Differences between a DBA and a PhD
(edited version of 2002 paper by Perry/Cavaye)
DBA programs did not begin in earnest until the 1990s. However,
by 1999, more than 16 UK universities offered a DBA program (Bourner,
Ruggeri-Stevens & Bareham 2000) and about 6 Australian
universities did. In 2001, SCU has one of the oldest and
arguably the biggest and most successful DBA program of any
university in Australia. The SCU DBA started in 1996 and by
early-2001 had about 130 active students and 35 graduates.
Indeed, this program is more successful than the PhD programs in
management at most universities in Australia.
DBA and a PhD
There seem to be three major differences between the two types
of doctorate: entry, focus and nature of the thesis.
Firstly, entry into a
DBA usually requires an MBA degree or the equivalent (students
with a master's degree in a non-management field or who have an
honours' degree, have to do four MBA-level units before they can
start the research part of the DBA). In addition, entry into a
DBA program requires appropriate executive or managerial
experience in the public or private sector. In contrast, entry
into a PhD program requires only a two-semester honours award
and no work experience of any kind. These differences suggest
that the teaching and learning experiences of a DBA program are
geared to more mature people with both academic and managerial
experience. Indeed, the SCU program is business-like in its
project-structured approach to producing the outcomes of a DBA
thesis and its related learning experiences. For example, the
DBA does not assume a research honours degree has been completed
before the program starts, as a PhD does, and it requires
several papers are written under close supervision in the early
stages, that 'ease' a student into his or her research
processes. Thus the completion rate of students in SCU's
DBA is higher than in most other DBA and PhD programs.
The second difference between a DBA and a PhD program is the
focus of the program. The DBA is a professional doctorate for
managers, that is, it
is a doctoral-level program that will help the professional
development of practitioners. A survey of UK degrees concluded
that the DBA program focuses an executive's development and his
or her practice:
...there
is reasonable degree of consensus emerging about the nature of
the DBA: it is program of
research-based
management development aimed at developing the capacity to
make a significant original contribution to
management practice. (Bourner,
Ruggeri-Stevens and Bareham 2000, p. 494; emphases added).
In contrast, the PhD is a degree that focuses on a contribution
to academic literature and prepares usually younger students for
a career in academic research - it could perhaps be called a
professional doctorate for
academics. This PhD degree has been scathingly criticised by
business and industry as inappropriate for a non-academic career
because it is too theoretical and solitary, among other things
(Perry and Zuber-Skerritt 1993). Nevertheless, the SCU DBA does
not discard all the features of a PhD. It keeps features such as
precision of thought and expression, and an awareness of what
others have previously written about a topic. But it applies
those features to address issues of practical relevance to a
manager rather than to an academic.
The third difference between a DBA and a PhD flows from the
first two differences, and is the
doctoral thesis
itself. Because a DBA student already has a MBA when he or she
enters the program and because of his or her focus on a
management problem, the DBA thesis is usually a bit shorter than
a PhD thesis. A SCU DBA thesis is normally about 50,000 words or
so, while a PhD thesis is normally about 60,000 words or so
(although it can sometimes be far longer) (Phillips and Pugh
1994).
Sometimes a DBA thesis can be longer than 50,000 words, and
sometimes a PhD thesis can be shorter than 60,000 words, so this
difference is not an important one. A more important difference
is that the DBA thesis will emphasise the
managerial implications
of what the DBA research project has found, and will not put so
much emphasis on the literature.
However, there are many ways in which the two types of theses
are the same. For
example, both must make a contribution to knowledge (although
the PhD's knowledge is usually about theory and the DBA's
knowledge emphasises practice). As well, both must be clearly
written and demonstrate an ability to plan, execute and report a
research project. For example, both will follow a standard
structure like Perry's (1998), and describe and justify the
methodology used. Finally, both types of thesis usually have at
least one external examiner and at least one internal examiner.
In brief, the SCU DBA is a professional doctorate for a manager
that aims to help their career in a way that a PhD cannot.
Conclusion
In brief, the SCU DBA program offers a manager a tough but
exciting journey of professional development that is more
appropriate for him or her than a PhD program would be. The
table below summarises some of the similarities and differences
between the two doctoral degrees.
List of references
Bourner, T., Ruggeri-Stevens, G. & Braeham, J. 2000, 'The DBA;
form and function',
Education + Training, vol. 42, no. 9, pp. 481-495.
Perry, C. 1998,
'A
structured approach for presenting research theses',
Australasian Marketing
Journal, vol. 6, no. 1, pp. 63-86.
Perry, C. and Cavaye A. 2002,
'Examining
DBA dissertations: developing appropriate examination criteria',
4th
International Biennial Conference on Professional Doctorates,
UQ.
Perry, C. and Zuber-Skerritt, O. 1993,
'Professional
doctorates in management',
in Still, L. and Clarke, P. (ed),
Directions in Management
1992: The Best of
Management Research in Australia, McGraw Hill, Sydney.
Phillips, E.M. & Pugh, D.S. 1994,
How to Get a PhD, Open
University Press,
Milton Keynes.
