enough but I agree that you have to clarify this aspect. Moreover, a systematic review applies specific rules and an extensive literature review with the aim to present corroborated evidence for a relationship between certain variables. On the other hand, literature review aims at presenting the fundamental aspects regarding your topic based on past and contemporary literature. Keep in mind that the first includes a much more sophisticated procedure. I think that what you need at the moment is a good literature review on the selected topic and some interesting research questions  so that you introduce it to the committee in order to prove them you are able to conduct research and write a complete proposal. The hypothesized sample in the endeavour of writing a proposal can be conceptualized as the number of references / bibliographical resources. In the next step of conducting the empirical survey the sample "normally" will be individuals (e.g. workers, managers, middle-level employees, human resources managers etc.).

Good luck! Everything will go fine..I

Andronikos

I decided to go with;

"The making of leaders: A review of the research in leadership development and education"

To be honest it took me about a year to finally decide on this topic and now the work in progress will start.  

dear  deidra

you can visit this URL to know the update the studes

http://pqdtopen.proquest.com

with best wishes

salim

Bad news for me. the research focus areas for 2017 changed and now i am left with very very limited options. 

But i will take the advice and start cracking on with a topic and develop something from it.