On this page
- Introduction
- Research help and library services
- Special topics guides
- Video tutorials for finding business information
- Selected encyclopedias and handbooks
- Terminology
- Databases for business research
- News databases
- Databases for Indigenous topics
- Google and Google Scholar (citation searching)
- Find books, journals, and other publications at SFU Library
- Government information
- Past MBA projects & theses - SFU First Nations Scholarly Community
- University research portals with a focus on Indigenous topics
- Presentation skills
- Library guides
- Inter-Library Loans (ILL Service)
- Writing help
Introduction
This guide will get you started with doing a literature search for your business topics. It includes tips for literature searches, with emphasis on using business databases, which give you access to information not freely available on the open web.
Research help and library services
You can contact Moninder Lalli, Librarian for Graduate Business Programs ( ) for assistance via email or to make an appointment. Or Ask a librarian.
Library services
- Belzberg Library Information for Graduate Business Programs for details of library services through the Belzberg Library, which is located in downtown Vancouver
- Services of Indigenous Students which provides details about library services
Special topics guides
Business information resources has side tabs with resources, including Facts & data sources, citing help, and Additional information. This last tab includes provides tips and resources to search for different types of information, including Company information, Industry surveys, and Market research, as well as guides to assist with writing and making presentations: Business presentations, Business writing
- BUS 615 Marketing - has a focus on aboriginal tourism.
- Indigenous business resources - provides links to information related to Indigenous associations, directories, etc.
- IBL-EMBA Special Topics Guide: Land Development
- IBL-EMBA Special Topics Guide: Indigenous Youth Cultural Programming
- Government resources
- Indigenous Studies
- Resource and Environmental Management
- University of Saskatchewan - IPortal - Indigenous Studies Research Tool - (University of Saskatchewan Library)
- UBC Xwi7xwa Library Research Guides Portal -
Check the BUEC Buzz to keep on top of new resources available for business research at the SFU Library.
- BUEC Buzz Blogpost: Business and Indigenous Communities in BC
- The UBC's Small Business Accelerator guides assist with finding information on businesses in British Columbia
- Welcome video -- for a quick introduction to using the Library website search engine
Video tutorials for finding business information
Before you start searching for information, please watch these four tutorials to save you time and effort. Created by Mark Bodnar, SFU Business and Economics Librarian, the tutorials provide very useful tips and search strategies to business information.
Actions vs Words: Understanding a Company's Strategies Using News Sources (11.35 mins.)
"This one is about using news sources to gather information about what a company has been doing so that you can infer the company's strategy, rather than relying solely on the company's explicit statements or third-party analysis." [Mark Bodnar] Also includes a very good demo of using Factiva (business news) database.
Secondary Research for Business Decisions: Foundations for Estimates (8.02 mins.)
To cover the all-important principles that underlie many of the presentations I do in Beedie classes. [Mark Bodnar]
For more on secondary research, try Mark's 12-part series of posts "on research to support new outdoor recreation services, but the steps involved are common to many research topics and the advice I've provided is based on my meetings with thousands of researchers over the years." [Mark Bodnar]
Spying on a Conversation: Literature Review Assignments in Business (18.25 mins.)
"Provides lots of tips and tricks to make the research for your next literature review assignment much more efficient and effective" [Mark Bodnar]
An earlier video tutorial, Only 4 Steps: Researching in Academic Business Journals (6.30 mins.), provides basic instruction on how to break down your topic and do a literature search.
Selected encyclopedias and handbooks
- 44 volumes of the Business Plans Handbook — all online and searchable for SFU researchers.
- Routledge Handbook of Critical Indigenous Studies
- Routledge handbook of indigenous development
Terminology
Terminology describing Indigenous Peoples has varied over time. For better search results, consider adding multiple search terms, names of specific groups, place names and also variations in spelling of names. For more on terminology, consult the SFU Library guide First Nations Terminology
Databases for business research
Search here to find scholarly journal articles, articles and reports from industry & trade publications. If the full-text of the article is not available within the database, then use the "Get@SFU" link to find a copy or to request through Library's Inter-Library Loans (ILL) Service (free)
- Business Source Complete (BSI) is a key resource, and includes business journals (trade and scholarly), industry reports, and country profiles.
- See Only 4 Steps: Researching in Academic Business Journals (6.30 minute video tutorial), to learn how to break down your topic and do a literature search.
- CBCA Full Text Business - Canadian focus: Trade journals, general business publications, academic journals, topical journals, and professional publications.
- IBISWorld Industry Reports - Analysis of Canadian, US, Chinese and global industries providing insight into current and future industry performance, changing trends, operating conditions and supply chain linkages. Each report covers the industry's description, outlook, and life cycle stage, as well as the competitive landscape, major companies, and key statistics.
- Plunkett's Research Online - access to many online (PDF) industry almanacs in this series. Industries covered range from Artificial Intelligence to the Wireless, Wi-Fi, RFID & Cellular industry. The reports are global in scope, but tend to focus on the US.
- Statista - Covers many market share topics and other statistical data on countries, consumers, industries, etc.
For more, see business databases by area of concentration: Accounting, Business Administration, Finance, HR/Management and Organizational Studies, International Business, Management Information Systems, Management and Organizational Studies, Marketing, News resources: Finding newspaper articles and newspapers, SAGE Business Cases, Technology & Operations Management
News databases
Search news databases for companies, industries, products, consumers, trends, etc.
- Factiva - Over 35,000 sources (newspapers, newswires, industry publications, websites, company reports, and more) from 200 countries, in 26 languages. Includes the Wall Street Journal.
- Nexis Uni - International news coverage, business news, legal cases and law reports from early 1970's to present. Content is strongly American with significant coverage of Canadian and international topics. Formerly LexisNexis Academic.
- Canadian Newsstream - Full text access to major Canadian daily newspapers (such as the Globe and Mail, National Post, The Gazette (Montreal), and Vancouver Sun) as well as small market newspapers and weeklies published in Canada.
- American Indian Newspapers Newspapers published in Turtle Island (North America) between 1828-2016. Topics include community news, health, education, cultural promotion, commercial enterprises, sovereignty, and more.
For more, try News sources (databases), and other guides: News, Alternative news, Newspapers
Databases for Indigenous topics
For assistance in search techniques, try: How to find journal articles
If the full-text of the article is not available within the database, then use the "Get@SFU" link to find a copy or to request through Library's Inter-Library Loans (ILL) Service (free)
NOTE: For topics related to Indigenous Peoples, it may be helpful to start with Bibliography of Indigenous Peoples in North America (Ebsco Platform) and then select additional databases. Click on the link for "choose databases" (just above the search box), and then select Business Source Complete (EbscoHost), Social Sciences Full Text, Academic Search Premier etc.
On the Proquest platform, start with ProQuest Sociology Collection, and then also choose other databases such as CBCA Complete , Canadian Newsstream, etc.
EBSCO platform
- Bibliography of Indigenous Peoples in North America - Academic articles and Indigenous news sources. Covers all aspects of Native North American culture, history, and life from the sixteenth century to the present.
- Business Source Complete (EbscoHost)
- Social Sciences Full Text - social sciences journals
- Academic Search Premier - Multidisciplinary index to academic & popular journals. Indexes many popular journals including the MacLean's Magazine.
- America: History and Life Canadian & United States history
- ECONLIT : Your best place to start with any research in Economics
- Education Source - covering all levels of education from early childhood to higher education as well as multilingual education, health education and testing. Includes journals, books, conference papers, book reviews and educational tests.
- Environment Complete - Comprehensive coverage (over 1,900 journals) in environmental and many related disciplines. Also available is fulltext access to over 200 monographs.
- PsycINFO - use for consumer psychology, employees, etc. Contains Articles, books, book chapters, technical reports, and theses and dissertations in the field of psychology
- Annual reviews Literature reviews and topic overviews in the sciences and social sciences. An excellent starting point for learning about a topic and for finding key articles on trending research.
- Annual review of anthropology Provides literature reviews of anthropology topics.
- Annual review of sociology Provides literature reviews of sociology topics.
Proquest platform
- ProQuest Sociology Collection - articles & dissertations. Includes articles on businesses, analysis of social issues such as racism, structural barriers, homelessness, drug use, etc.
- CBCA Complete - Comprehensive Canadian periodical collection for reference and current events. Publications include scholarly journal articles, trade publications, dissertations, books, newspapers and magazines.
- ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Abstracts and Index Dissertations and theses from around the world. Historic and ongoing coverage. Current theses on your topic can provide you with both research methods and useful bibliographies.
- Canadian Newsstream - Full text access to major Canadian daily newspapers (such as the Globe and Mail, National Post, The Gazette (Montreal), and Vancouver Sun) as well as small market newspapers and weeklies published in Canada.
- Canadian Research Index (1982-) Access to "all depository publications of research value issued by both the federal government and the ten provinces and three territories".
- Older reports are on Microlog fiche, which is very useful, as many are not available on government sites or in print in libraries. For relevant reports, note down the Microlog Number.
- Look for the Microlog fiche on 6th floor of Bennett Library (Burnaby Campus). They are stored by Microlog number, who will then request a special loan. Example: 1992's "Native women and aboriginal treaty rights : a discussion paper" Microlog number: 92-04323)
Other platforms
- Native Health Databases - Bibliographic information and abstracts of health-related articles, reports, surveys, and other resource documents on the health and health care of American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Canadian First Nations.
- Canada Commons (formerly, Canadian Electronic Library from desLibris) - for public policy documents from Canadian institutes, think-tanks and research groups.
- Note: Boolean operators must be in capital letters (OR, AND)
- CANLII - Largest free web resource providing access to legal documents from Canada's federal, provincial and territorial governments, including laws & legislation, and cases.
For more, check out other database guides: Databases for Indigenous topics, Databases for Law, Databases for Resource & Environmental Management (REM), Databases for Health Sciences, Canadian Studies,
Google and Google Scholar (citation searching)
Search tips
Search tips for Google, Google Scholar, DuckDuckGo, and other search engines
Google Scholar: Save special settings in Google Scholar by adding "library links" so that the "Get@SFU" link" will appear besides the search results.
Guide: Google Scholar library links and button
There are a few search tips that may make your searches more effective.
intitle: limits search results to words in the "title" (may include the leading paragraph)
site:.ca limits seach results to Canadian URLs
Use capital OR within parentheses to combine synonyms or related words
Don't use AND to combine different concepts, Google assumes an "AND" when two words are next to each other
Don't use asterisk (*) to search for various endings or words, instead, spell out the word
Google Scholar
Search for a topic: Indigenous land claims in British Columbia
(aboriginal OR indigenous) land claims (BC OR British Columbia)
Results
Indigenous consulting / entrepreneurship
canada ("indigenous consulting" OR "indigenous entrepreneur") (business OR company)
Search results limited to words in the title of document, using "intitle:". Use capital "OR" for synonyms. Put braces "()" around words that mean the same thing.
intitle:wine industry intitle:(BC OR British Columbia OR Okanagan)
Results
Searching for publications by industry associations, websites of groups, etc.
intitle:(Indigenous OR Aboriginal OR "First Nations") (association OR society)
Search for documents from a particular country's domain. Country domain codes used by Google: Web country codes
The example below is for Canada, with country code of ".ca".
site:.ca (elderly OR seniors OR aged) intitle:families (Indigenous OR Aboriginal)
Results
Google Scholar
- Google Scholar Be sure to access Google Scholar via the Library's website to ensure you see the "Where can I get this?" links that will take you to the full text SFU offers.
Add Library links
In addition, you could also save special settings in Google by adding "library links" so that the "Get@SFU" link" will appear besides the search results.
Guide: Google Scholar library links and button
Citation searching
- Citation searching is a useful strategy to check to see if a work that is relevant for your research has been cited by anyone else since it was initially published. Enter the "citation" information into Google Scholar, using the link from SFU Library. If your citation appears in the results list, check beneath it for "Cited by."
- Example: Trosper, R., Nelson, H., Hoberg, G., Smith, P., & Nikolakis, W. (2008). Institutional determinants of profitable commercial forestry enterprises among First Nations in Canada. Canadian Journal Of Forest Research, 38(2), 226-238. doi:10.1139/X07-167
"Cited by"
For more on measuring the quantitative impact of articles, journals, or authors, see Impact metrics.
Google NGO and IGO search engines
- Google's special search engines to find reports from government and governmental organizations
- NGO Search - is a Google Custom Search that searches across hundreds non-governmental organization (NGO) websites.
- IGO Search - International governmental organizations (IGOs) are organizations made up of more than one national government—examples include NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) and the WHO (World Heath Organization). The governments are the members. IGO Search is a Google Custom Search that searches across IGO websites.
Find books, journals, and other publications at SFU Library
BLOG: Indigenous business books & e-books
Search the Library Catalogue to search for books, and to search for journal articles by citation, journal title, article title, or topic. For advanced search strategies for finding books and articles in the Library Catalogue, see the guide Power searching and Boolean searching
For the searches below, you can limit the search results by "Subject" (left-hand side) or "Resource type."
Sample searches:
- (Aborig* OR Indigen* OR "First Nations") AND (land OR "natural resources" OR minerals) AND rights AND (Canad* OR "British Columbia")
- (Aborig* OR Indigen* OR "First Nations") AND business AND (Canad* OR "British Columbia")
- (Aborig* OR Indigen* OR "First Nations") AND (fish* OR tourism) AND (Canad* OR British Columbia")
- Limited by selected "Subjects"
- (Aborig* OR Indigen* OR "First Nations") AND (employ* OR jobs OR labor* OR labour* OR skill*) AND (Canad* OR British Columbia")
- Limited by selected "Subjects"
- ("settler colonial*" OR decolonial* OR post-colonial* OR imperialism) AND (tour* OR travel* OR ecotour*) AND (aborig* OR "First Nations OR indigen*)
- Can further limit by "Subjects"
- (Aborig* OR indigen* OR "First Nations") AND elder*
- (Aborig* OR Indigenous) AND knowledge
Combine different concepts using AND
Combine same concepts using OR
Use quotation marks to search for a phrase
Use brackets for synonyms
Use asterisk (*) for different endings of words
Note: For Catalogue Search, when combining concepts, use CAPITAL letters ( "OR", "AND")
TIP: When you find a relevant book, try clicking on the "Subject" link in the full Library record for more books on that topic.
Selected subject headings of interest:
- Aboriginal Australians -- Business
- Aboriginal title -- Canada
- Entrepreneurship
- Indian business enterprises -- Canada
- Indians Of North America -- British Columbia -- Claims
- Indians of North America -- British Columbia -- Industries
- Indians of North America -- Canada -- Economic conditions
- Indians of North America -- Canada -- Government relations
- Indians of North America -- Employment -- Canada
- Indigenous business enterprises
- Indigenous Peoples -- British Columbia
- Indigenous Peoples -- British Columbia -- Claims
- Indigenous Peoples -- British Columbia -- Government relations
- Indigenous Peoples -- Canada
- Indigenous peoples -- Canada -- Claims
- Indigenous peoples -- Canada -- Economic conditions
- Indigenous Peoples -- Canada -- Government relations
- Indigenous peoples -- Land tenure -- Canada
- Natural resources -- Law and legislation -- Canada
- Native business enterprises
- Project management
- Small business -- Management
- Small business -- Planning
- Tourism -- Canada
For more:
The Library Catalogue Search Guide provides search tips for effective searching, including power searching, and strategies for finding books and journal articles.
Government information
British Columbia
- BC Data
- Ministry of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation - "leads the B.C. Government in pursuing reconciliation with the First Nations and Indigenous peoples of British Columbia." [from website]
- Economic Development - "Indigenous entrepreneurs through programs, training and funding." [from website]
Canada
- Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada
- Library and Archives Canada
- Includes Aboriginal Heritage and Land Records
- Statistics Canada
Other guides:
- Business: Government Resources
- Government Resources: Canadian Federal, Provincial, and Local
- Government of Canada Publications
- Indigenous Policy
Past MBA projects & theses - SFU First Nations Scholarly Community
- MBA research projects completed by previous SFU graduate business students. NOTE: from about 2010 on, please contact staff in Beedie School of Business.
- SFU First Nations Scholarly Community in Summit for theses of interest from other departments
University research portals with a focus on Indigenous topics
Two resources for information on key topics relating to Indigenous peoples of Canada:
IPortal - Indigenous Studies Research Tool
From the University of Saskatchewan Library.
Indigenous Foundations Portal
Developed by the First Nations Studies Program at the University of British Columbia.
Presentation skills
See the Student Learning Commons for expert and friendly help with academic writing, learning, and study strategies.
- Resources on developing your participation skills
- Resources to help you improve your presentation skills
Library guides
- Avoiding plagiarism
- Home: Library Catalogue search guide
- Power searching and Boolean searching - for advanced search strategies for finding books and articles in the Library Catalogue
- Search tips for Google and Google Scholar
- Library Tutorials
Inter-Library Loans (ILL Service)
If the item you want is not available at SFU, it can be requested from another library (Interlibrary Loan) and delivered to Belzberg Library. This usually takes one to two weeks. See Borrowing materials from other Libraries for more information.
- Request an Interlibrary Loan for books or articles not available at the SFU Library. Most article indexes also allow you to request copies of journal articles directly online, using the "where can I get this?" link. For more information, check the Interlibrary Loan guide.
- COPPUL Card
Allows you to get a library card from UBC or other post-secondary libraries. You may borrow books directly from UBC and many other academic libraries. Obtain a reciprocal borrowing card at the Belzberg Library Loans desk.
Writing help
Research Commons writing help
For writing support services, check:
- NEW: Citing Indigenous Elders and Knowledge Keepers
- Writing Services Offered by the Research Commons.
- Upcoming workshops
For citing help, see the SFU Library guide: Citation Guide for Business Sources.