Thesis, Master's Degree

On these pages we have compiled a description of the steps, requirements and objectives of the thesis. You should read the material on these pages carefully and in well in advance, as it will answer many of your questions. The head of your specialisation and your thesis advisor will support you in your progress. The Master seminars will also help you to brainstorm and start your thesis.

The Master's thesis is a 30-credit (ECTS) research and development project (approximately 800 hours of student work). You can start brainstorming a thesis topic right from the beginning of your studies. First discuss the topic with the head of your specialisation and submit a topic proposal by e-mail. Then enrol for the Applied Design Research course. NB! You do not enrol for thesis in your PSP.

In the 90-credit Master's degree programme, students start their thesis at the beginning of the second academic year at the latest, so that they can complete their studies within the target time.

Haaga-Helia awards scholarships from the scholarship fund twice a year for the best theses. The amount of the thesis scholarship is 500 euros.

Master's thesis

The thesis starts with the choice of the topic. First discuss the topic with the head of your specialisation and submit a topic proposal by email. Then enrol for the Applied Design Research course. Remember that the topic proposal must be discussed with the specialisation head before you enrol for the Applied Design Research course. Send the more detailed thesis plan you create as a course assignment to the specialisation head by email. Based on this thesis plan, you will be assigned a personal thesis advisor. NB! You do not enrol for thesis in your PSP.

The Wihi system is used to monitor and communicate the thesis process. The head of the specialisation will instruct you at which stage of the thesis process you log in to Wihi.

A carefully prepared plan is a good starting point for the implementation of the thesis. In general, the plan consists of the following elements:

Introduction: The subject of the work i.e. the problem or need, and a brief introduction of the target organisation.
Objectives: The expected results of the work for the organisation.
Research questions: Which questions does the work answer?
Theoretical framework: What are the previous studies, theories, concepts, literature and other possible materials relevant to the work?
Methodology: the materials and tools that will be used to conduct the research and development, and a data management plan describing how the collected data will be handled and stored.
Organisation: the unit, function or project of the target organisation to which the student's research and development relates (if the thesis is commissioned by an organisation)
Timetable: Phasing and scheduling of the work.
Risk mapping: Anticipating and preparing for problems.

The thesis is usually done for a client, but it can also be done without a client if necessary. The commissioning organisation will be involved in the brainstorming phase of the thesis topic. In addition, the commissioning organisation is often able to help define the objectives and timetable.

If possible, the student will make a contract for the thesis with a representative of the commissioning organisation. In addition, you need to agree on a possible research permit within the organisation. Commissioning contracts will be uploaded to Wihi.

In cases where the student's employer is Haaga-Helia, a commissioning contract is always made. If Haaga-Helia is the subject of the thesis or if the research is carried out for Haaga-Helia students, staff or alumni, the research must be approved in accordance with the attached research authorization guidelines. The research authorization application should be sent to [email protected].

When designing the plan, the student will also learn about research ethics (see 5. Research ethics).

Forms:

Instructions:

Instructions for handling trade secrets and confidential information in Master Theses

The implementation of the thesis includes the following steps:

Familiarisation with the literature on the subject of the thesis.
Design and implementation of a research and development project.
Writing the thesis in accordance with Haaga-Helia's reporting guidelines.

You should start writing your thesis right away using the reporting template for the Master's thesis (the Haaga-Helia template for long reports). Writing a thesis is an independent activity, but there is a wide range of support available for students:

Thesis advisor supports the progress of the student's work, for example by giving feedback at different stages. The advisor and the student will agree on meetings separately. If there are any changes to the plan, they must be agreed with the advisor.

When a student is working on a thesis in a group setting, the peer group also provides support.

Master seminars and specialisation’s student community (e.g. Teams or Moodle) provide an opportunity to discuss the topic and the thesis. Master seminars can, for example, be used for thesis presentations.

The thesis workshops for Masters are workshop for all students to support, among other things, the use of methods and writing. The schedule and content of the thesis workshops can be found on their own subpage.

Library and information services (online library HH Finna) provide guidance on information retrieval and the management of source literature. Haaga-Helia’s LibGuides provide information and support for writing a thesis. Students should familiarise themselves with How to search for information guide and Referencing help at LibGuides. The LibGuides also provide tips on academic writing and research methods literature.

Discussions in the organisation can also provide support, especially in the implementation of the practical part of the thesis project.

Forms:

The student agrees with the thesis advisor on a timetable for the completion of the thesis, so that there is enough time for evaluation.

The finalisation of the thesis includes the following tasks:

Presentation of the thesis
Maturity test
Thesis plagiarism check
Publishing the thesis

The presentation of the thesisv is agreed with the student's advisor and/or the head of the specialisation. For example, the student can present his/her work at a Master seminar or make a video recording of it for the specialisation's Teams channel.

The maturity test is nowadays the abstract of your thesis. The student writes an abstract in his/her school language (Finnish or Swedish, otherwise English). The maturity test is evaluated on a scale of pass/fail. Read the instructions for the maturity test.

For the plagiarism check, the student sends the published version of the thesis via Wihi to the Ouriginal check.

The thesis is published after the student submits the thesis to the thesis supervisor for review in Wihi, and the supervisor gives the student permission to publish the thesis. If the student has agreed on the confidentiality of the material with the commissioning organisation for a thesis started before 1 August 2022, the student will receive instructions from the advisor on how to finalise the thesis.

The student will publish his/her thesis in Theseus, which is an open collection of the national online library of universities of applied sciences. If the commissioning organisation does not want the thesis to be published in the open collection, the thesis will be stored in the restricted collection of Theseus. In Theseus' open collection, the thesis canbe read online in full pdf format. The thesis stored in the restricted collection can be read on the Haaga-Helia intranet. The thesis metadata and abstract are openly available in both Theseus collections. However, the thesis is always a public document, so anyone has the right to request to read it. This also applies to a thesis stored in a restricted collection. For more information on the restricted collection, please visit the submission page of Theseus.

As the thesis is public, please ensure that the published thesis, its abstract or other metadata do not contain any business, privacy or other confidential information.

The publication link will only become active once it has been published in Theseus by the library staff. This may take 1-2 working days. For more information about the online library and how to use it, please contact Haaga-Helia Libraries.

If your thesis has not been published within a couple of days in Theseus, please check the email you have given when submitting your thesis. You may have received a message of a failed submission. Please note that the confirmation message for an approved submission always comes to your Haaga-Helia email address, regardless of the address you provided when submitting your work.

If you have problems with publishing your thesis, please contact Haaga-Helia library ([email protected]). If you need personal guidance with publishing, library's specialists would be happy to help you via a Teams meeting. Please tell in your message, if you wish to get guidance via Teams.

Open UAS students can't submit their thesis to Theseus. They can contact library staff, who will take care of the submission: [email protected]

Feedback on the thesis process

Feedback on the thesis process is included in the AVOP feedback at the end of the studies.

The evaluation of the thesis begins after the advisor has approved the Ouriginal analysis and the student has saved the finalised thesis to Wihi.

The thesis is evaluated on a scale of 0-5, and the thesis is assessed by two evaluators, the advisor and another person appointed by Haaga-Helia. The grade is determined on the basis of a joint evaluation by the thesis advisor and the second examiner. The detailed evaluation criteria can be found in the file below. There is a form for feedback from the commissioning organisation, which can be found at the end of this page. The thesis evaluation statement is a public document that can be viewed by anyone in Haaga-Helia's library.

Rectifying procedure

The approved grade of the thesis cannot be raised by improving the thesis after the assessment. However, a correction request can be made for the assessment of the thesis (see Norms to be observed and appeal proceedings).

Forms:

In accordance with Haaga-Helia's values, we take responsibility into account in all our operations. We are committed to following good scientific practice and to conducting research and development in accordance with the principles of research ethics (see Responsible Conduct of Research by the Finnish National Board on Research Integrity TENK). In addition, we follow the ethical guidelines of The Rectors’ Conference of Finnish Universities of Applied Sciences Arene.

The following are the functions and processes related to Haaga-Helia's research ethics principles, especially from the students' point of view.

The Finnish National Board on Research Integrity divides research misconduct into four subcategories, namely, plagiarism, fabrication, falsification and misappropriation:

Unacknowledged borrowing, that is, plagiarism, refers to presenting material produced by someone else as one’s own.
Fabrication refers to presenting invented observations or results.
Falsification refers to the modification of original observations in such a way that the results are distorted, or that essential information is omitted.
Misappropriation means that results, an idea or a plan by someone else is presented as one’s own.

Ouriginal, plagiarism tracking program

All theses are checked with the Ouriginal application. The Ouriginal review of the thesis is done through Wihi. The thesis advisor approves the Ouriginal report in Wihi if there is no indication of plagiarism in the report, and the thesis can proceed to evaluation. If there is reason to suspect plagiarism, a preliminary investigation will be started, in which the student will also be heard.

The program can be used to find out if there is possible plagiarism in thesis or other learning assignments. The program compares the content of the document to three different source types:

Material published on the internet
Publisher material (eg. e-books and e-magazines)
Student-generated materials previously stored in the Ouriginal database.

The result of the comparison is an analysis report, which shows the similarities found. Based on this report, the advisor can determine if there is a suspicion of plagiarism.

The student's report is stored in a database, which will reveal possible plagiarism of the student's work in the future. If the student does not want the work to be the source material for plagiarism comparisons with other Ouriginal users, he/she should click on the link at the end of the confirmation message: "Follow this link if you want to prohibit the use of your document as described above."

Thesis Ethics Committee

Suspicions of plagiarism in theses are reviewed by Haaga-Helia’s Thesis Ethics Committee.

Haaga-Helia’s Degree Regulations 27 §, Personal Conduct at Haaga-Helia: “Cheating in examinations and plagiarism of assignments, thesis reports or other existing materials are strictly forbidden. If a student is found guilty of cheating, he or she is will be removed from the exam session or learning assignment and the course exam or other performance is failed. Plagiarism will result in failure of the course in question. Proved cheating will be entered into the study register. The punitive measures for the above-mentioned violations are governed by Section 38 of the Polytechnics Act (932/2014).”

Students get support for their thesis work either in the specialisation’s Master seminars or the general thesis workshops. In the seminars, topics for theses are brainstormed, and in addition, the graduating students present their thesis.

Master seminars take place on the following Mondays in the spring 2025:

February 2nd in English
March 24th in Finnish
April 28th in English from 17.00 to 19.30.

The teachers responsible for specialisations inform the students separately about the seminar agenda and place.

Thesis workshops

The thesis workshops support the planning and implementation of the Master's thesis and are intended for all Master's students. Participating in the workshops is voluntary and does not accumulate study points, but according to the feedback, they are useful at every stage of the thesis.

Monday's theme workshops and Tuesday's method workshops are organised online. For Monday's theme workshop, one must enrol no later than the previous Sunday evening, in order to receive a link to the Haaga-Helia email address before the workshop starts. Kindly notify master(at)haaga-helia.fi if you cancel your enrolment.

Master seminars and theme workshops on Mondays from 17.00 to 19.00

20.1. Mindfulness opinnäytetyössä
27.1. Mielekkään tutkimusaiheen valinta
3.2. Master seminar in English
10.2. Choosing a meaningful research topic
24.2. Opinnäytetyön rakenne ja rajaaminen
3.3. Framing and structuring the thesis
10.3. Tiedonhaku ja vinkit hyvien lähteiden äärelle
24.3. Master-seminaari suomeksi
31.3. Information search and tips for finding relevant sources
7.4. Kriittinen kirjoittaminen ja teoreettisen viitekehyksen rakentaminen
7.4. Critical writing and building of theoretical framework
Huom! Sama päivä – opiskelija valitsee kielen ilmoittautuessaan. NB! Same day, student chooses language version when enrolling to the workshop
14.4. Tiedon havainnollistaminen
Data visualisation workshop is available as a recording. See also PowerPoint presentation.
28.4. Master seminar in English
12.5. AI in thesis / Tekoäly opinnäytetyössä
The workshop is multilingual. Presentation is in Finnish with subtitles and English slides. Participants may join conversation either in Finnish or in English.

Method workshops on Tuesdays from 18.00 to 20.30

For Tuesday’s method workshops, one must book a personal meeting time by email no later than the night before. The email addresses are in the following form: [email protected]

Quantitative methods (e.g. surveys) > Principal Lecturer Pirjo Saaranen
Qualitative methods (e.g. interviews, content analysis) > Principal Lecturer Juha Lindstedt

Method evenings on 11.2. and 25.2. from 18.00 to 20.30

Spring semester method evenings will be held in English.

11.2. Interviews and content analysis - Assessing reliability and validity, Principal Lecturer Juha Lindstedt
25.2. Questionnaire design and use of Webropol for collecting data - Analysing and presenting quantitative data, Principal Lecturer Pirjo Saaranen

Types of thesis

The research and development objectives, results and outputs of Master's theses can be very different. Respectively, working on the thesis can proceed in many different ways, and therefore, one general model cannot be given. However, theses have always in common that the student gets acquainted with previous research, collects and analyses one's own data or plans and implements one's own development project, and finally, describes and evaluates the results.

The Master's thesis always starts with degining the objectives of research and development. The whole process is described in a thesis report and there can also be other outputs depending on the nature of the thesis. The progress of the work between these start and end points can then take different directions. The following types serve as examples.

The development-oriented thesis progresses from getting acquainted with previous research on the topic to the analysis of the current situation of the target organisation and to the planned development and evaluation of the validity of the results. The outputs of the thesis can be, for example, a new operating model, an operating manual for the organisation or operating instructions for an ICT system. In a development-oriented thesis, in addition to development, the output can also be implemented and tested.

Another common type of thesis is a research-oriented thesis. A research-oriented thesis can be phenomenon-oriented, in which case it can focus on a current topic or challenge in working life, business or society. The student does not necessarily have an organisation or company as a commissioning party. Even in this case, the thesis progresses from getting acquainted with previous research to collecting and analysing one's own research data. The result can be, for example, development suggestions, a new operating model for business, a blueprint or other recommendations.