Looking for options to earn doctorate in industrial relations

Although spending 4 plus years in residential PhD programs in the US remains an option (an expensive option given opportunity costs of giving up a job and steady income), I'm leaning towards earning a doctorate via distance learning.

Like many, my motivation to earn a doctorate is a combination of broadening career opportunities and personal satisfaction.

I've kind of ruled out Athabasca's DBA due to its lackluster response to my inquiries. Before plonking down 40k+ in tuition I was looking for more responsive and thoughtful answers to my questions, however that didn't happen. I was particularly wanting to know whether I could utilize non-business faculty members to guide my research in industrial relations, but couldn't get a straight answer. So I'm hesitant to proceed there.

The US for-profit programs like Capella, and not-for-profit like Nova are too expensive for me when factoring in the costs of residencies of which I recall are quite a few.

I'm leaning towards research based programs in South Africa, Australia, and UK, but how do I go about confirming whether basing my research in labour relations, collective bargaining, or negotiation and conflict resolution is possible? Is finding and contacting interested professors the only way?

The Valdosta State DPA also interests me, because I work in municipal government and maybe able to connect PA with IR in topics such as collective bargaining with municipal unions. For those in the DPA program, could you advise if they would entertain such proposal?

Thank you in advance for all inputs.

 

I am an Alumnus of the Middlesex University in London, you may be interested in looking at the Doctorate in Professional Studies (DProf) programme:

IWBL Doctorate in Professional Studies

I read that you work in municipal government, as you said you could connect PA with IR, the programme is specifically aimed for advanced practitioners and is designed to focus on their professional development within their organisational/professional context. This organization could be a municipal union, a professional body or your employer.

The University is a traditional B&M Uni, that offers DL studies.

 

London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE): MPhil /PhD (part-time) in Employment Relations and Organizational Behavior (£7,080 /year).
Employment Relations and Organisational Behaviour Group - researchProgrammes2012 - Graduate - Study - Home
2012-2013 fees table - Table of fees - Money matters - Students - Staff and students - Home

 

Hi there,

If you can frame your research interests within the realm of 'business leadership,' then you might enjoy the UNISA DBL (UNISA SBL).

It's not easy to get into, and it involves a lot of work, but it is a very worthwhile program.

If you take a browse through some past DBL theses (DBL Theses) you can get a sense of where your topic might fit in, and which supervisors and co-supervisors might be worth considering when you get to the thesis stage.

The first year is taken up with digesting and synthesizing a large number of excellent articles on all areas of business/leadership into a major paper. This gives you more insight into your potential thesis topic, and with a little artistry, you can steer the major paper toward your research topic, and get a jump on the future work.

They only do intakes in January now, so time is of the essence... Good luck!

 

Here's one...

University of Leicester online PhD looks like it might have something for you, as they list Industrial Relations as a Master's degree option and they have faculty that specialize (specialise? British English/US English joke) in that field.

Distance Learning Msc, MBA

Rich Douglas - an estemed long-time member of this board - was connected with the outreach portion of the distance school and a search of this board may come up with prior topics. (I remember them but don't have time to look right now.) Rich is very knowledgable and if you send him a personal message (PM), I bet he'll have some info for you, even if he is no longer connected.

 

All your suggestions are great, it's time to investigate.

Vadro, you said you are alumnus of Middlesex, did you do the DProf degree?

The Leicester DSocSci and PhD degrees look very promising.

Honestly not too keen on UNISA's DBL name. Why do they do that?

LSE is the best name brand but its residency requirement may be killer.

As I intend to conduct work-based research, finding suitable topic options is also a task I must tackle. I like to write about collective bargaining strategies, process, and outcomes, going to the bargaining table in two years' time.

 

Yes, graduated in 2011.

 

I just don't see why UNISA felt the need to deviate from the PhD or DBA nomenclatures for its business degrees; I feel that it only draws unnecessary more attention to its graduates who already have to contend with explaining the exclusive DL mode of UNISA to many potentially biased ears.

I've seen doctor of social science and it doesn't sound as controversial, especially from a B&M school like Leicester. DProf is clearly new name, yet rightly or wrongly the B&M status of Middlesex makes it easier to defend more as a unique thing rather than a negative thing.

For some reasons some B&M schools like to give unusual names to their non-traditional doctorates. One thing I like about US online schools like Walden and Capella is that they seem to know what their students want, which is not to be cute with names of their degrees that they work hard for and are costing them the price of a new 5 series BMW. I know if I am going to invest time and money in a doctorate I would want it to be as widely accepted as possible and having a traditionally sounding name helps. Just one person's opinion.